18-Wheeler American Pro Trucker for the Game Cube
OK, it's a bad game, what can I say? 18-Wheeler American Pro Trucker for the Game Cube is a pretty horrific Truck Driving game that gives developers a reason to try harder. In all honesty, this game would've done so much better as a Sim, I firmly believe that. But regardless of what I think, here's a review for 18-Wheeler American Pro Trucker for the Game Cube.
For some reason, the first mode to catch my eye was parking mode. Yes, parking mode, that's not just a clever name either. You turn around very sharp and difficult turns and you PARK, that's it. I wonder what ingenious game designer decided that parking would be an excellent aspect to a DRIVING GAME; the majority of car games hardly even put any emphasis on parking, but 18-Wheeler American Pro Trucker has an entire mode devoted to it.
The real core gameplay, though, is the Arcade Mode. In Arcade mode you have to travel and drop off the cargo in your truck to various stops while keeping within the time limits. Don't worry, your time gets extended when you drive marked cars off the road. Driving cars off the road? Is this American Pro Trucker: Mafia Gangster? It's not even as entertaining or violent as it sounds, sometimes it's just frustrating when you miss the car and lose even MORE time than you had in the first place.
Speaking of time, watch out for Al. You mean, the bearded guy that looks like Billy Maze from home improvement? That'd be a nice change of pace, but no, the first-named-only "Al". He's your rival trucker that you constantly contend with and compete to beat at time, but it isn't necessary, so it doesn't exactly motivate you. Al isn't particularly tough either, but boy, does he taunt. Well, he only says a couple things, but he repeats them like a reoccurring nightmare. The same phrases will haunt your mind over and over and over, damn trucking radio.
Yes, the radio, every truck is equipped with a dispatcher and this one has the same people saying the same things, like I previously stated. But what about the other radio, you may be asking, is there music? Yes, there's music, and if you like old style Rock N' Roll and Country Western you may enjoy it, but on the other hand you can just buy a CD/Record for that. The games glaring problems will be too hard to get over for you to listen to the music, anyways.
The other mode is Score Attack mode, which once again, sounds like how it is. You go around and try to accumulate as much money/score as possible in the shortest time. It doesn't provide much of a challenge and it isn't very entertaining. In fact, it is more of a chore. I would go more in depth, but I simply can't.
That is, in my opinion, the largest problem with 18-Wheeler American Pro Trucker, that it suffers from shallow depth. The game just never lets you feel like you're actually delivering cargo to a buyer, but rather playing a timed drop off game. I mean really, you can finish this game in under an hour, how pathetic is that? The complete lack of content makes this game not worthy of the $30 price tag, and really makes you wonder why the release date wasn't pushed back a couple months.
18-Wheeler American Pro Trucker for the Game Cube has a lot of potential, but proves to be less than a good time. You can't even have fun making fun of it, it simply just isn't finished. I hope it will serve an example for all game developers to test their product thoroughly before releasing their game. I find it pathetic, but on the other hand, so are a lot of things. It just goes to show that something released for entertainment purposes can be the very opposite of fun.
18-Wheeler American Pro Trucker CHEATS:
Bonus parking levels
Successfully complete each of the four parking levels to unlock an additional parking level. Successfully complete the bonus parking level to unlock a sixth parking level.
Nippon Maru
Successfully complete arcade mode with all four characters.
Bonus parts
Go to arcade mode and select any truck. Get to your destination ahead of your rival, then complete the bonus parking mini-game to win bonus parts. Note: This works on any destination.
Bonus trailers
Successfully complete arcade mode with all four characters to unlock two bonus trailers in score attack mode, versus mode, and arcade mode
Hint-get more points
On Arcade mode if you see a bonus car keep hitting it to get more points.
More time
Go into the options menu, select "Difficulty" and set it to "Very Easy". Next, save the game in the options menu and return to the main menu. Select arcade mode and you will have more time in each level, until you reach into the last level and complete the game.
Shifting
For Highway Cat and Stream Line, shift up when at about 50 mph.