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Monster Jam Urban Assault (DS)

Status: Stopped playing - Something better came along
I started playing this game on Saturday 21 March, 2020  //  I stopped playing this game on: Sunday 5 April, 2020
Current opinion of this game
No comment, yet.

April 5, 2020 02:06:16 PM
Here's another one from my pile of shame. I made the mistake of buying a large number of DS games as a lot on ebay - very few of which I owned, for a few I was really interested in. And, well - I'm going to play them all! I genuinely think it's a good idea (if you're interested in game dev and games academic) to play widely and broadly - especially titles you might not be personally interested in.

So here's another one. :-)

You drive a monster truck and there are lots of different types of events: races, do tricks for points, etc.

I think what has surprised me most about the game is that the trucks - despite being massive - move really fast! They're quite "bouncy" and nimble. It definitely makes them more fun to drive around than what I think the real ones must feel like. The feel like what I'd imagine super-charged buggies would drive like. Not that I've ever driven either.

Also, strangely, the first time I played I flipped the truck over and, to my surprised, it didn't automatically flip over/reset. I had assumed that's a "default" thing that happens in driving games but apparently not. I was actually really disappointed because it didn't reset when pressing the "regular" buttons you use for play - so I hit select and quit. It turns out you can hit start to reset the car. Doh!

I'm also pretty surprised that there is (apparently?) no real explanation of the game's core mechanics. Mostly, there's a "turbo" system it took me too long to "discover" and, I have no real idea how you should try to execute combos/tricks. I've been randomly pressing buttons and sometimes things work and sometimes they don't. I even checked the manual - it says you should do tricks. Not how.


 
kudos for original design to Rodrigo Barria