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0 Launched recently was Hot Wheels: Monster Truck Stunt Mayhem. Developed by 3D Clouds and published by GameMill Entertainment, this monster truck game based on Mattel toys was likely to appeal to a varying audience. They weren’t wrong. Allowing die-hard monster truck fans to get into their favourite Hot Wheels truck and perform incredible tricks that break the laws of reality.
Let’s Get Ready To Rumble
If you ever played with any of the Hot Wheels cars in your childhood, or even if you are a parent to a monster truck fan. Then this review might be the one you’ve been looking for. So let’s take to the track.
Gameplay
The core gameplay in Hot Wheels: Monster Trucks Stunt Mayhem (Phew what a title, I promise I won’t use it too many times through the article. Just enough to satisfy the SEO Gods) is dedicated to performing as many stunts as you can meanwhile carrying out secondary objectives. Each time you take to the arena you are given a number of objectives, these can be from scoring high enough scores, to getting a great combo. Each of these objectives grants you wheels, which are used to level up your fame and unlock more monster trucks.
The includes a line up of Monster Trucks that you will be sure to recognise. Featuring fan favourites Bone Shaker, Tiger Shark, Race Ace, and more. Each is recreated with a plastic finish to give the impression of playing with a toy. Each truck also comes with a number of different skins for you to unlock meaning there is always something to achieve to unlock.
Environments
Playing through the game you unlock a number of environments to spin, flip and jump around. Each arena has a special interaction, which can either be a loop the loop, or even a boss. Fancy taking down the boss? All you have to do is find 3 cut-outs, crash through them and then find the relevant piece of track to perform a boss hit! This usually involves flying through the air and hitting them in the face.
When you get further into the game the difficulty does ramp up a little, but I never felt like anything was holding me back. The only real challenge that I had trouble with was the destruction one. Having to destroy over 70% of the arena’s destroyable items was tough, especially when some arenas are on multiple levels. Some of the secondary objectives can be fun, trying to find hot dog stands through the level was always fun.
Mini Crew Time
The TC Mini crew had a bit of time with the game, and really came away feeling a little disappointed. There were no real control pre-sets to allow the younger gamers to play. For example, another recent monster truck game had some settings that would help with controlling the monster trucks as well as helping with stunts. We found nothing similar in Hot Wheels: Monster Trucks Stunt Mayhem. Meaning that the youngest member of the crew (5yo) had trouble with stunts as well as driving. We couldn’t even remap the driving controls to the d-pad. This is definitely an oversight, especially when the game has an age rating of 3+. That’s got to be some 3 year old with giant hands to reach the thumbsticks!
Aside from that the youngest was more than happy to watch me unlock the many monster trucks. With their favourite being both Mega Wrex and Race Ace.
Graphics & Audio
Graphically Hot Wheels: Monster Trucks Stunt Mayhem is pretty colourful, it doesn’t have realistic graphics, but instead opts for a more cartoony feel. The arenas are well decorated with plenty of graphical effects going on. My favourite effect was the trucks special move, the screen gets covered in lightning bolts, sparks as well as colourful waves of light.
From an audio point of view, it’s very basic. A straightforward soundtrack, and generally accurate sound effects, although the announcer can sometimes get a bit annoying.
Longevity
Coming in at around 4 hours to get through all the single-player events, the game isn’t the longest, but it’s a lot of fun. Well, I had a lot of fun playing through it. Will I go back to the events that I haven’t completed in their entirety? Possibly. Does that mean the game wasn’t enthralling enough? Absolutely not. I enjoyed all my time playing through this one, even playing after the Mini Crew were tucked up in bed.
Final Thoughts
Whilst Hot Wheels: Monster Trucks Stunt Mayhem may have been designed for the younger gamers, there is still plenty of the grown-ups to enjoy. Will it be a title that you will be playing in weeks to come, probably not, but that doesn’t mean you can’t have fun right now.
Hot Wheels: Monster Trucks Stunt Mayhem receives the Thumb Culture Silver Award.
Disclaimer: A code was received to write this review.
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