Note: This article originally appeared on GamesToaster.com, here.

Monster Trucks. Like its followers, it is big, dirty, loud, over-the-top, and very in-your-face. Perfect fodder for video-gaming. A shame then, that this videogame translation is rarely anything other than pedestrian.

Originality makes its appearance in the shape of a packed-in steering wheel attachment for the Wii’s remote - allowing you to steer the remote wildly to steer your truck around the game’s multitude of tracks. Originality then quickly says its goodbyes for the rest of the experience, and we were are left with a very pedestrian racing game.

As a port of a year old XBox game onto Wii hardware, the graphics are per-functionary at best. The track-side scenery is angular, and the mud textures are, well, muddy. And although not terribly essential in a monster-truck game, the sense of speed is quite lacking.

All of the whacky racing features are present and accounted for. Power-ups? Check. Speed boosts? Check. Upgradable cars? Check. Obligatory fire-truck? Check. The tracks vary from Egypt to Alaska to Mount Rushmore, and yet save for a change in texture colour, they don’t really vary at all. Outside of wholly derivative design choices like these, there is practically no sign of personality. Relying as they do on copying the hundreds of identikit racers out there, any attempts to be whacky or zany entirely miss the mark, and we are instead left with a soulless, joyless experience.

The title is rescued somewhat by a healthy amount of multi-player options, including soccer and combat mini-games, but are made somewhat redundant by the fact that without the steering wheel attachment, the game loses perhaps its only hook. As the single-player game is incredibly brief, playing with friends, provided you have all the necessary equipment, will perhaps provide you with most of your value for money.

It’s not that Monster 4×4 is a particularly bad game - it’s not. The problem is that it is not a particularly good game, nor shows any ambition to be so. It is almost painfully inoffensive, and as such is never going to be any more than average.