Medabots, known in Japan as Medarot (メダロット, Medarotto), is a Japanese-Canadian role-playing video game franchise created by Rin Horuma (Horumarin) and currently owned by Imagineer. The main series of RPGs focus on collecting and battling with the titular robots. The bulk of the games releases have been on Nintendo platforms, including the Game Boy family, Nintendo GameCube, and the DS and 3DS handhelds.
The series was adapted into a Japanese anime television series spanning two adaptations. The first was animated by Bee Train while the second, Medarot Damashii, was animated by Production I.G. The television series originally aired on TV Tokyo from July 2, 1999 to March 30, 2001. Both series were originally licensed and localized into English by Nelvana and were broadcast on YTV in Canada and Fox Kids and ABC Family in the United States from 2001 to 2004.
A manga series, written by Rin Horuma, was also produced. It was serialized in the children's magazine Comic BomBom in Japan and then published into collected volumes by Kodansha. The manga based on the first game, Medarot, was never translated into English, but the manga based on the sequel, Medarot 2, was licensed for an English language release in North America by Viz Media, simply under the title Medabots. Medarot 2, 3, and 4, have also been translated into English for distribution in Singapore by Chuang Yi.
To date, only Medabots (a remake of Medarot 2 for Game Boy Advance), Medabots AX, and Medabots Infinity have been released in North America. There have also been plastic models produced by Kotobukiya.
A compilation game Medarot Classics Plus was released on November 12, 2020. It features the Kabuto and Kuwagata versions of the first eight mainline games.[1]
