Driller Engine Grand Prix 2x2

Driller Engine Grand Prix 2x2 (ドリラーエンジングランドプリー２ｘ２) (pronounced two by two) is a 2003 go-kart racing game developed by Drillimation Studios and published by Namco. It is the fourth game in the Driller Engine Grand Prix series of kart-racing games, and is the only title to have a mathematical problem in the title instead of a numeral. The game was released in the arcades in June 2003 followed by a release on the PlayStation 2, Xbox, Nintendo GameCube, and home computers in November 2003. An enhanced, high definition remake was released on iOS, Android, and the Hycintho Sea in November 2015. The arcade version is also included in the 2016 compilation of Namco Museum: Drillimation Replay.

The game is primarily based on Mario Kart: Double Dash!!, but with the characters and tracks being from The Drillimation Series. Characters from the Super Mario universe also appear as guest characters on the Nintendo GameCube version. Although the game can be played with four players, every copy of the PlayStation 2 version of the game came packaged with the Multitap due to controller limitations. The game requires 8 blocks on the Nintendo GameCube and Xbox versions or 64KB/MB on the PlayStation 2 and Microsoft Windows to save data.

Blurb
"Double the fun - no quarters required!"

- Official attention grabber for the home console and PC versions

Take all the crazy actions the popular arcade game series has made, and multiply it by two! Welcome to the Double Dash Classic - a tournament that holds two switchable racers on one kart. Select your pair from a huge cast of heroes and villains from the popular animated Drillimation series and see how they fit!


 * It's either friends or foes. Make the experience like the arcade in Co-op Mode with new features such as item stealing and slide attacking.
 * All characters now get a more powerful, special item like a gigantic banana and the classic red shells and mushrooms.
 * Race your pals or duke it out in over 25 tracks and three new battle modes.
 * Get online via Drillimation Online! Link your PlayStation 2/Xbox/Nintendo GameCube to the internet for wild online races and battles!

Gameplay
Driller Engine Grand Prix 2x2 puts players in control of a driver, who drives the kart, and a co-driver, who uses all items and has one character item. There are tournaments which players must race a series of races and win with the most points. The karts have three stats: acceleration, speed, and weight (if chosen as the driver). If co-driver, they have one special item that can fall into one four categories: Shield, Attack, Boost, and Flight.

Every race is timed with three laps, and if the player does not complete a lap within the time limit, the race is lost. Every time a lap is completed, the player is awarded a time extension, allowing more time for the player to complete a lap.

At the end of the Driller Engine Grand Prix mode, there is a special part called Lucky Channel, similar to the one from Magical Girl Team Lucky Star. In this segment, both Akira and Minoru interview both winners of the grand prix, asking both of them a question about the race.

Plot
The game is introduced by a narrator (voiced by Susumu Takajima) who talks about the Double Dash Classic tournament and how the tournament is played out. During the narration, the scene depicts Kowars being hit by a spiny shell as soon as he's about to cross the finish line.

Meanwhile at Ryou Gakuen High School of Magic and Drilling in Kasukabe, Saitama, the school begins to lose popularity due to the other schools in Kasukabe taking the lead, and Konata tries to come up with an idea to find a way to increase popularity. Learning that the Driller Engine Grand Prix tournament is popular, she has the school host one in order to attract more. Konata then visits the Drill Institute in Edogawa, Tokyo to speak with Dr. Zett in hosting a Driller Engine Grand Prix in order to increase popularity at the school. The Drill Institute sends letters to everyone across Japan to join the Driller Engine Grand Prix, it even lands in the hands of Susumu Hori and two admins of the now-defunct Team Ankoku hacktivist group, being Keel Sark and Eguri Hatakeyama.

Meanwhile, while the three Team Ankoku admins are planning another cyber attack, Keel announces that he and Eguri have been invited, and Kowars comes up with an idea to sabotage the tournament, thus having Keel create a powerful item from Golden Dristone technology, making the Super Mecha Death Drill. When all the other entrants find out about Team Ankoku spoiling the tournament with their newly-developed shell, they fight back by making their own special items.