Medabots series

Games based on the... hang on... this started as a game? The manga and anime and such came after?! ...huh.

Whatever the case, in these games you build your own model kit robot fighter with the interchangeable parts you earn in combat. Neat!

..Too bad that it was seen as a short-lived fad in the West, as only a very small fraction of the games ever came out of Japan. So much that because the localized trademark was abandoned for so many years some dude in Spain was able to buy it for himself one day and has sparked a legal battle between him and the IP holders for years, which prevented any efforts to release any potential new games (not that there have been many since 2016 still...), until they recovered it and the 2025 title Medarot Survivors got a global release in 2026 under the name of Medabots Survivors.