So I dabbled in Mario Kart 64 150cc because hey, maybe Mario Kart 64 isn't so bad as I remember. Maybe I was being too harsh?
Boy I was wrong.
It's still as terrible as I remember it. I still cannot believe this game has gotten past basic playtesting or how anyone can enjoy at least its single player. I guess I'm retiterating what's been said about this a thousand times, but there is no way this game is better than any other Mario Kart by any stretch of imagination. It's definitely the worst among the series and probably among the worst of all playable racing games.
Its AI
single-handedly ruins any sort of fun, strategy, etc. The game actually controls okay except the drifting is weird and unwieldy. But anyhow, the rubberbanding is basically you just have to keep these characters in the screen or else you will fall behind. The rubberbanding is so extreme that any lead you gain WILL be quickly be gone. This disincentives ANY sort of risk taking as all boosts you get from trying to follow a racing line and successfully drifting will be negated by the AI. Additionally, the game punishes your mistakes
hard because your kart grinds to a halt and it's easy to have the AI take the lead, vanish, and then speed up to ridiculous degrees. The Red Shell's tracking is horrific, too. They're useless in corridors and they have no idea how walls work.
So you don't take any risks. You just drive and avoid obstacles. You hit one obstacle, your lead is gone for good as catching up is nearly impossible. But it makes Mario Kart 64's 150cc extremely dull and focused way too much on dodging obstacles and using items purely defensively. And you save one of your items just to temporarily keep the CPUs off your back because as long they're a few feet from you, they're not really going to pass you, just stay at the same speed (and since their most threatening item is the fake item box, it's safe to just be close to them), but it's good to save the Lightning Bolt as a backup OR you use it at the end of the race to prevent the AI simply driving past you at the last millimeter (as what happened in Toad's Turnpike). Mushrooms, outside of cutting through offroad, are absolutely worthless and they don't feel like a speed boost.
Even if Mario Kart Double Dash's AI is piss easy, at least you can afford to take risks shortcuts and drift boosts and feel rewarded for them, and if you mess up, you can still make a comeback. Even if you secure a lead in Double Dash, the course itself is usually interesting enough to keep you going and drift boosting. Not Mario Kart 64. You don't drift boost because there's no reward for it, they'll be on you. You just get punished because you couldn't dodge an obstacle or the AI will catch up to you anyway. You just drive and keep your shells out and hope you don't get hit by an unlucky banana they throw at you or make a mistake and roll off a slope. Oh, and AI loves running into their own bananas. Peach one time threw a banana right next to me, just to slip RIGHT when she threw it. Any lead you gain is probably from lucky items and you cutting the track but if you see 150cc playthough, you notice
this person is constantly drift boosting and I've just driven the track without doing any of that, just turning and drifting when I need to, and the AI is still right behind you and absorbing all items you have behind you, which I do too.
I'd give it a 2/10 because, well, it at least works; it looks okay (but generic). Otherwise, it's a trash-tier Mario Kart whose only saving grace is a decent (but not especially great) track design which is spoiled because you're not encouraged to tackle the track with drifting and staying in the racing line. It's among the worst Mario games. The short-sighted developers for this digital disease were likely drugged while play testing because this game sucks
hard. IF you just fix the AI, make them more reasonable, even implement a reverse rubberbanding rather than have them shoot off because they weren't rendered AHEAD, or even increase the render distance, it'll make the game a lot more engaging. Make drifts and taking risks ACTUALLY REWARDING.
As it stands, it's the dullest Mario Kart, somehow more dull than even freaking Mario Kart Tour. The 150cc is shockingly boring despite being touted as fast and high-energy. On top of it, it has. scant content and zero unlockables beyond Extra Mode. It's developed by incompetent sadistic dolts and it's a stain on the Mario Kart series.
Why do you enjoy Mario Kart 64? Have you replayed it in 150cc and tried to get first in every race? Why do you think it's any good? What are you doing that I'm not? I really want to know what kind of value people put on it.