My Analysis and Opinion for Mario Kart 7
by LeftyGreenMario
Mario Kart is an enjoyable series. I've always liked Mario Kart for its zany gameplay that is much different than the usual racing games. In fact, it has influenced other racing games. However, no racing game has been as successful or popular as Mario Kart.
Like almost any series, there is a jump or a dip in perfomace of the games. Mario Kart is no different. Here, we have the latest Mario Kart game, Mario Kart 7 for the 3DS. Although there are many opinions on this, I'll give a review on this game on my own one. Now, this review might seem long. I'm trying to include every detail in this game so I can show my opinion on it. I don't want people to think that this is a rant especially about being a snobbish female user disecting every last detail. Rather, I want to point out the flaws that can be fixed. No game is perfect. The only mode I have not played extensively is online mode, but I'll draw some opinions that people complain about.
Parts and Coins
Mario Kart 7 introduced some brand-new concepts. The most honorable one, in my opinion, is that the player can select his or her kart body part, wheels, or gliders. I can call it "customization", but only two parts of the kart will be visisble most of the time. On the good side, this is the first time the Mario Kart series had introduced such a thing, which is wonderful, but on the bad side, it is rather limited in terms of customization. In the later games, Nintendo should add more body, wheel, and glider parts, or they should add more customization of the details of each part, or they can add more options such as a customizable engine. If they decide to ditch the option, then shame on them. The parts can use a bit more variety in terms of stats as well, especially the gliders. Bascially, all the gliders are categorized into three parts: fast, hard-to-turn gliders; slow, easier-to-turn gliders, and gliders that are somewhere in between. That is rather limited. Also, the gliders that are hard (or tedious) to recieve (Beast Glider and the Gold Glider) have the same stats as the Super Glider, which is a disappointment. I think there should be more gliders and stats that differ as much as the bodies and wheels do. However, again, the addition of changeable parts is a great addition.
Also, there are characterisitcs that are hidden in normal gameplay. Why Nintendo did this, it's a mystery. Don't they want to let their players know what kart performs best underwater or in the air? Isn't that part of the customization process, letting players pick what they think is best for them?
Speaking of the tedious-to-obtain things, what Nintendo did wrong was the coin system. Now, the coins themselves aren't too bad, but the sheer amount the player has to collect is horrendous. Players collect coins in every race, basically. However, the coin cap is a measly 10 coins. Coins do increase the kart's speed, but the top speed should max at 10 coins, not how 10 coins is the cap and collecting anymore does not count to the total. Instead, it should be like in Diddy Kong Racing. In that game, players can collect 15 bananas (which function similar to coins), but their top speed maxes at 10 bananas. However, the extra five bananas is counted.
Now, how is the ten coin cap a problem? Well, since players can get ten coins per race maximum, and since there are four races per cup, players can get a total of 40 coins. Let's look in relative terms of how much that is. Every time players collect a certain amount of coins, a part is unlocked at random. (The random unlocking is lazy, by the way. Nintendo should provide a shop where players can buy parts they choose from their accumulated coins (like in Diddy Kong Racing DS.) This way, players don't have to get parts they dislike.)
Anyway, I mentioned previously that the 10 coins per race is bad. Here is why: at the beginning, players can unlock their first part with 50 coins. Then, it is 100 coins. It doesn't sound bad, consdering the max of 40 coins per cup, but later, the interval increases. When the player has unlocked most of the non-golden parts, he or she has to collect 500 conis to unlock a new part, which means that 50 races must be played. In perspective, there are 8 cups, each with 4 races, which makes a total of only 32 races. Now, racing all the cups again sounds rather boring, but this is one of the only ways to get a certain part. The Beast Glider, the last non-Golden part players can unlock, requires a whopping 5,000 coins to obtain, which means there are 500 races played before it is unlocked. Compared to 500 races, all the races in the game is rather measly.
Now, the Golden parts require a disgustingly high amount of coins to unlock. Once the player receives the Beast Glider, finally earning 5,000 coins, the next part is the Golden Glider, which requires DOUBLE the amount. Then, there are the Golden Wheels, which require another 5,000 coins to receive. However, these wheels can be received rather easily by beating the cups in 150cc. No, the real part that requires a grueling long time to unlock is the Gold Standard. This part requires a grotesque 20,000 coins. Obtaining the Beast Glider requires a substantial amount of time, but the Gold Standard requires FOUR times that amount. The fact that all these parts are not even very redeeming adds only injury to the completionist.
Now there is an alternate way, fortunately, to get the Gold Standard. It is by earning a Vs Rating of 10,000. It still requires some time, since every player starts at 1,000 VR, but this method is faster. Now, I'm not too big on online play, so I don't know how much effort this takes to receive 10,000 VR.
Gameplay
Like in most Mario games, the gameplay is the most redeeming quality. There may be no backgrounds and stories, but at least this gives Nintendo to focus on making the actual game. I think I even prefer a lack of story in the Mario Kart series. I can just say they are racing for fun.
Items are the reason Mario Kart is unique. Basically, they can let players win or lose the race. If the players are last, they get stronger items. The items get less and less powerful once players rise in position. I won't go into detail about the items, but I will offer some changes to the items and my reaction to them.
Bananas are much stronger compared to Mario Kart Wii and Mario Kart: Double Dash!!. However, this is probably because that fake item boxes are absent. I haven't missed the fake item box that much since they fail to block incoming red shells. Red Shells have been stronger mostly, since they can fly in the air and hit players. I find that an unnecessary and rather annoying feature. Stars increase the player's acceleration greatly, which is actually rather inconvenient since there is a higher chance of overshooting. The mechanics have also changed how a player gets hit by a star. I'm not sure how it happens, but sometimes, the opponents get pushed aside rather getting knocked aside as usual. Lightning Bolts, which attack all players on the screen, have not changed since Mario Kart DS, but I still do not understand why the last player regrows since in practice and theory, this does not benefit the Lightning Bolt user much.
Spiny Shells have recieved a drastic change. They lose their wings, but they still explode in impact. I really like this Spiny Shell much more since it now attacks all players that get in its path, but it is still painfully ubiquitous as in the previous 3 games. What I dislike is the fact that Spiny Shells cannot be dragged behind the user, which hinders its usefulness somewhat. Also, this Spiny Shell flies through walls, making tracking its path a little less predictable. Why the Spiny Shell hovers, I have no idea. It should act like Red Shells that go after first place, and it should be destroyed by walls and pits.
There are new additions in the game, but my least favorite is the Fire Flower. The impact of a fire ball hitting a player is weaker than a Banana slip, but since the user can hurl it mulitple times, the user can spam it on a player. The computers get it too often,and their apparent precision makes it even more painful. Another new addition is the Lucky 7, which I do not like either. It gives players too much items to abuse. In Battle Mode, especially in shells-only matches, where players with the Lucky 7 get 7 spinning red shells, is overkill.
Now, it might be all bad for Mario Kart 7, but no, it isn't. Again, the game returns almost all parts of its gameplay that Mario Karters are familiar. The drifting mechanic is returned from Mario Kart Wii, which is something I respect, because I know snaking from Mario Kart DS. My stance is against snaking. Snaking does not do any good to my fingers or the control pad. I am very glad that snaking has been at least greatly reduced in effectiveness.
For some reason, the timer that records the player's time during a Grand Prix race is absent (same goes for multiplayer VS mode). I believe this is just sheer laziness. It is a quite small irk, I admit, but when Nintendo fails to include the small things, laziness shows. As the saying goes, a small hole can sink a large ship.
Mario Kart 7 is a very enjoyable game. Despite all these complaints I have, the game does not lack any major glitches that affect the quality of the game (the Maka Wuhu glitch does not count as a glitch that makes the game unplayable), which is respectable, since the debugging process is very tedious and difficult. However, it has some flaws that I cannot leave out. It's still very fun, but there is a significant amount of frustration involved.
CPU Programming
This is my least favorite part of the game by far. Each character has three AI opponents that are set to give headaches to whoever the players may main. For me, I'm a Mario user, but Metal Mario and Bowser are recurring every match. Peach is another pain in the tootsies for me, but at least she does not recur every single darn match. Now, this type of setup is lazy, lacks variety, sometimes doesn't make any sense, and it gives the player who mains a certain character an evolving hatred for the opponents. Before, I was neutral to Peach. Now, she makes me very mad and frustated, to the point that I strongly dislike her. Metal Mario and Bowser don't seem to give me as much pain as Peach, however. Further proof is that players who main Toad have a hatred for Koopa Troopa, Peach, or Rosalina; players who main Yoshi seem to share a common dislike for Toad. While it's not set in stone (I have a very strong dislike for Yoshi), I still dislike this system of set AI. It is Super Mario Kart's haunt (another game with set AI), I guess.
My biggest frustation is the AI's performace in 150cc and Mirror Mode. Rubberbanding is just an unfair, artificial difficulty to the game. Not to mention, it is lazy as well. Mario Kart 7, while it is kilometers better than Mario Kart 64's AI, is quite bad. In 150cc, the AI is directly behind the player most of the time. It is as if the AI is simply waiting for the player to make a mistake. What makes it worse is that the AI is faster than the human player overall in 150cc and Mirror. In straights and the beginning of the course, the AI zooms ahead most of the time. That might also be the case in Mario Kart Double Dash!!, but the AI in that game are very stupid and they go into lapses where the human player can speed past them. In Mario Kart 7's case, in Maka Wuhu, the first place AI stays ahead of the course 90% of time in many instances for me.
The AI has also taken advantages of shortcuts for perhaps the first time in a Mario Kart game. While this might be seen as a positive for smarter AI, I view it as a bad thing. Since the AI is already cheap, their potential to use shortcuts adds salt to the wound.
Overall, the AI is not too difficult. In the 50cc, everything is relatively easy. In 100cc, the computer players move a bit faster than the human player, but they are still bearable. In 150cc and Mirror Mode, the AI can be very infuriating. Mario Kart Wii and Mario Kart Double Dash's 150cc and Mirror computers seem much tamer than these rubber-banding cheaters. Fortunately, it is very easy to obtain three stars (the highest driver ranking) in this game: stay ahead and get first place in all three races. Players can still gain three stars if they fall off the course 3 times (which loses plenty of time in a race), as long as they get first and stay first as much as they can. In Mario Kart Wii, it is more complicated and difficult with a hidden point system that factors how many times tricks are performed, walls are bumped, kart goes off-road, Lakitu has to fish the player, etc.
At least the AI won't ragequit or purposely abuse a star just to get the human player.
Graphics and Sound
Like all Mario Kart games, the graphics in this game are not incredible, but graphics are not the whole of the game. I am not going to majorly rate on the game based on how smooth the models appear. For models, the Mario characters still have blocks with painted fingers, not an improvement since Mario Kart Double Dash!!, an old game. The characters in this game have better mouths, which is better than Mario Kart Wii's textured mouths.
The biggest problem is the resizing of characters on the karts. No, I am not talking about Honey Queen or Wiggler. I am talking about the princesses. If a player has already unlocked the Pipe Frame (a go-kart part), the player can notice that the dresses of Peach, Rosalina, and Daisy are incredible tiny in proportion to their bodies. I have not seen anybody else point that out. While Mario Kart 7's models are definitely an improvement from Mario Kart DS's curious lack of legs, is can definitely use some work for a Mario Kart game. The characters are never out of their kart. I bet if they were, Peach, Rosalina, and Daisy will not look very attaractive with their tiny feet and dresses. Bowser also has the same tiny feet symptom.
While the models are an improvement overall (despite lack of propotion of the body), the models seem to downgrade once non-playable characters are included. The opponents' models, both human and CPU, are much more jagged and generally worse-looking than the player's animating model. While it is mostly a minor issue, I wish there can be some more consistency on the models.
The sounds in this game is a disappointment. Most sounds are recycled from Mario Kart Wii (2007) and Mario Kart Double Dash!! (2003). I do not know why Nintendo has to recycle voice clips from an 8-year old game when a more recent game (Mario Kart Wii) has a huge bank of it. Not only that, some of the recycled clips are noticeably shortened (one of Mario's cannon voice clips, one of Donkey Kong's noise when he gets a player, and one of Daisy's winning voice clips have noticeable cuts in their voices, which makes the voice sound unnatural and rather ugly.) Nintendo can do a more subtle job than that, and does cutting a voice by a few millisecond save plenty of space?
The 3D is in the game, but the effect is subtle. I think it is too subtle, but I'm not a big fan of 3D in the first place anyway.
The frame rate in this game is fluid and wonderful, a good point. I wish they would focus more on the models themselves, though.
(continued)
