Those who regularly watch the Discovery Channel will undoubtedly know the name Monster Garage. It's the show where motorcycle guru Jesse James and his team transform a vehicle into a functional machine with a purpose. It's no surprise that the fun, dynamic show would make its way onto video games. Unfortunately, the PC version released earlier this year was a travesty, due to its lack of strategic gameplay, poor design, and stability issues. Ten months later, an overhauled Monster Garage has turned up on the Xbox. The Xbox version yields mixed results: It makes numerous improvements but it also takes away some of the freedom offered in the PC version.
The Monster Garage TV show works like this: Jesse James and a group of specialists are given a task. For example, they may have to convert an RV into a mobile skate ramp or a Porsche into a golf ball retriever. It's not that easy, though. The team has to complete the project in seven days and they are only given a budget of $3,000. Fortunately, the team is able to sell unused parts stripped from the vehicle to earn extra cash. Unlike the PC version, the Xbox version gives you seven brand-new challenges (plus a bonus challenge) with the same rules, except now you have $5,000 to spend. The challenges, such as the flying car or the tank, aren't something that you're likely to ever see in real-life Monster Garage, so they're actually quite fun to see in the game.
Each challenge in the game is split into four phases: design, construction, decoration, and trial. Day one is solely devoted to reviewing the design. You can only use one design in the Xbox version, whereas you had multiple choices in the PC version. The removal of choices really hurts the game because there is no incentive to rebuild any of the monsters once you finish each one. Days two through six are spent chopping up the vehicle, ordering materials, creating custom parts, and attaching parts to the monster. You click on a team member and you will get a list of tasks he or she can perform. Each task will take a certain amount of time, and adding or subtracting parts from the vehicle also eats up the time. On day seven, you are allowed to customize your monster with paint jobs and decals. When you're finished, you'll actually get to drive your monster.
And that's all Monster Garage has to offer. It truly is as straightforward as it sounds. That's because each challenge has a paint-by-the-numbers approach. There is only one way to build the monster. You can't cut any corners. You can't construct something cool on your own. Nope, Jesse is going to build a roll cage the same way every time. If you get stumped, you can review the part-by-part blueprint video on how to build the monster so there's no mystery about what you need. In the PC version, you could install parts in any order, so sometimes you would make an error if you weren't paying attention. In the Xbox version, you can't install a part out of order. It makes the game less tricky because you won't incur time penalties from reinstalling parts in the correct order. The Xbox version also has no mystery about what parts you'll need to fabricate. You can click on any team member immediately to find out what you'll need to make, so you can jot down all the raw materials you need and then order them immediately. Again, this removes any guesswork from the game by holding your hand throughout the entire process.
The biggest improvement in the Xbox version is with the team members. You'll be randomly assigned three team members for each challenge (Jesse James is always on the team). The team members all have varying statistics, so one person may be better at welding than the others. There still isn't any direct interaction from team members--you'll never see any person-to-person conversation, or see anyone walking around in the shop. But there are some random events that occur. For instance, we had team members who didn't show up for work one morning, and some guys said that they had gotten into an argument with Jesse and left for a few hours. These added touches are nice, but they hardly affect the gameplay. The varying times for job completion between team members don't make a difference in the long run because you can complete jobs well before the deadline in all the challenges. We also never had anyone leave the garage if they were working on a job. The result is that we never had any time pressure to get the job done, and as such, we never had to restart a challenge due to running out of time.
Another improvement in the game is with attaching or removing parts. You now have the option to manually or automatically remove parts. Manual removal brings up a close-up view of the part, where you must either weld along a line or fasten a few bolts to attach the piece (or cut a line or loosen a few bolts to remove it). Eventually, doing these tasks over and over gets repetitive. Fortunately, you can now automatically remove parts instead, although you'll sacrifice time to do so. A manual removal may take five minutes of in-game time, while automatic removal will take 20 minutes. The manual removal times appear to be more realistic, as opposed to automatic removal times, which are exaggerated. The solution between the two options is that you may want to juggle between the two to manage your time. But as mentioned, you'll never be pressed for time so the extra time of automatic removal won't hurt you. Even so, the automatic removal is a nice addition because it makes the game less monotonous.
Once you've built your monster, you'll get to test it in a driving simulation. In the Xbox version, all seven of your driving portions take place in the same arena. The trick is that some parts of the arena are closed off by obstacles at the start. Later challenges will allow you to build machines that can destroy these obstacles, opening up the arena as you progress. It's a nice idea and it works pretty well within the game. The machines are also fun to use. You'll be able to fling bowling balls with the slingshot machine and break glass panes with the glider. The actual driving is functional, but not great. It can take a while to get used to the controls, especially because the camera is difficult to handle in some challenges. You can also spend a lot of time finding where you need to go next because you don't have a map.
Monster Garage is Xbox Live-enabled, but you won't be directly challenging your buddies online. Instead, there is an online scoreboard that tracks your time spent in the garage and on the challenge field. There are two categories: all-time and monthly scoreboards. It almost seems pointless to have build-time scoreboards because there is an obvious critical path in building the monster. You may have finished fabricating all your parts, yet you will be waiting for one part to arrive before you can complete the monster. Therefore, scoreboards will fill up with people who complete the build in the set amount of time. The challenge scoreboards are a different story, because it takes some skill to drive and do the tasks. The Xbox Live scoreboards may cause some people to challenge the best times of others, but ultimately it won't have enough long-lasting appeal to cause players to come back to the game.
Monster Garage on the Xbox looks better than the PC version, but that's not saying much. The menus and inventory screens are set up nicely, but the game still looks bland graphically, both inside and outside the shop. There is very little detail, and the driving area has low-resolution textures. Your vehicles take no damage when driving around the course, making you wonder why you had to install driver protections. The audio is equally disappointing. Team members get excited when you give them a task ("This is going to be so cool!"), and then sound like it was the worst thing in the world when they finish it ("That took forever. Next time give me something easy to do."). The music tracks are limited as well. The shop sounds, like torches and power tools, are appropriate, at least.
There really isn't much to keep you playing Monster Garage for long, since the game will take you three to four hours to complete. The challenges are all easy to build and drive. That's unfortunate because some of the challenges in the PC version were difficult despite its shortcomings. Even though it's bad that the game doesn't offer any alternative designs, you can't fault the linear approach it takes to building the monster. Obviously you need to install parts in a given order in construction, but the game can still be at fault for being so inflexible with the parts themselves. Why does the Xbox version practically tell you the order of the parts to be installed? Why can't I build a roll cage with fewer crossbeams in order to save money? If the in-game engine included damage modeling, you could have considered the consequences of this trade-off. Was saving a few bucks really worth the risk of damaging the vehicle in the trial? You should ask yourself that same question in regards to the game. Is saving a few bucks worth it to avoid a simple game with no replayability? We think so.
