Science fiction has taught me that humans are not alone in the universe, that ships can punch a hole into another dimension and sail straight into hell, and above all else, that today's sports will be replaced by giant robot battles. That's the premise behind Namco Bandai's IGPX, or Immortal Grand Prix, a futuristic combat game based on the Cartoon Network show of the same name. You'll travel over 350mph, customize bad ass mechs, and along with your buddies, make scrap metal out of your foes. It all sounds good on paper, but in practice, it's a bit tame.

IGPX (in theory) combines the frantic skirmishes found in Sega's Virtual On arcade games with the twisty tracks in Nintendo's F-Zero GX, and the result is something that's not as good as either of those games, at least from what I've seen. The goal is to lead Team Satomi to the very top of the winner's circle by beating a handful of leagues, so you and two AI-controlled teammates (that can be controlled one at a time on the fly) take to the race track against another three-person team and all hell breaks loose, or something like that.

Basically, your only objective is to win at all costs, whether that means having a nice, clean race to the finish line (which isn't realistic), or beating your opponents senseless using a myriad of weapons that have all been mapped to two or three buttons that you must repeatedly mash. But even though the controls are pretty simplistic, you can still do some cool stuff. While you're "blazing" down the track, you can slide over to an enemy, lift it up into the air and toss it, or you can grab onto it and pummel it into oblivion. Plus, you can work together as a team by doling out orders, which simply amounts to pressing a direction on the d-pad. If, for example, you select "man-to-man", your teammates will match up with an opponent that best fits their position, and if you should select "defend", then they'll block enemy attacks. It's a pretty straight forward system that's been designed to make you feel like you're in control as things appear to be going haywire, though upon closer inspection, everything is fairly manageable thanks to the way the races have been designed. Actually, it's more like, no thanks.

Instead of just allowing the player to burst from the starting line, developer Sting has made each lap different. In the first, you don't even control your IG Machine! You watch all three go around the track while you instruct your teammates to race (builds up your boost meter) or fight (allows you to rack up combos more quickly). Once that lap's complete (it can be skipped), you're given control of all three IGs (click R3 to switch), except the actual racing feels more like Mario Kart. You're just putt putting around the track.

The actual speed doesn't kick in until the final lap, in which you're able to boost, but that's apparently tied into your health meter, so if that's low, you can pretty much kiss first place goodbye.

The game's 70 plus tracks resemble futuristic roller coasters, except the roads are pretty wide. There's definitely a lot of room to maneuver, and considering the number of robots on any given track, that's definitely a good thing. But the sense of speed (at least initially) is pretty weak and the action's not all that intense. However, the IG Machines are customizable (winning races earns you money that can be used to purchase new parts), and you'll be able to experiment with a lot more attacks than what the developers initially give you, so for all I know, things could pick up considerably.

The single player game doesn't appear all that thrilling, and unfortunately, I'm getting the same vibe from the multiplayer component. If Namco were smart it would make IGPX online enabled and allow six people to crush one another, but instead of making this extra step (probably more like a tap routine, really), the company wimped out and crafted an offline two-player versus mode.

I've never watched the show, so I can't comment on whether or not Sting has remained faithful to the material. But as a random game about robots and race tracks, IGPX hasn't impressed me yet. It's still early, so for all I know it may become this life-altering experience, but considering the success that Namco Bandai (Bandai in particular) has had with anime-based games, I'm not getting my hopes up. GameDaily will post a review shortly after the game's September 13 release.