Road Rash

Road Rash brought its trademark blend of motorcycle racing and raw street-fighting action to the Game Boy — the mix that made Electronic Arts' series famous on home consoles. The player races down roads packed with traffic, trying to reach the finish line among the first, while also keeping an eye on rival riders who physically attack them mid-race — kicks, punches, and chain swings are all fair game as the player tries to knock opponents out before they do the same in return. The track is far from empty or safe, either, since heavy civilian traffic and police patrols add another layer of risk to every race.

This emphasis on close-quarters combat while riding made Road Rash a noticeably more aggressive experience than typical racing games, and even on the Game Boy's small screen the sense of chaotic, high-risk riding came through intact. The player has to constantly balance attacking rivals against riding safely, since colliding with civilian traffic or crashing the bike can cost precious seconds and position in the race. The visuals are spare, but the combat and crash animations are readable and give the game the dynamism it needs, letting even a small display convey exactly when to strike and when to swerve away. The risk of colliding with police or civilian vehicles further forces the player to keep weighing aggression against caution.

Road Rash was one of the defining representatives of the genre blending racing with combat in the nineties, and its move to the Game Boy showed that even a handheld could deliver the same raw feel of road combat as far more powerful home consoles. It was exactly this combination of speed and violent rivalry between riders that made the series famous, which still makes it one of the most memorable racing concepts of the nineties, even though this early handheld installment is necessarily more modest than later entries on more powerful hardware.