The midnight blue Ford was a delivery vehicle for parts at first, as well as used to advertise the shop, as after the work week, Bob, his family, and Jim would go out off-roading, and every weekend Bob would come back with something broken on his truck. Eventually a guy in their shop chastised chandler by telling him "it's because of your Big Foot Bob", and the name stuck to Bob first, then the truck. Bob would also take the truck to local mud racing events, and truck shows, including even industry trade shows like SEMA (Safety Equipment Manufacturer's Association).

In 1979, Bob and some friends took some derilict cars out behind a friend's farm and shot a video tape of him driving Bigfoot over the cars. This video was played in the shop and caught the eye of a promoter that spent the next few years "working on" Chandler - who thought it was destructive and bad for business - to get him to perform such a stunt in front of a crowd. Eventually though, it happened, and Bigfoot became a household name, and Monster Trucks became a "thing".

As popularity grew, Bigfoot 4x4 inc grew. Bob sent off Kramer with Bigfoot #1 in 1982 to tour the USA, then he had to build a second truck, Bigfoot #2, and then Ford came calling for sponsorship - boom, there's Bigfoot #3 - the "Showboat". In 1984, the longest campaigning "race truck" of the fleet was born - Bigfoot #4. Bigfoot made history yet again in 1985 when they had the first feminist monster truck - Ms. Bigfoot, "grossly overpowered" 1985 longbed Ford Ranger STX powered by a 571 Cubic Inch Alan Root V8 hemi putting out around 700-1500 Horsepower, and piloted initially by Bob's wife Marilyn, and using some surplus 10 foot tall Alaskan Land Train tires he made Bigfoot #5. In 1986 came the Bigfoot Shuttle, probably the first factory stock V6 powered monster truck being an Aerostar van with the 3.0 Liter Vulcan V6 under the hood with a nitrous boost, and in 1987, a "tank vehicle" known as the Bigfoot Fastrax was outsourced and added to the fleet. Meanwhile, the regular 66' Agricultural tire trucks kept coming with Bigfoot 6 in 1988, and Bigfoot 7 built for the movie "Roadhouse" in 1989. In 1990, Bigfoot preimiered the first "modern" monster truck, Bigfoot 8 - a truck so high tech it was barred from competition at one point in the racing season because the competition could not keep up.

The "Plot" of Bigfoot is this. It's something like that of the Cannonball Run movies (well Bigfoot WAS in the Cannonball Run II movie). Basically you travel in your monster truck from event, to event, to compete in these various events all over the United States. So in a way, it's a little educational in geography...that is it would be if they included the states.

The game, like hte Cannonball Run, starts you in Los Angeles California, racing in a car crush event. After that, a stop in Reno Nevada for the mud race, then a jump up to Yakima Washington state for a hill climb..and so on, ending up at a "Drag Race" in New York, which is basically just a combination "Mud Race" and "Car Crush" event.

The way to win is to get the most points at the end of the season, which is actually quite realistic considering. How most Monster Truck events work(ed) in real life was that the trucks would compete in a heat against each other, the loser is cast aside, the winner is sent to the next elimination round, until only two trucks are left, and then winner of that gets the most points in the series, while the other teams, depending on placement and how many races they have one, get progressively less points as you go down the chain. The truck with the most points at the end of the season, wins the Monster Truck racing season. That's how it works in real life.

Bigfoot simplifies this in that all events are only two trucks: Bigfoot, and some other truck, either "Player 2" - a red monster truck (High Roller II....is that you!?!?), or a series of forgotten names such as the "Growler", "Crusher", "Eliminator", and "Terminator" trucks. Basically you race for a maxiimum of 3 heats and the one that wins the most heats wins the race and recieves more points than the other guy.

Plus you get to kick off the game with some pretty decent flag girls in swimsuits, a staple of 80's car culture, and the overhead races look pretty cool though I have to question why Bigfoot and co decided not to opt for a Strategy element with a hauler and a highway, and rather more of a "let's run through the forest in 4x4 low-range with a 60 shot of nitrous". I mean what's going on? Jim Kramer in the bed snaggin' cans of Nitrous? Did an airplane on it's way to Reno Airport to drop off Summit Racing goodies dump it's load in the middle of US forests? And at the end we have a big-arm Andy Brass or Gene Patterson waving the flag every time, lol. Can't we just rile up the whole crew and have a Bigfoot convoy across the countryside - Kramer in #7, Piant in #4, Keolling in Ms. Bigfoot/Ranger? Maybe chandler in the Fastrax? Then get to the event and choose the truck to compete. This would be PRIME ROM hack material if there ever was.

And I'm sure you're thinking....who are these guys? Well, there's a form of music known as "production music", it's like the "clipart" or "licensable stock footage" of music in a way. But unlike Stock Footage, there's actually some really damn good music in there. And this stock music was what Bigfoot used on their VHS Tapes back in the 1980s. Bigfoot had three out when I was a kid: Bigfoot: King of the Monster Trucks, Bigfoot: Strikes Again, and Bigfoot: Battle of the Bigfoots. These were all self-produced by Bigfoot 4x4 INC using footage they shot, and the soundtracks on them were so memorable that's why people look these songs up on YouTube.

In "King of the Monster Trucks", they kinda' pulled what this game pulled, and used the same Craig Palmer piece over and over again - "Deadlines" - which was used in a lot of sports stuff, and apparently comes in 2 versions, an earlier version that has no horns, and a later version that adds horns to it.

Bigfoot Strikes Again seems like someone there got their hands on "Legion" by Mark Shreeve - an album he did prior to the video, and slapped all the tunes to individual trucks and scenarios. The title track being used for the racing sequences, Intimidator being used for the opening, Storm Column used for the Bigfoot Ranger and Shuttle montage, and so on. They used his stuff again for Battle of the Bigfoots. So when I think Monster trucks.....I don't really think of the local country radio station, I think of all this crazy late 80's techno music and hard-rock production music I heard on the video tapes. Bigfoot was never "cuntry'" to me, it was always a metal/rock/techno beast. Made sense, it's a technological marvel.

Overhead Events - ie, the forest races between each actual event, seem like you should press "up" to go forward, back to "brake", left and right to steer, B for special functions, and A for nitrious. However, it works more like this. Pressing forward moves in "Granny gear", wiggling the truck back and fourth with left and right makes it go forward, pressing back makes you do a wheelie, the rest is fine and intuitive. It's still intuitive enough that it's enjoyable at least, unlike.....

Side Scrolling Events - ie, Mud Races, Car Crushes, hill Climbs, Tractor Pulls, and the final Drag Race. This is the part that messes EVERYONE up. If you remember games like "Decathlon", aka "button mashers", that's how this part of the game works. Basically, you move the truck by pressing left and right on the D-Pad alternating, as fast as possible, all the while, you need to make use of the gearshift and nitrious the AI player never uses in 1-player mode. With a stock NES gamepad, this makes playing the game a chore and a pain...unless you ignore the instructions, and play like I do, which I'd only figured out because I play guitar.

Most people "cheat" the above by purchasing a joystick controller like the NES Advantage or InterAct I had as a kid, but the way I play this game as an adult, is I hold the gamepad like a Guitar Neck, and I press down on the left side of the gamepad with my left pointer finger, then I put my right pointer finger on the Right side of the D-Pad, and put my right ring and pinky fingers on the B and A buttons respectively. Then I proceed to play the D-Pad like I'm Edward Van-Halen playing Eruption - right-hand-hammer-on style, while tossing a couple extra "notes" into the "arpeggio" using my right ring and pinky to shift the truck and introduce nitrious - and it works awesome. Actually, mastering those two items can really case for some impressive looking feats. I once sent Bigfoot #5 into the stratosphere in 3rd gear - so high up the roof of #5 came up from the bottom of the screen into Player 2's track, LOL! Something it seems Monster Truck Destruction revivists in a 3D environment - so it's not all bad and can be entertaining.

The earlier events are pretty easy, just a swift run across some cars and a few hills, but the hill climbs, tractor pulls, and later, longer events with gas lines can be rather tiring. Hill Climbs add to the tedium with the ease of blowing up engines just by driving without nitrous or even with a gear change, it's almost too easy to blow your truck up if you're not extremely careful. Tractor Pulls are the all-or-nothing of the lot. Basically, you can literally whip through gears with nitrous at the get go, and win with little to no damage, or you can get stuck 3/4ths of the way to the finish line until your engine, transmission, or shocks give out, or the other guy wins. I've had more than a few stalemates in those races.

But yeah, that does not cloud my judgement. I do know most average people first off see this as a game about a massive middle-finger to the environment (there IS An EV Bigfoot truck BTW, #21 - and it's there so Autistic people can enjoy monster trucks BTW...take that Monster Jam), destroying other middle-fingers to the environment (mostly 1970's land yachts at the time), being patroned by a bunch of shirtless, sunburnt rednecks chewing snuff, smoking cigarettes, eating nachos, and indulging in beer. Well, I've been to only ONE event with Bigfoot, and it was not like that (but all the others were).

But back on track, to me, it's an average to better game, once you get around the wonky control scheme and put it on mute and put on some Mark Shreeve or Craig Palmer production music. I like to revisit at least once a year. That's why it's the most "Let's Played" game on my entire youtube channel, because it's a sure fire win.

First off, so we're planning a tour basically. So first off, just like Bigfoot, you'd pick the monster truck you'd want to tour with, and it'd affect the vehicles handling and characteristics...and we'd stick to the circa 1990 or 1991 trucks like a mock sequel...i.e.

Bigfoot #1 - High power, high gas consumption, high top speed, low durability, lower-medium suspension. Makes sense, it's a Stage #1 truck with a 640 C.I. Alan Root Ford Hemi making about 1500HP.

Bigfoot #2 - Medium Power, medium gas consumption, medium top speed, medium durability, lower suspension. Makes sense, stage #1 clone in the vein of #1, just with a 460CI instead of a 640CI.

Bigfoot #3 - Medium Power, medium gas consumption, medium top speed, low durability, medium suspension. #3 was the showboat that got a lot of body damage in the form of chrome trim falling off. It was the Ford sponsor truck. Maybe give ia payment bonus for this one since it represents a stock Ford pickup as a race vehicle. Had a BOSS 429 Mustang engine.

Bigfoot #4 - High Power, High Speed, High Durability, med-high suspension. #4 is the legendary champion of hte Bigfoot fleet. It has been a Stage 2, and a Stage 2.5,a nd now has been rebuilt as of 2023 (Fred Reap). The question is, do we do high powered late stage 2 era #4, or the hybrid suspension pre-crash #4?, or the post-crash striped #4?

Bigfoot #5 - medium power, low-medium speed, high durability, low suspension. #5 is the 10 foot tal tire truck, and it is said it leans 4-feet when it climbs onto cars. But it has to be here. Might give you some benefit in car crush events, but those tundra tires are not aggressive enough for mud racing IMHO, but it'll get through.

Bigfoot #6 - high speed, high power, medium suspension, med-high durability. #6 is the faster version of #3. Would be a great reason to make the trucks un-touchable in 2-player if the other player picked one - ie #7 vs #6.

Bigfoot #7 - high speed, high power, high suspension, med-high durability. #7 was the truck from "Roadhouse", but also was the one they unfortunatley converted to 10 foot tires for the Race Rock Cafe in florida, and now spends it's time hedging bets on when it's going to fall over from rust and disreapair as "Big Fun".

Bigfoot #8 - high speed, high power, high suspension, med-high durability. #8 was the newest truck with the desert race truck inspired suspension setup. This means there should be an easter egg in being able to launch #8 into the opponent's track from the bottom of the screen (hehehehehehe), just to give Bigfoot a chance to be the worlds first Stand-Up comedy monster truck...in the case of making fun of wonky Nintendo physics.

Bigfoot Shuttle - Aka, a 1985 Ford Aerostar minivan with a nitrous boosted Ford Vulcan 3.0 V6. low speed, low power, high suspension, med-high durability. This one you'd really need to rely on the nitrous, but it can hold it's own.

Bigfoot Ranger - aka, Ms. Bigfoot, a 1985/1989 Ford Ranger STX with a Alan Root 540 CI Ford Hemi engine in it and Air-Ride shocks. High Speed, High Power, High Suspension, med-high durability. This could be the other one that can come up from the underside of the screen if Ken Keolling's flight was any indication.

Bigfoot Fastrax - aka, Overtime Trax, aka, the "tank Vehicle". Fastrax had 2 460 CI engines. High Speed, High Power, Low Suspension, and high Durability. The fun part of racing this one is it'll pass everything on the track at blazing speed, might trigger Tank opponents.

With that out of the way, let's talk opponents, let's use real ones: Aces High, Bear Foot, Clydsedale, No Problem, Little Foot, Outlaw, Hawiian Punch, Grave Digger, USA-1, The Ozark Viper, Micro Machines, Wild Thing, The Pony Express, Monster Vette, Excalibur, Nitemare, King Kong, Goliath, Godzilla, Pac-Man...yes, there was a Pac-Man truck, a Ford Bronco actually. Then toss in the Terminator, Growler, Charger, Eliminator, and Challenger.

So you'd pick your truck, tour, earn points, and win. And the plethora of vehicles would allow some replay value. Instead, you'd just repair the vehicle after each event.