05/03/2025
𝗠𝗼𝗻𝘀𝘁𝗲𝗿 𝗥𝗼𝗰𝗸 (SchilMil Games/Wallace Designs)
We've seen a fair few rock band games in recent years, including On The Road (HELVETIQ), Boy Band Builder (GoodGood Games) and Big Easy Busking (Weird Giraffe Games), and there's always no end of monster-themed games. The two themes occasional coincide - for example, we last year featured Band of Ogres (Sneaky Lab) on Board's Eye View - but Amanda Milne and Martin Wallace have really gone all in in their design for Monster Rock (SchilMil Games/Wallace Designs), where, in competitive mode, the 2-5 players are various monsters collecting cards on a city board, activating song writing and musical performance attributes, performing gigs and fomenting revolution. And if that doesn't sound drug-crazed enough, there are Events, an army of robot police, secret files and more awards on offer than at the Grammys.
Franz Vohwinkel's artwork sets the tongue-in-cheek tone for this game set in a modern rather than Medieval fantasy world. If you watched the Buffy The Vampire Slayer spinoff series Angel, you'll have an idea of the sort of setting the designers had in mind. The band names are all parodies of familiar groups (Elvish Light Orchestra, Velvet Underwear, They Are Giants, Jethro Troll etc) as are the many song titles.
Tho' the bands in Monster Rock all draw from several fantasy races, each type of monster or fantasy race (werewolves, goblins, ogres, trolls, undead 𝘦𝘵 𝘢𝘭) all have their own particular musical preferences, so you'll need to tailor your output so that it appeals to your target audience: elves expect to hear a melodic song but if you're playing to an audience of the undead it's all about the volume. You're also trying to recruit your audience to become your followers as you lead them in revolution against a mad king whose robot police are trying to throw you in jail. It may not be Dungeons & Dragons but there are nonetheless dungeons - to avoid or break out of rather than explore - in this psychedelic rock-themed set collection, engine-building game.
To cap it all, Monster Rock also incorporates the option of solo play or playing as a fully cooperative game for up to five players.
SchilMil Games will soon be launching Monster Rock on Gamefound. You can find out more at https://gamefound.com/en/projects/schilmil-games/monster-rock.
