238. Road Fighter (Konami, Famicom, 1985)

Like most early Famicom games made by Konami, Road Fighter is a port of a simple arcade game. The arcade version of Road Fighter was released a year prior in 1984, but this home version more or less includes all of the features and sounds of the arcade version, except that the original was more of a racing game that tracked your position, while the home version is more about just getting through each level without running out of fuel.

Gameplay is a lot like 1983's Spy Hunter: you control a car driving down a road from a top down view, and you can shift between 2 speeds while avoiding traffic as you race to your destination. Shifting is handle elegantly between the 2 face buttons: the B button will only get your car up to 200 km/h, but it will get you there faster than the A button, which will get you up to 400km/h. That's about where the Spy Hunter comparisons end, as your sportscar in Road Fighter lacks any kind of weaponry. I wouldn't say this makes Road Fighter a worse game than Spy Hunter, though it definitely has less going on (and no music).

As Road Fighter is primarily about dodging traffic, there are a set of rules depending on which type of car you come across. Yellow cars don't move left or right, but blue and red cars can do one of 2 movement patterns (or not move at all), and somewhat unintuitively, multicolored cars give you points and extra fuel when hit. There are also occasional road obstacles in the form or oil slicks or barriers. When you hit an enemy car or oil slick, you start to skid, and this skid mechanic is by far the best part about Road Fighter. Instead of just skidding into a crash, your car will start to skid, at which point you can steer into the skid to pull out of it. If you steer out of the skid, your car will start to spin at which point you will likely crash but can potentially avoid that if you release the gas button. 

The whole game has 4 tracks and can be completed in about 5 minutes, though once you reach the end of the 4th course you are booted back to the first on a harder second loop.  Road Fighter really of reminds me of a top down version of another Konami arcade port, game #192, Kekkyoku Nankyoku Daibouken, as that game was also vert short and all about racing and dodging.

3/5, a basic overhead racing game with an interesting skid mechanic