Goo-Net Find Of The Week: The Mitusoka Orochi, Japan’s Strangest Sports Car

Welcome to Goo-Net Find of the Week, a new series in which we pretend we’re not procrastinating on a Friday afternoon by idly browsing the coolest online used car platform in the world, Japan’s Goo-Net Exchange.

We really hope you’re familiar with Mitsuoka already but, if not, we really urge you to dive deep. The Japanese manufacturer is one of the weirdest and wonderful in the business, creating some utterly bonkers and fascinating retro-styled cars.

Most of Mitsuoka’s works are based on new cars that are given face and bum transplants to look like non-Japanese classics, new interiors to match and then slapped with a new name. Recent examples include the ND Mazda MX-5-based Rock Star, styled to look a bit like a C2 Corvette, the Toyota RAV4-based and Chevy Blazer-aping Buddy and most recently the M55, inspired by the original Dodge Challenger and based on a Honda Civic.

As weird as these may be, at least you know they’re built on the foundations of solid, OEM cars merely with extensive cosmetic work. There was one occasion when Mitsuoka decided it could go it alone with its own car, though, resulting in this mad-looking creation

The Mitsuoka Orochi took the translation of ‘Huge serpent’ for its name, and apparently, its design was supposed to reflect one, too. That may explain the slightly unsettling snake-like oval grille, the strange vented bonnet, gopping headlights and well… everything, quite frankly.

Say what you want, though, but its low-slung silhouette and staunch proportions at least suggested it’d be a fast car. Err, yeah, about that.

Based on a custom chassis, its power came in the form of a Toyota-sourced 3.3-litre V6 engine with… 231bhp. Sent through a five-speed automatic taken from the Lexus RX of the early ‘00s, that’d make for a 0-60mph time of seven seconds flat. For some context, that’s about a second and a half slower than the NA2 Honda NSX it was designed to compete with.

Ugly, slow and downright strange, then. We sort of love it. Buyers evidently didn’t. 400 were set for production, but the final figure is thought to be significantly lower (some estimates suggest as few as 20).

One coming up for sale is rare, then, and worthy of a mention. We’ve found one on Goo-Net for ¥13,215,000 (approx. £65,000). That is a lot of money for not a lot of car on paper, but imagine all the heads you will turn in it. We suspect even something like a Lamborghini Temerario would struggle to get a look in next to an Orochi, for better or worse…