Mighty Monster Mayhem is a VR exclusive game that puts us in the shoes of a mad scientist that has somehow managed to turn himself into a giant monster. He yearns for revenge, and it is up to us to smash, tear and destroy our way to victory. Booting up the game you are immediately given the option to play Single Player, Multiplayer or go through a quick tutorial to show you the ropes of properly controlling your monster before being thrown into the fray. The first thing you’ll learn is that there is no teleportation, instead, you must hold your Vive controller’s grip buttons and swing your arms in a walking motion to move around.
It works really well, and you’ll have no problem dashing across the street to snatch people off the ground or find something heavy to throw at whoever’s day you feel like ruining. Then you are tasked with climbing a skyscraper which is done by moving your arm to where you want to cling to and pressing the trigger button to grip. Climbing is easily the best feature in this game and is a ton of fun to swiftly scale your way up a building with tons of gunfire narrowly missing you. You can also leap vast distances by holding and releasing the triggers in a skiing like motion to quickly close in on an enemy or simply jump to another building.
Movement in this game is top notch and will have you effortlessly pulling off impressive stunts. The city itself changes a bit from level to level though they are typically small play areas that have a blue force field to make sure you stay within its bounds. Where it really shines is in its vertically. Even as a giant monster once you start to climb a skyscraper and look down, you will soon realize how incredibly far up you are. Luckily for us, there is no fall damage so once we feel that the building is starting to give way and will come tumbling down, we can simply leap right off of it without a care in the world. That is unless you have a fear of heights in which case you should probably stay away from this game.
Your gleeful rampages will not go unhindered. It won’t take long for the military to swarm in and attempt to take you down. You are a beast very efficient at destruction but at fighting not so much. While you can easily pick up a tank, slam it into the ground and throw it at a nearby group of soldiers, there is no limit to them, and they will eventually take you down if you don’t make good use of your mad parkour skills. The only long range attack you have is via throwing objects though it’s not easy to hit the tiny soldiers that are on foot and stuff like helicopters are oddly resistant to having a chunk of the building dropped on them, you will have to throw it with force to cause damage for some reason.
Enemies also phase through the buildings annoyingly enough, so it is not uncommon to see a helicopter fly right out of a solid building to shoot you in the mouth. Combat is never necessary unless you are trying to complete a level’s side quest such as eating 30 soldiers. That is not the say it is terrible, it is indeed fun to jump off a skyscraper to deliver the world’s most overkill punch to an enemy that was shooting you in the butt the whole way up, but it is clearly not the focus of the game. Every mission has one primary goal, and it is always to demolish a certain amount of buildings. How you choose to do so is up to you. It can be accomplished by throwing stuff at it until it collapses, finding and destroying its support beams or just by causing enough damage to it.
To rip off chunks of the building you just grab it and twist your hand around a bit until it comes loose. While climbing up a building, the twisting motion will be the only way to cause damage since the punch button is the same one you use to grip and it always defaults to grip. Instead of simply letting the debris fall however, it is better to use it to attack enemies or damage nearby buildings. Speaking of, the destruction physics are quite satisfying in this game. Each structure is made up of small individual pieces meaning that there is a lot more to taking one down than just standing at the base of it and punching it until it topples over. You must climb and weaken it all around to have a serious impact on it.
Unlike jumping off of absurd heights, having an entire skyscraper fall on your head will hurt you, so that is another small detail to watch out for. As previously stated, eating people be they civilian or military will refill your health a bit though not enough to be worthwhile in all but the most dire cases. Buildings are not just husks; they actually have an interior with people and power-ups in them. These power-ups range from X-Ray vision that will allow you to see exactly where the support beams are located, a health pickup and one that causes whatever item you throw to explode. That last one is exactly as awesome as it sounds. You haven’t lived until you’ve taken down a skyscraper using nothing but exploding trees. On the flip side, that explosion is just as capable of killing you as well if you stand too close.
There are nine missions to play through overall, and each has minor changes to the cityscape but nothing drastic. Hidden around them are objects that when picked up will unlock a new character to play as. All characters play the same and are only different visually. Worth mentioning is that pausing the game does not freeze time so you can not put the game down lest you find yourself shot to death when you come back. You are given three lives to make it through a level though you will likely not need to use them unless you are going for the side quests. When all is said and done, while Mighty Mansion Mayhem does have some flaws and may get repetitive for some, it is a title you should own if you have an HTC Vive and are not afraid of heights. With the combination of excellent movement, tons of vertically and a fully destructible world, it is easily the most fun experience I have had in VR.
[Review copy was provided]
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