Mario Kart World

[Xiahou Dun]

Custom emblems were a cute gimmick but most of the time you're not really seeing them unless you're using the awful Rambi Rider or you finish a race.

That being said, it's a pity Mario Kart World created these detailed stickers and designed their entire unlock system for a reason to explore their otherwise barren wasteland, only for these things to be completely undermined by the lack of control and design sense on how to apply them. What's the point making these things if they're just going to be placed in a microscopic spot of most vehicles?

List of stickers in Mario Kart World

In Mario Kart World, the player can unlock stickers, decals that can be used to customize their vehicle and earned by completing various objectives, such as racing in Grand Prix cups, driving certain distances, and completing P Switch missions in...

www.mariowiki.com

What an effort amounting to nothing. I'd pity these graphics less if they were AI generated.

 

[Xiahou Ba]

So, I've played quite a bit of Mario Kart World. Mind you, only winning the 150cc cups with my sister, I haven't played Free Roam. This is fresh off of playing Kirby Air Riders and Sonic Racing Crossworlds; I'll preface with this: both racing games are much better than Mario Kart World despite what Geoff Keighley might tell you in which I'll try to explain in-depth why that's the case. Keep in mind, this is coming from someone who has played and loved the series as a whole, so a lot of it comes from the heart as someone who has hyped Mario Kart Wii, 8, 7 (especially 8) as one of the most hyped up games of all time.

I really think Nintendo dropped the ball hard on this game, and so much of their design philosophy contradicts with our ability to simply have fun here, as well as so many archaic design choices that plague this game that other racing games have moved on from. I didn't come into this game with good expectations, especially after coming off the demo I played on the kiosk at Target, but after getting a proper run with it with my sister through all cups in the game in 150cc, the entire design of the game is lampooned by its awful track design and lackluster racing mechanics, which is the crux of most of the game's problems. The addition of 24 racers also contributes to this design and I think it's a big mistake: adding more racers has decreasing returns and I really think 24 is an unnecessary amount that also is resource intensive and contributes to the ridiculously wide track design. While we played against CPUs, never once did we drop below 12th place and if we did, we quickly got out of it, even in 150cc. I'm aware they did patch to make the CPUs easier, but their difficulty fluctuates and then they just let you win like in the last lap. They're not difficult, and every single time we reset the Grand Prix, it was only because the rival CPU placed 2nd instead of both of us being 1st and 2nd.

The routes (aka "intermissions") are terribly designed and are ill-fitted to be in Mario Kart. Had this been in a much faster racing game like Forza Horizons or Sonic Racing Crossworlds, they would have been very fun. Here? Mario Kart's strong points has never been its sense of speed: Mario Kart has extremely maneuverable vehicles that can take tight turns, and most Mario Kart tracks knows this (it's tough to drive in Mario Kart tracks with a conventional vehicle in something like Beam.ng). So much bouts of the game has you racing in a straight line while jack all is happening, and this is especially apparent on the route to Crown City, where we memed it being a morning commute and we just obeyed traffic laws while we were "racing" (we both ened up destroying the rival 150cc CPU in this "race"). 200cc would have alleviated some of my speed concerns with this game, but IMO it's a band-aid solution to the whole issue of tracks being way too wide where no turns are difficult to handle save for the tightest of loops in 150cc (like the U-Turn in Mario Circuit). The route design also is extremely counter-productive to learning the tracks too, because you spend the last lap on the track and thus the tracks become insanely forgettable as a result. One track in the game is literally just a straight line of up and down, (Peach Stadium I believe) and it was an awful part of the track. The game's Rainbow Road is a whole lot of being pretty without having any sort of substantial gameplay about it at all: people say it looks pretty but it plays terribly and I think it's probably the second worst Rainbow Road in the series, after the original N64 Rainbow Road because it's just mindboggingly boring to race on, having the same issues as a lot of tracks of being simply too wide and straight to have fun on it.

The new driving mechanics being the ability to leap off the ground and drive on the wall and drive on rails are fun additions, but they mean very little when the game's overall track design is so poor. Yes, I've seen advanced tricks online, and yes they do look fun to pull off, but to me, it's not worth learning it just because of how overall boring the game is and the counterintuitive straight lines and ridiculously wide roads. At least they should give you the ability to boost further when you perform stunts while you're in the air so doing more than one stunt actually means something than just giving you a button to mash while you're in the air, like how the Sonic Racing games do it.

Oh yeah, the items kind of suck in this game and much of the useful items you can get amount to trying to smack the CPUs down with Red Shells because virtually every item in get in like 2nd or 3rd are useless triple Bananas or coins or Coin Blocks, plus the Fire Flowers are nerfed hard in this game by being much slower and less spammable (the blue icy Fire Flowers are literally...what's the point of having them, they're functionally just a palette swap entirely). The Spiny Shell as a first place control item has became entirely archaic especially compared to other kart racers of its ilk (especially in the Sonic Racing games which have much better and fairer first place control items), the only counterplay is holding onto a Super Horn and hoping you don't get hit by a Lightning Bolt or a Boo stealing your item.

The soundtrack? It's a mixed bag. It has its share of great tunes, it's great if you're nostalgic for them, but it has its share of trash rearrangements. I liked Moonview Highway and Vancouver Velocity. I disliked SNES Koopa Beach and Rosalina's Ice World. I can barely hear the music in this game and I really wish I can turn the music off in Free Roam to get immersed and soak into the world's ambiance thanks to Nintendo's dogmatic insistance that we have to play with their sound mixing as intended, their solution to this is one of the worst cases of sound mixing options I have ever seen in a video game. Speaking of rearrangements from a track design perspective, so many returning tracks I think got completely butchered, this includes Choco Mountain, Dino Dino Jungle, Wario Stadium; those are the types of tracks I criticized earlier when they refurbished Ribbon Road in Mario Kart 8. If they're going to bring back tracks and redo them to the point of being virtually unrecognizable, there's just little point of "returning" them at all and just design an entirely new track and layout in whatever new theme they're doing. In something like Dino Dino Jungle, they really should have just left the old track alone, and designed a new one entirely.

The vehicle unlocking system has become ridiculously archaic at this point: I'm so tired of collecting 100 coins to unlock some bullshit random part and more often than not, it's a vehicle that I really don't want to use. What exactly is wrong with the conventional approach of going to a store and buying the parts you want that other racing games employ? The vehicle customization system sucks in this game too (one of the worst vehicle customization options in racing games period), and those stickers (which serve as the game's only worthwhile unlocks especially in the Free Roam mode) are horrible and barely worth mentioning. It's a huge waste of development resources too: the stickers are fun and well-designed and would look impeccable if they were actually sold as merch that you can stick in your actual car, but here? They're tiny-ass little JPGs you almost never see in your vehicle or a tiny ass icon next to your character, so much better development resources could have been spent being able just to tweak the paint of your kart. It would have been less development budget and much more reward if you're able to at least freely change the color of your vehicle to express yourself, and I've been asking for a paint job feature since forever. A lot of the vehicle designs I do not like and some of them I do like the design but I don't like the color (Hot Rod and Chargin' Truck) and having a color change option would have alleviated that. I miss the ability to slap Monster tires on every single vehicle in the game and the removal of the feature is very frustrating to me.

For some fucking reason, I don't know why the costume and the "NPC driver" unlock system is what it is: an unconventional convoluted mess, just designed for the sake of being different than other racing games. Why do I have to eat at a drive-through at some particular fuck-off area in the map to unlock costumes? Why do I have to wait until Kamek changes me into some jackass just to unlock them? Why does it even change the character I'm using at all, like what's the point? I want to play as Baby Luigi, why the fuck is the game changing me to a character I don't even want to play as? Plus, why is there a ridiculous uneven distribution of character costumes in this game? Why doesn't Baby Luigi have a swimwear alt???? Anyway, these unlocks could have been part of the P-Switch objective in Free Roam instead of just unlocking those useless bullshit stickers but here we are. The new characters are give and take, I personally don't care about them much, especially the throw-away NPC drivers but they're not worth the cost of the cut racers either (yes they had to cut racers for no reason).

Oh I didn't go into much depth with Free Roam. There's zero excuse to have it to be single player only (two players can only access it through some janky bullshit so like...why not have natural integration), and without co-op Free Roam, there's no reason to engage with that mode. The entire thing is just a colorful barren wasteland. I wish you can turn the music off here and I wish there's a first person option, btw, both features that used to be present in a past Mario Kart. I also didn't bother playing with Knockout Tour for the same reasons, though peolpe say it's the highlight of the game buuuut...I don't know if the context is playing co-op with friends offline or playing online, but I don't think this mode will alleviate any of the deep-seated issues I have with the game as a whole so blah.

The voices are rather dull and forgettable too. Whatever happened to satisfying voice effects we got in Mario Kart: Double Dash, Mario Kart Wii, and Mario Kart 7? I've had issues with the voice since Mario Kart 8 and they're still highly prevalent here too, where they take a backseat to all sounds in the game. At least the explosion sound is very satisfying.

The game's graphics are nothing to write home about, but I will not blame the game for this: they obviously have to make sacrifices to make this run at a fixed 60fps including two player splitscreen so I can forgive them for some rough edges in its presentation. 24 racers again are rather expendable though, I'd rather they cut the amount back to 12 if that means we can have a game that looks and runs better. Performance is probably the game's best thing about it, but honestly, you can only polish its mediocre gameplay loop so much and at the end of the day it's still just a mediocre Mario Kart game no matter how polished the gameplay is.

So anyway, I've spent a lot of time griping about this game, the good parts of the game? Absolutely the characters. If your favorite is playable, seeing them is literally the only reason you'll have fun with this game. I know it was for me. Which really makes this game all the more tragic. I really didn't want to gripe about this game as much as I did. There was a lot of heart poured onto the body and facial animations of these characters, and it makes me all the more sad that these lovable and beloved characters are stuck to an aggressively mediocre Mario Kart. I'm so happy Baby Luigi even got two alts, even if that meant he had the least alts out of all baby characters (again no Swimwear Baby Luigi is a Geneva Convention violation and I stand by that). He's extremely lovable in this game.

The worst part of all of this is that Nintendo charges 80 dollars for this game. I know this talking point has been brought up over and over again and I'm sure many of you are tired of hearing it at this point but it must be repeated because Nintendo should be held up to higher standards than this. Nintendo HAD put their games out with higher standards than this. Mario Kart World DOES have hints of it in it which makes my entire gripes all the more infuriating because I know they can do better than this. However the game we got is basically a game that screams "we need to move Switch 2 units because Mario Kart 8 Deluxe has been such a smash hit" rather than "we want to make a good and fun kart racer that everybody can enjoy, whether they're new to the game or are veterans", and Mario Kart World at this point really feels like it was designed for newbies than Mario Kart veterans. Never had I felt so burnt out from a Mario Kart title, especially coming from playing Mario Kart 8 for so, so, so long, and this entry only exacerbated it. In the wake of the timespan since the release of 8 until now, so much better kart racers that have further pushed the envelope has came out since (Kirby Air Riders and Sonic Racing Crossworlds, both came out this year, and I don't want to go into much detail into why both those two games really felt like they wanted to be a good kart racer on their own merits with so much customization and fun mechanics unique to them than selling on just its brand name alone) that this kind of quality from Mario Kart is unacceptable, and I don't think diehard Mario Kart fans have to put up with such mediocrity.

Anyway, tl;dr: the game is 6/10 from a Mario Kart fan's perspective for any of you who won't bother reading my post so here you go I guess. Baby Luigi and his little charming obscene gesture he does at the beginning of Knockout Tour himself cannot carry this game unfortunately.

 

[Xiahou Dun]

My sister wrote a big post but an experience that'll stick to me is jumping into 150cc Special Cup after Special Cup was unlocked, finally racing on Rainbow Road, for the first time, zero familiarity with the track, on the game's max speed and difficulty, and I was laughing my ass off at how I was front running the entire race and there were literally no CPUs and even my sister was behind albeit saving her shells for pelting CPUs behind us.

I've tried to give this game a chance, I really did, I wanted to tune up difficulty, I tried to solo 150cc special cup (same thing happened, got first all four races). I still had fun I guess but in the wrong ways possible with this game (also sometimes LARPing as commuters in 150cc intermissions and then getting 1st place). Maybe Knockout Tour is the real brilliance of the game idk. But it can't make up for me asking myself "what the hell?"

I really wanted to like the soundtrack too but from my experience it's mostly background guitar and brass noise , even with the loud setting on. Like honesty it was so hard to even remark on. I was surprised too, I thought I was going to at least look forward to what was coming up next when the music ended. I can say this soundtrack is a rare specimen where the music sounds way better on YouTube than in the game it's supposed to be designed for.

I guess I can't hate the game that much due to how much I laughed *at* it for the wrong reasons but since my time on 150cc Rainbow Road I can say this game is the marvelous shitpost of Mario Kart, almost feels like a parody of it, and it doesn't help when the older tracks were redesigned to be unrecognizable, all the characters look and sound very off, the unlocking system is erratic bullshit, the new driver additions are literal track hazards, the music are weirdo cover versions washed out by the sfx, and more.

 

[Fizzle]

Now that I've unlocked "some" of Mario Kart World's characters and things (done with NPC drivers, still have like 40 costumes to go, Special Cup done etc.) and said I'm gonna push to 100% the game (which I mean just getting every sticker, including 30 thousand... coins doh), I'll go ahead and speak my thoughts.

I played all eight cups with my family (all eight with two and four with another) and they were good. I mean, my only gripe with the game so far is how much they changed Grand Prix as compared to usual. Some of the tracks are pretty unique, main examples being DK Spaceport turning 25m into a race course and being a first in multiple fronts for Mario Kart, Boo Cinema for the vibes and going into the movie and stuff, and Rainbow Road's absurd length that I lost to all my family members on for once, but some of the tracks could have been swapped out or improved in my opinion.

Tracks like Choco Mountain and Moo Moo Meadows make... not much sense as they return again after just being in MK8/BCP, but they're alright as tracks. They at least rethemed Choco to make more sense then a random brownish mountain in the middle of nowhere, but Moo Moo Meadows is just as meadowy as usual. On the contrary, they managed to make Sky High Sundae more engaging, and make its DLC appearance and in Tour seem like a backport. I'm pretty fond of Mario Circuit for mashing the circuits together in a single track instead of using just one, but we will likely never see Mario Circuit 4 ever again. Salty Salty Speedway is just a bit forgettable to me, but the other tracks were OK (not talking to you, Peach Beach, when the "retro" gets stripped from you unless its a 3-lap race)

Now, I've done a bit of free roam. Roughly 30 P-Switches, 12 Medallions, 41 Panels. This is gonna be so difficult. Why, though, does DK Spaceport, of all tracks, have the most elaborately hidden panels of all, I'm still missing two there. Same to Boo Cinema. I've just been finding switches on my search for the panels (which seem to be the easiest) and either playing them or just unlocking them to teleport to. Free Roam is OK, but it still feels like theres not much to find in some areas. There are 394 missions, you could have spiced up some areas with an additional challenge to make a solid 400. Or are they planning on a Rainbow Road area with the remaining 6...

Going back to what I said before, I would change one thing for Grand Prix. Similarly to how they did with Koopa Troopa Beach (why is this track in this game again, and as a Prix's 3-lap slot no less?!) and its to-routes giving 2 laps, I wish that all routed tracks would be 2 or the normal 3 laps instead of a one and done. If you're touching the game for the first time, you'll have no experience with a track in a Prix and no time to prepare for it either, which was pretty evident for my family's playthrough.

The music is great, but I wish it was easier to hear in game. If they put so much work into it that I would call it an 80$ soundtrack with free game on its YouTube uploads, I wish it wasn't drowned out so easily, even on Loud. (why is it a toggle and not a slider is my main question)

Overall? While open world is not and likely never will be Mario Kart's thing, I see the bit of effort they tried to put in making it work. Right now, this game feels like Breath of the Wild to me: I want to 100% it eventually, but it's going to be ridiculous and take ages. The online scene is OK, but they dropped the bottom out from beneath it with all the nerfs when all we want is a normal, classic racing mode. For now, it's gonna be on my playlist, but I'm enjoying Bananza as much, if not more, as MKW, and I'm having more nostalgia back to my original Odyssey playthrough through it than this to 8DX. I will be accidentally trying to charge jump in that game now, or be messed up with the different drifting.

wow I didn't mean to rant on it this hard lol

 

[Lily]

My sister wrote a big post but an experience that'll stick to me is jumping into 150cc Special Cup after Special Cup was unlocked, finally racing on Rainbow Road, for the first time, zero familiarity with the track, on the game's max speed and difficulty, and I was laughing my ass off at how I was front running the entire race and there were literally no CPUs and even my sister was behind albeit saving her shells for pelting CPUs behind us.

I personally really enjoyed the game but I definitely relate to this. Mario Kart World's Rainbow Road feels like it prioritises spectacle and not track design. I didn't mind it in the grand prix for the finale, at the very least the development team understood the importance of Rainbow Road and tried to make it feel special, but the course itself just isn't interesting to me, and I feel no desire to go back to it. It's especially weird to me how it goes against all the new features that make this game interesting, playing with routes it can only be accessed from one course, and has no routes exiting itself, it doesn't exist at all in open world, and the course has pretty much no spots to make usage of the new wall riding and rail riding mechanics.

 

[Hint Toad]

Some things you should know before I start: As racing games go I mostly stick to the Mario Kart series. I've also played Kirby Air Ride and Air Riders. I've 100% Diddy Kong Racing which is my favorite racing game. But in my review Mario Kart World, I'll be comparing it only to past Mario Kart Games, specifically to Mario Kart Wii, as that one's my favorite of the series.

My Random Thoughts on the Game​

Overall Feel
- For some reason this game feels more like your'e in the Mario universe, compared to past Mario Karts. Maybe it's because of the inclusion of more regular Mario enemies. Not just the racers, but the ones hanging out in the world. I was driving around one time and found this random Fuzzy on a railroad track. Pretty neat. I also learned of the existence of Frost Piranha Plants. Which apparently made their debut in Paper Mario.
- This game is supposed to be about freedom, but at the same time, Nintendo wants to force you to play the intermission tracks which kind of defeats the purpose.
- The biggest let down for me was the lack of a full fledged single player story mode. Bosses and all. They basically created the perfect world for this even.
- I'm not against 24 racers. I just don't think they executed it perfectly.

Characters, Karts, Unlockables
- Some people like to blame the enemy racers for taking up spots of other racers. I blame the costumes. Costumes were cool at first, but I think I like the classic look of the characters more. I like that they got rid of the kart customizations. Which means you can have crazier looking karts.
- The P-Switch missions feel like the bare minimum of a mission mode. I do like that some of them are wicked hard tho.
- I've never liked having to collect coins to unlock vehicles. There's no skill involved in that. I guess they do hide coin piles and rewards around the map but meh.
- I like having achievements but the practicality of the stickers feels like an afterthought.

Driving
- I LOVE how this game feels when your'e driving around!!! It feels SO GOOD!!! The drifting tho is very different from past Mario Karts. Not my favorite, but I'm slowly getting used to it.
- On some tracks the roads are too wide which makes it feel like your'e driving slower in comparison but it's not a huge issue for me.
- As time goes by, Mario Kart games feel like they're getting more and more easy. Which is why I like this games new trick system, as it adds a new layer of depth. Basically, if there's more secrets to pull off, it's better.
- Drafting is way easier to do which I like.

Tracks
- Am I wrong on this or are there no tracks in this game that were introduced in Mario Kart 8? huh. Guess not.
- Some track designs felt rushed. Specifically Starview Peak. Rosalina's Ice World would have been way better. Rainbow road was kind of a let down for me. Looks amazing, but being a Mario Kart Wii fan, way too lackluster in terms of track layout. And you can't even explore it in free roam?!?!
- Not a big fan of the intermission tracks, which is why I've mostly been playing online races recently in the Mario Kart World discord.

Items
- Most of the time my triple shells get destroyed as soon as I get them. So I kinda wish they gave you like 5 or 6 of them to make up for double the players. Same with bananas.
I'm glad Mega Mushroom's back!! Kinda sad it doesn't play the music from New Super Mario Bros. like it used to.
- The time you stay mini or flattened should be way longer I think. Just my preference.

Music
It's wild that they have like every Mario song in existence in this game. Which makes me a little sad when I hear songs from Mario Kart tracks that aren't in the game, cause I know there was a chance of it getting in. They should have just smooshed every track in existence in the game, like how Mario Circuit is. And then also allow the player to make their own racing path like Mario Kart Live.

Final Thoughts
I feel like Nintendo is holding off on us. "Can't have an open world AND a full fledged story mode just yet. We gotta milk it. First we'll introduce the idea of an open world. And then give them a story mode in the next game." That's what I picture Nintendo thinking.

Overall pretty good game. It's definitely one of my favorites.

That's all for now. Can't think of anything more to say off the top of my head.

 

[Xiahou Dun]

People talk praise about the trick system and that stuff but I find it pointless to even engage with that and practice tracks because the game doesn't offer any challenge or otherwise reward you for this. Why should I jump off walls when I can drive straight and maintain a lead in a 150cc course I've never played on? Hell why even bother with shortcuts half the time? I'm sure online is the place for it but that's not an excuse for the game itself being so easy you can win just by proper item management, sandbagging with mushrooms to cut into the course (which is insultingly easy and overwhelmingly advantageous in "routes", further compounded by 1st place being stuck with even more situational or borderline useless items like feathers and coins and coin blocks; bananas don't exactly benefit from these straight ultra wide tracks either; I note online players also complain about sandbagging) following the racing line, and drifting correctly. Hell I find just cornering these wide curves good enough .

 

[Fizzle]

After seeing this one comment on a video titled "7 Billion Reasons Why Kirby Air Riders' Sales Doesn't Matter" by Channel Kirby, I think this describes our three racing games this year the best we can.

Mario Kart has the nice open world and fun mechanics with the wall and rail riding.
Sonic has the fun tracks with plenty of great Sonic references, plus the bonus Sega characters, and is just a solid if not terribly innovative kart racer.
Kirby has the usual Sakurai polish, the great single player mode (plus an achievement list that actually UNLOCKS GOOD STUFF) and an amazing non racing mode in City Trial. And oodles of customization.

So while each game may not have all that we want, each of them cover different mechanics or are for different audiences. Like Air Riders is meant for those diehard fans of the original 20 years ago while still attracting new fans.

 

[Xiahou Ba]

As much as I rail on Mario Kart World, I'm not a hater: I do recognize it has plenty of strong points. The driving feels very nice, the parkour mechanics are great additions, and I think the Free Roam mode could have been absolutely fantastic, especially if it was built for two players to enjoy. My sister and I got around it by wireless connection 2P and "waiting" for another player to join, and it was fun. It's just that Mario Kart World also has a bunch of frustrating design choices that hold it back, and I have a feeling that the developers weren't even finished with this game.

Sonic has the fun tracks with plenty of great Sonic references, plus the bonus Sega characters, and is just a solid if not terribly innovative kart racer.

Sonic Racing Crossworlds can be ridiculously challenging, it on its 150cc equivalent (Super Sonic Speed) is more like 200cc, plus one of the biggest boons to Sonic Racing Crossworlds is its gadgets system (imagine a Mario Kart where you can customize your gameplay so you can hold three items and your more likely to get offensive items or you can run a build that can go up to level 4 drifts). I'd say it's more geared towards players who want a little bit more oomph to their kart racing games, basically players who love 200cc and still want more challenge out of it.

 

[MnSG]

I did try out the online gameplay earlier this month, and it's one heck of a mess if a player who starts with 3000 points can end up in a room filled with 8000+ point players. And good luck trying to get in 1st place even once, because item spam will always find a way to send you from 1st place to dead last in a matter of seconds.

Also, the fact that you can't save online replays is one heck of a downgrade when compared to Mario Kart 8.

 

[Fizzle]

I did try out the online gameplay earlier this month, and it's one heck of a mess if a player who starts with 3000 points can end up in a room filled with 8000+ point players. And good luck trying to get in 1st place even once, because item spam will always find a way to send you from 1st place to dead last in a matter of seconds.

Also, the fact that you can't save online replays is one heck of a downgrade when compared to Mario Kart 8.

Yeah, but I have gotten second in some of my plays (and most of my KO Tour Runs if I survive long enough) but you don't get many points for surviving to the end in KO Tour, and what seems like a lack of invincibility frames in any race is rough