Monster Energy Supercross 3 Review

Monster Energy Supercross 3,was developed and published by Milestone. Milestone have developed a good selection of racing games from the MotoGP series to the MXGP series. Monster Energy Supercross is their latest release. The release of this game proves that Milestone may just be the most prolific developer of the generation, this is its 20th title to be released on the PlayStation 4 and the fifth different motorcycle specific brand its brought to market. It has been made available across multiple platforms, and this review is based on the Xbox One Edition.

Somewhat predictably you start out from the bottom in 250SX championships where you will then work your way through the career to make your way to the 450SX championships. In the previous games there was an event calendar where you could not only see the upcoming championship races but have a change of play and partake challenges and cutscenes to gain additional XP. It seems Milestone have decided to take this feature out for this sequel. One or two additional Team Races do crop up, but these are simply regular races that happen to be outside as opposed to in the arena. So once you have completed one there isn’t much of an incentive to complete another one.

One of the best features of the game is when you  first start the game up, instead of forcing you to play through tutorials, Monster Energy Supercross 3 actually gives you the option to play the tutorials or skip them. This is helpful for the gamers who have experience in playing supercross type games. I personally found the tutorials to  not be all that helpful for me especially being a new gamer to the supercross game types. All the tutorial taught me was  how to use the clutch to  good effect at the start of a race. Which is something you can figure out yourself by just jumping straight into a race or career mode just like you have to figure out everything else. The rest of the tutorials are silent videos which run through how the in game events and tournaments work throughout career mode.

That said because the tutorials are an optional feature, chances are that you’ll probably not bother with them. When you get into the main menu, you will see the breadth of impressive content that Monster Energy Supercross 3 has on offer. From the usual single player races, multiplayer races, career modes and so on. Not to mention the track creation tool  for you to build and share your own courses online. The compound also makes a return featuring a complete pen playground in which you can practice and improve your skills, you can also use this feature if you fancy a relaxing ride.

If you are anything like me and a bit of a perfectionist when designing your character for games, you can spend a lot of time creating your rider. Whether it be the traditional male or the new female, you get to customise their appearance and equipment before guiding them through their career. I  find that the option to be able to choose a female rider now brings the supercross gaming industry into the 20th century and is showing that its not just men that can compete in motocross sports.

When working on your career you will find that its fairly basic as you bounce from event to event, but it’s always keeping things moving along smoothly as you attempt to fulfil the objective of the current seasons contract. Every now and again you  will be given the opportunity to take part an exhibition race on one of the compound tracks which was a nice break from the intensity of the competitive races.

Racing is where Monster Energy Supercross 3 shines, now that Milestone has got the handling just right. Playing on an Xbox One controller both the 250 and the 450 class bikes almost always feel within your control. Your rider leans nicely into corners, with braking and accelerating responding smoothly, allowing you to corner as easily or aggressively as your riding style requires. You can use your right analogue stick to shift the weight of your rider on the bike, as you aim to ride the undulating waves of jumps, bumps and whoops of each track, this is something you really shouldn’t take for granted. How you position your rider is just as important as how you position your bike, and can be the deciding factor in the outcome of a race. Supercross racing can be unforgiving as a misjudged landing on the first jump can  slow you down on the long series of jumps and cause you to clip each bump at the wrong angle which is not only painful to watch but also extremely difficult to correct.

That said this is where the rewind function becomes handy as at the simple click of a button you can begin to rewind the time backwards to that very first jump and try to correct your error. Occasionally I found myself misjudging the sharpness of a corner causing me to separate my rider from their bike, this rewind function allowed me to save myself and correct my errors. If you’re the type of player that prefers a full simulation you do have the ability to turn this function off any time you wish.

Sometimes bad luck can come in the form of an erratic AI. Though much rarer than the Switch version the AI will still sometimes shunt you around. During the drag race off the starting blocks, things can get a little crowded and hectic leading to a lot of pushing and shoving as elbows come out. Due to this not every racer will make it through the opening bend in one piece, this highlights how realistically unpredictable races can be.

Fancy a break from the intensity of the races, step into the compound. Here you have the ability to organise races on various predetermined tracks in the open environment if you wish or you can just enjoy riding around without restrictions for a while. There is a wide range to choose from whether it be the obstacles or the quarries to ride around as aggressively or calmly as you like. It is light on things too but it is a nice little distraction if you want to enjoy a quick, chilled out ride but it can otherwise feel very empty.

This emptiness is something you have no need to worry about in the arena. There’s a good amount of detail packed into each officially-licensed arena from the AMA Supercross calendar, with some impressive lighting especially when it rains. The riders faces are not the greatest when it comes to detail but when you put them alongside their chosen bikes with their helmets on, it is very impressive seeing their shirts billowing in the wind or the mud splattering up over them and the bikes whilst riding through the track. This provides a great visual spectacle and adds plenty of realism to match the exciting races.

Monster Energy Supercross 3 is developed and published by Milestone srl

Monster Energy Supercross 3 is available on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, Microsoft Windows, Google Stadia

This review is based on the Xbox One Version of the game which can be purchased here.

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