It’s Mega Man... the Kart racer. Because why should Mario and Sonic and Diddy Kong

have all the fun? Well, “fun” is kind of a subjective term here. As far as Kart

racers go, Battle & Chase is pretty far from optimized, especially in the realms of controls

and balance. The gulf between Mario Kart and this thing is about the size of the gulf between

SSX Tricky and... that snowboarding mini-game from Final Fantasy VII. (Which got an update

as a mobile phone game, and what the hell is up with THAT.) But, as Mega Man games are

wont to do, Battle & Chase achieves notoriety by being... well, a racing game inspired by

Mega Man, which lets you swipe parts from your defeated opponents for the purpose of

improving your own racer. And that’s pretty freakin’ awesome.

Upon choosing your racer and their interestingly-named vehicle (which may welcome a lawsuit from

either Konami or Media Vision, unless you just go and rename the kart yourself), You

select from a number of courses, each featuring another named racer as well as a couple generic

Joes just there to take up space. I have to admit, getting a 3D model of the track before

you compete IS a nice touch. And then you race. As per usual, there’s an items system

that lets you debilitate your opponents, though instead of just hitting an item box and BAM

turtle shells, you actually have to accumulate points by blasting or running over the various

Mets and traffic-cone-looking robots littering the field. Upon hitting your quota, the item

roulette automatically starts, blessing you with mines or invincibility or whatever. You’ve

also got a power bar up there in the top left, which can be discharged before it’s full

for a moderate effect (depending on which racer you’re using) or saved until it hits

capacity for a stronger boost-slash-weapon-slash-jump or something. It’s kinda like CO powers

in Advance Wars. There you have it, Advance Wars to Mega Man Racing in one step.

So maybe it’s not an A-1 title. Heck, the original PlayStation version never even saw

a release in the states, instead heading directly to Europe from Japan. Didn’t see you getting

all Project Rainfall about this one, did I? Exactly. But, if you must get your robot-centric

racing on (and maybe you just want to see Roll all decked out in racing gear, and I’m

not even gonna judge), it’s included in the Mega Man X Collection for PS2 and Gamecube,

unlocked by beating X, X2, and X3. Maybe it’s not more obscure than Battle Chip Challenge.

Oh well, in the absence of Rock Board - the Mega Man meets Itadaki Street mashup - or

that woeful PC version of Mega Man 3 (which had nothing at all to do with the REAL Mega

Man 3), it’ll have to do.