VR Game Wrench Teaches Car Mechanics without All the Oil

I’ve never thought of working on a car’s engine as “fun”, but there are plenty of people who really love getting their hands oily over the weekends. Just because you’re too delicate to swing a wrench for real, doesn’t mean cars and their mechanical principles aren’t interesting.

So if you’re not too keen on physical labour, but want to learn about the fine details of car mechanics, then Wrench might very well be the game for you.

The Early Bird

Wrench is a PC game that’s still in “early access” on Steam. Which means that the developers have not actually finished making the game, but want to give players a chance to try it out, by selling them what’s essentially a beta version of the game. Fear not however, since you only have to pay for it the one time. Just manage your expectations when it comes to bugs and features. Plenty of early access games have changed dramatically by the time they are officially released.

Pretty Pictures

That being said, the game looks absolutely fantastic from a graphical point of view. The developer has done an amazing job of creating the art assets. There are seemingly thousands of car parts that make up the two licensed machines the game has so far. These are the Bauer LTD Catfish and Exomotive Exocet. Yes, they are as exotic and weird as they sound, but both are real cars.

The Finer Details

As far as I can tell, you’ll be able to assemble these cars from nothing but parts down to the actual bolts. Players can do this in VR, with motion controls, or on a computer.

It supports the Rift and the Vive. It can be played seated, standing or at room scale. The game is a true simulator that is about more than just wrenching on a car. The idea is that you run a car shop and have to deal with customers. Custom cars are possible, you can hire more mechanics as your business takes off and more incredibly pedantic details.

Have a look at this gameplay preview.

This seems like it would be a car nerd’s wet dream and even those of us who have a more moderate attitude to vehicle innards may be intrigued. There’s no solid release date yet, with a rather vague “Fall 2018” as the only promise the devs are willing to make. So until then I guess everyone should just work on real cars then.