Rhythm really is the name of the game here, too at times, MES5 plays more like a rhythm-action game than a racer. Controlling your bike can feel fiddly at first on the small tracks, and it only takes a small error to completely throw your rhythm off, leaving you driving slowly over jumps, rather than soaring through the air like Evel Knievel. Racing itself is a smooth, enjoyable affair. Now we just need big head mode and I’ll be happy. It turns what could have been a button on a menu into a really enjoyable, interactive experience and adds some light-hearted silliness that many games lack these days.
MXGP 2021 BIKES SERIES
Surprisingly, this is not accomplished through a trip to the doctor, instead, through a Tony Hawk style free-roaming level in which you are given a series of tasks to do such as performing a backflip or collecting the letters S-H-A-P-E within a time limit. After each race, if your rider has sustained injuries, you are offered the opportunity to take part in a Workout Session, designed to help heal broken bones and improve your riders’ overall shape.
The progression is enjoyable, and the inclusion of the new Rider Shape System adds a new layer of depth that I didn’t realise I wanted until now. The game’s career mode is roughly what you’d expect from this type of racing game join a team, race as hard as you can for your sponsor, earn skill points to develop your character and money to buy new bikes and gear. There’s a brilliant, in-depth tutorial mode to introduce newcomers to practical techniques like whips and scrubs, as well as theory lessons to help you get accustomed to the rules and strategies of a Supercross race. MES5 seems to have not only improved on everything MXGP 2021 was lacking, but has gone above and beyond its predecessor ( Monster Energy Supercross – The Official Videogame 4, if you were wondering), adding many features and improvements that even a racing behemoth like Gran Turismo 7 doesn’t include. The most immediate difference between Monster Energy Supercross 5 (hereby known as MES5) is in how the bigger budget afforded by a more profitable sport has clearly had a positive impact on the game. So, how do these differences translate to the videogame world? The faster pace of Supercross, combined with the beer-and-hotdog appeal of packing into a stadium with some friends has led to Supercross becoming Motocross’s younger, but more successful brother. Not only do the races take place inside arenas or stadiums, the tracks are shorter and tighter, requiring a lot more precision handling of the bike, and creating many more opportunities for crashes and pile ups. However, Supercross, despite looking on the surface very similar to Motocross, is a different beast.
Rather than adding an on-road kit or picking suspension options for your intended ride, as per the Bukk, the Varg’s configurator sets the bike up for each rider’s weight and chooses between a motocross-ready 19-inch rear wheel or an enduro-spec 18-inch.To the uninitiated it may seem strange for Milestone to bring out yet another dirt bike racing game mere months after the release of the highly enjoyable MXGP 2021. If this feels like an altogether more serious set of wheels than the 89kg, 21bhp Cake Bukk, it very much is. Assuming there’s ever enough traction to get all that power all down, of course. Whether the Varg achieves any of that is something we’d probably need to borrow an MXGP champion to test adequately, but with 80 horsepower shifting just 118kg (plus a presumably gurning rider), that’s the kind of power-to-weight ratio that should see it walk away from 450cc race-ready dirt bikes. But now that Stark has started delivering bikes to customers, there’s at least a legitimate product to support the lofty claims made back in 2021 – ‘unparalleled performance’, ‘class-leading powertrain’, ‘the most advanced electric motorcycle in the world’ and ‘the fastest motocross bike on the market’.
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