The game you don't want to like, but do.
This game came out way back in the year known as 2006. Before all that Forza Motorsport business came and declared dominance on the 360, but after PGR 3 was on the scene for about a year.
That said, Import Tuner Challenge (or Shutoku Battle X it’s known in Japan) is a totally different racing game than you’ve probably ever played (or won’t play, let’s be honest). No longer are you racing around a confined track, there are no laps, no official starting lines, no checkpoints, and no finishes. Instead, once you have a car, you drive around an open highway with other traffic looking for other cars to challenge. Just drive up to one, hit A, and the battle (not a race) commences.
Each car has a life meter that’s full when the battle commences, the farther a car is ahead of another, the faster their opponent’s bar decreases. When one car’s meter is depleted, they lose. If the two cars are fairly close to each other neither bar depletes, making it possible for a battle to go on indefinitely. You are however evading other traffic when doing this, and the roads can become two lane gauntlets when you and the other car spar for position to pass other vehicles. Any contact with a wall, your opponent, or other cars also takes a chunk out of your bar.
After each battle you win some money based on the length of the battle, the opponent’s strength, and your current winning streak. You then take this money, go back to your garage, upgrade your car every which way, then go out on the streets and repeat the process. As you beat more rivals, bosses come out and challenge you. These racers have cars that are seriously pimped out, with some of the later ones having electricity running through the frame of the car for some random reason (other than the obvious cool factor).
At first you can only afford the most basic of cars with none to limited upgrades. This makes the game somewhat frustrating in the beginning as even the most basic of rivals will leave you in the dust. But after a couple hours of gathering funds you’ll probably be able to afford a new ride, or a nitro upgrade and start competing on a more level playing field. This is where the game’s addictive qualities kick in.
After beating some bosses, new roads open up, with new bosses and greater monetary rewards. You’ll find yourself thinking that this will be your last battle, then you go into the garage to save your game, but you decide to buy an upgrade first. Then you want to test it out on the street. Then a boss comes out and challenges you. You win. A new area opens up. Next thing you know, it’s 4 am and the only things you had in the past 6 hours was a cold cup of coffee and two Excedrin.
As fun as the driving the battles can be after you get into it, the games characters give it extra charm that most other driving games severely lack. You have to put in some work to find it though. You can stop at different Parking Areas on the streets and read “Info” to read what other rivals are talking about. Sometimes they will give you tips on tuning your car, other times they just give you random information regarding their love lives. Each team of rivals also has a history and theme. Such as the team of rock musicians that can’t get along, a team of divorced husbands that just want a Second Chance (that being their team name), and even a team of Goths. All these teams have rivalries with each other and you’ll find other characters in the game talking about them, such as someone who can’t decide whether the Goth teams leader is a guy or girl, and another who still can’t get the courage to talk to the all girls team.
All this is presented with somewhat poor translation, and in the end adds nothing to the actual game play, but it gives more of a history and feel to the cars that you’re racing, instead of just being another set of wheels.
Graphically the game looks like a PS2 game, but there are some nice lighting effects in the garage. Also the character art is very limited and seems rushed. There are however some nice paint options available for your car, not to the crazy extent of Forza, but there are a wide variety of logos and patterns to choose from.
This isn’t a technical racer, far from it, and it can get redundant fast if you aren’t into the whole customizing/street racing thing. But seeing how it’s in the bargain bin now, it won’t hurt to pick it up and kill a few hours.