What I hate about Mario Kart

[TV Eye]

Yeah, this is a rant. I love Mario Kart but I have a lot of gripes I need to get off my chest. The series could use a lot of work but they just keep giving us new features in short bursts. Here are my complaints.

Also, long read.

The Characters

Okay, everyone can agree that the 8 from MK64 are always going to be in Mario Kart. We will always have Mario, Luigi, Peach, Bowser, Toad, Yoshi, Donkey Kong, and Wario. These are the characters everybody loves and nobody wants to see go. But ever since Double Dash, the Mario Kart series has hosted a whole slew of unlockable characters to add a bit of flavor, and I LOVE having more characters. The thing is...what makes them choose who comes and who goes? Let's take a look:

Double Dash needed to find doubles to go with the original 8. We have Mario and Luigi now combined, Peach/Daisy, Yoshi/Birdo, Donkey Kong/Diddy Kong, Bowser/Bowser Jr., Wario/Waluigi, and Toad/Toadette. On top of that, they felt the need to have Baby Mario/Baby Luigi, Koopa Troopa/Koopa Paratroopa, and Petey Piranha/King Boo. From a fan's persepective...why did we need the babies and the Koopas? Or better yet, why couldn't Koopa Troopa be partnered with a nonidentical partner like a Goomba or Shy Guy?

Then in Mario Kart DS, they added some new mainstays such as Daisy and Waluigi. I'm not complaining, these two need as much screentime as they can get. But some WTF characters were also added. Dry Bones and R.O.B.

I. Love. These two.

Dry Bones had an awesome tank and his voice effects were great. R.O.B. was also an awesome sendout to classic NES fans. I think Mario Kart DS had the best list of characters.

Mario Kart Wii on the other hand gave us...Baby Peach, Baby Daisy, and Dry Bowser. Baby Mario, Baby Luigi, Toadette, Birdo, King Boo, and Koopa Troopa are also back after a noticeable absence, so I gotta ask...why so many freaking babies! The Mario series is SWARMING with characters, why do we need baby versions of everybody?! Why do we need a skeleton Bowser that only shows up in specific moments of the NSMB games?

And finally, HONEY QUEEN?! What were they thinking? Waluigi has been in every Mario Kart since Double Dash (or Mario Kart 4 if you prefer, Nintendo) so why has he suddenly and inexplicably been replaced? We still have Daisy, hell...we even still have Waluigi Pinball! And Metal Mario? What's next, invisible Mario? Wing Cap Mario? Baby Metal Mario?! Ugh. This pisses me off.

The Tracks

Alright...here's the thing...I know you like to pad out the tracks, Nintendo. But tell me...why is there a snowy mountain called DK Pass? What does this level have ANYTHING to do with Donkey Kong? Oh...Kalimari Desert, okay...where's the Bloopers? Toad's Factory?! WHAT?! When did Toad get a freaking factory! I though Waluigi was the one who drove the excavator in MKDS. Why wasn't he given the factory?

As you can tell, the stages make no sense. Why can't they be based off actual levels from Mario games? Why can't characters have a stage that actually represents...them? Is that so hard to ask? Does Wario need a level filled with sunken ships in the middle of the ocean? When has that ever appeared in a Wario game? Hell...when has Bowser ever had a neon Tron city? Why couldn't that be Metal Mario's level? I guess that would make too much sense. I'm trying to apply logic to a Nintendo game and I guess that makes me insane.

The Music

Here's another gripe about not collecting any resources from the near limitless media from the Mario franchise. I like that the Mario Kart series uses original music. I LOVED the music in Mario Kart DS. It was catchy and amazing. I also love the music in DK Jungle! Oh, wait. That was a remix of Jungle Japes. Okay, Rainbow Road's music in MK7 was also really goo...nope, also a remix. Um...well, the rest of the music in MK7 was forgettable...I honestly can't think of any songs except for those two off the top of my head.

The Gameplay

Okay, I know you were all expecting this from the start so I'm just gonna get it over with. I fucking hate blue shells. I also hate the slingshot AI. You'll notice whenever you start a race, blue shells are never given. They only appear in the second and third laps. I wouldn't have a problem with blue shells if the AI was driving at the SAME FREAKING SPEED I AM. On 150cc (which I'm convinced stands for "Cheating Computer"), your opponents will go unbelievably fast in order to catch up to you. Usually at speeds greater than when you're given the star.

This is a way for programmers to cheat the player in thinking that the AI is skilled. Now, I'll be on lap 3, faaaaar ahead of everybody. The finish line is just in view when I'll be hit by a blue shell when out of nowhere, all my opponents appear and finish ahead of me.

This isn't right, Nintendo. Give the gamer a break.

In a perfect world, our pleas will be heard but this is Nintendo we're talking about. They can't see me with all the money I'm shoving in their faces.

[Koopaul]

The biggest deal would be the horrible item system. Not only will I get hit by a Blue Shell but I'll also get hit by a Red one, Lightening, and knocked off the stage. All in a row!

[Dances in Undergarments]

Koopa Troopa was the greatest character in the first Mario Kart and every Mario Kart that doesn't have him is automatically a failure (except maybe DS since Dry Bones is close enough). No Waluigi in 7 is also a travesty.

Otherwise, who cares? The characters are all for visual difference and nothing more. And with the tracks - again, who cares what they are called? As long as they are fun to race on, I don't care if they get a random name associated with them. Music is also fine with me, though I haven't played 7.


As for the main issue of gameplay? I can certainly see how it can be frustrating for people. No doubt. But me? I honestly could not care. I like my games to be fun and exciting, and if that means I have to lose a race or two so that one of my friends can win thanks to a Blue Shell, than so be it. I have bigger things to worry about in my life than losing a game of Mario Kart. It has always been a 'party racer', and always will be, so its not going to go to the 'best' player 100% of the time... that being said, even with crazy items flying around and whatever, I would still argue the best player wins at least 3/4 of the time anyway. Is it really worth getting upset of losing a video game 25% (or less) of the time?

[Koopaul]

Well characters are important to the fans. We expect to see the faces we love and respect over those who are pointless.

[TV Eye]

Exactly, and if a stage is called "DK Pass", would it kill them to add some Donkey Kong flavor? And if you read my post, when I complained about blue shells I did so in the Grand Prix. I don't care about getting hit with one as long as my opponent is playing fair. I have no problems with playing online (aside from people who take the Maka Wuhu glitch) and when I'm blue-shelled playing with real people, it was all in fair-game.

It's the cheating computer that irks me. I look at the map and see them coming in at top speed as soon as I'm hit. There's no logic or fair game there.

[Da Robot]

Kalimari desert is possibly a reference to Kalahari Desert

The current theory of why Waluigi doesn't appear in MK7 is supposedly he was too tall and his head would clip through the glider portion of the kart (but still seems bizare that they included the retro track Waluigi Pinball)



Things that have pissed me off about Mario Kart (haven't played 7, and I don't think I'll buy it I had a 3DS)

- No decent optional item list removal, I heard 7 has a basic one (but not like the one in SSB, why is it so fucking hard for them to implement?)
- Why can't the Spiny Shell be disabled on the 3rd lap to prevent what I call "losing because I was item raped in front of the finish line syndrome"
- How much do they fucking beta test these games, do they think getting item raped is fun? How the hell did the Maka Wuhu track skip not get found out?

- Also I'm getting sick of "feature removal" with each game

eg,
- MK 64 lost coins (and higher track number) from SMK
- MK DD lost the quick race feature from MK SC and the "speed" of MK 64 and "ground hugging" Spiny Shell.
- MK DS lost the Mix cup from MK DD (but it is sort of possible to do with versus) it's hard to say if people want the "double rider" mechanic again (who here loved co-op?)
- MK Wii lost the basic mission mode from MK DS (and the mode was only accessible with online and a new mission came every two weeks), Battle mode was changed for the worse with "compularsy teams" and ruining awesome stages like N64 Skyscraper (WHHHHHHYY!!)
- MK7 lost the MK Wii mission mode, and most importantly the 1P Versus mode from Wii/DS (meaning that to play a final track with 7 cpu's such a Rainbow Road, you have to do in in Grand Prix mode, they probably did this get people to play the tracks online but still!) Is battle mode still average, or has it improved?


At the rate the series is going at, I'll expect Mario Kart Wii U, to bring back DD's double rider/co-op mechanic, fuck battle mode even more, keep online at the same level as 7 (no voice chat), and then have some sort of "snaking" like controversy to fuck everyone over and then . . . maybe they will remove the retro courses. All I can imagine is that something from 7 (good or bad) will be lost in the next installment (The Spiny Shell will probably start flying again).

[nocturnal YL]

Let's see...

Characters

I think the character selection has gone mostly wrong in MKWii and MK7. I'm fine with those babies myself, although Dry Bowser really irritates me because he's essentially Bowser.

Those babies are the same as their adult selves in a way, but I'm kinda convinced that the're more reasonable than multiple forms of the same character. Mario and Luigi do deserve having their baby selves showing up (giving the popularity of YI1), and for those others, M&L2 predated Mario Kart.

On the other hand, Queen Bee and Metal Mario made no sense to me. The former is a planetoid in SMG1 and SMG2, and the latter probably showed up as an individual character thanks to SSB64, which I don't even consider a canonical Mario game.

I don't like Dry Bones and ROB in MKDS myself (although I won't complain if ROB shows up in Wii), simply because MKDS has only 12 spaces for characters and there as to be better choice than those two. Also, Dry Bones are annoying to deal with in the main games.

Tracks

I agree that DK Pass makes no sense because it doesn't look DK enough. Other than that, I'd say DK's Jungle Pathway is not DK enough, and I didn't even know why was Koopa Troopa Beach called so in MK64 until I saw the Koopa rock in the racetrack intro of MK7.

Other than that, I'm most dissatisfied with the remakes, especially in MKDS. A lot of tracks are dumbed down in DS. Other than the obvious graphical difference, shortcuts in the GC tracks are killed.

MKWii revives a lot of tracks I didn't like, making the old tracks less enjoyable in overall (Waluigi Stadiium over Wario Colosseum, inclusion of the boring Yoshi Falls, the hard-to-navigate-with-Wii-Wheel Desert Hills and Delfino Square and so on). For the new tracks, MKWii often features tracks that features sharp corners and expect you to perform tricks on them, which I'd say is way overused.

MK7 is much better in terms of design and old course selection (and they finlally look like they're from the Mario/Wario/DK series), but I'm not satisfied that they included TWO tracks that have absolutely nothing to do with Mario. These tracks also mark the return of numbered track in the Japanese version (Wuhu Island 1, Wuhu Island 2). The old tracks were handled excellently, making the SNES tracks far more playable and adding branched paths. My only complaint for the old tracks is the removal of the Kalimari Desert raillroad shortcut.

MKSC did a good job in including a total of 40 tracks, putting all Nintendo-made Mario Kart games to shame. But its way to handle the extra (old) courses made absolutely no sense: They kept only the Mode 7 plane and removed whatever sprite stood there. No more pipes in the circuits, Bowser's Castle and Rainbow Road looked bland without the Thwomps. And those made the old tracks far less entertaining.

Music

I'm on the opposite side as Teev on this one. Most music in the series do not sound as rememberable as other games, but MK7 did a good job in some of the music. Neo Bowser City is catchy, remixing 3 songs from MKMK64, MKWii and MK7; Bowser's Castle included pieces from MKDD, which makes the music sounds like a Mario Kart Bowser's Castle song. Music Park and the menu music are god stuff too. And the music actually interacts with the game itself for the second time in the series. The first time was in MKWii, which saw relatively limited use. Rainbow Road is indeed forgettable, though.

Music from GC and DS are also memorable, albeit on a smaller scale. Wario Colosseum, Bowser's Castle (both), Waluigi Pinball, Airship Fortress are among those.

The cheating compouters

The cheating computers are understandably unpopular. Compared to human opponents, though, the computers don't pose as much of a challenge. SMK was the worst offender, and things are getting better in the later iterations. Computers now have to actually get items from an item box instead of simply being invincible all the time, to say the least. And since I tend to remain first place after a blue shell is launched (either by sterring backwards as soon as a computer gets one, or by being way ahead of them), I wouldn't call this a serious problem. Compared to SMK, at least. Or compared to playing with other human players online (who are even more merciless). That is, however, not to say cheating computers is not a problem at all.

Computers in MK7 have better AI (they actually know they should try usng the shortcuts, although they aren't smart enough to steer backwards at the very sound of a blue shell), and that would become a problem if they still cheat.

Mirror Mushroom Cup seems to be a good example of cheating computers in MK7. At the beginning, you always fall behind them because they can time their rocket start perfectly, and it appears that no matter what vehicle you use, you will fall behind for a while. This seems to me that they do indeed have better top speed than the player. And that makes three-starring Mushroom Cup difficult.

I feel kind of mixed when it comed to whether computers should be given advantage like this.

Gameplay, game modes

There are a few things I don't like. First off there's the scoring system. What makes a B, a star, or three stars? There is no way to know. And that makes three-starring the game in MKSC and MKWii a very difficult task.

And then there is the problem with certain items. Having mushrooms, Fire Flower or Super Leaf means you can't get a second item for a good while, and at the same time Fire Flower and Super Leaf are next to unusable (tapping L while drifting with R is a highly demanding task for a normal human). The item box can hate you in other ways by giving you bad items. There's the cloud in MKWii, and Chain Chomp in MKDD is known for being unhelpful in courses like Rainbow Road. While that may help "balancing" the game a bit (or not), it's still annoying.

And, game modes. If game modes in all games are combined, Mario Kart would be excellent. But in reality, each game only implements a subset of these potential modes. Here's the list:

1P Grand Prix: SMK, MK64, MKSC, MKDD, MKDS, MKWii, MK7
1P Free Run: MKSC
1P Time Trial: SMK, MK64, MKSC, MKDD, MKDS, MKWii, MK7
1P VS: MKDS, MKWii
1P Balloon Battle:MKDS, MKWii, MK7
1P Coin Runners: MKDS, MKWii, MK7

MP Grand Prix: SMK, MK64, MKDD
MP VS: SMK, MK64, MKSC, MKDD, MKDS, MKWii, MK7
MP Balloon Battle: SMK, MK64, MKSC, MKDD, MKDS, MKWii, MK7
MP Coin Runners: MKDS, MKWii, MK7
MP Shine Runners: MKDD
MP Bob-omb Battle: MKDD

Of those, only single-player GP, Time Trial, multiplayer VS and multiplayer Balloon Battle are consistent.
Games like MKDD and MKSC also give a pleathora of options in certain modes (Multiplayer VS, 1P Free Run), including the ability to configure the number of laps to go through. And this option is not there in MK7, making looped racing in Wuhu or Rainbow Road impossible. Then why make them loop at all? (I'd say the very notion of having 1-lap courses is not good. MK64 Rainbow Road is a boring, uneventful, 6-kilometer race and I won't be complaining; so why should the replayable MK7 Rainbow Road be a 1-lap race?)


It's basically "a superset of all those is excellent, while individual games maintain their flaws" - as if those flaws are intentionally kept there.

[8bitretroshit]

So basically MK7's AI is just like the N64's. Losing to actual players is all fun 'n games, but yeah losing to bullshit AI is pretty aggravating.

Blue shells don't seem to bother me as much as the average player though. And in retrospect the post-SNES tracks are pretty out there, but atleast they don't get much weirder than Toad's realistic highway race

[nocturnal YL]

Depends on who I'm losing to, I'd say. Losing to players who I don't know, and may have activated their Action Replay on their side, is not what I call fun.

And yes, the way MK7 computers have higher speed, more so when they are away from the player, is pretty much like MK64.

[kirbychu]

Mario Kart Wii let me play as Funky Kong, which is pretty much the greatest thing ever.

Otherwise, I agree with pretty much everything Teev said. Although honestly, I dont care that much what the courses are called.

[TV Eye]

The Tanooki leaf is probably the worst item to get. And once you get it, you're stuck with it for like 30 seconds. You also can't use ANY OTHER ITEM when you have it!

There should be a way to throw away items. Maybe by pressing "select button".

And yeah, I also miss the ability to choose any track to play against 7 other computer opponents. Why would they remove that? I wanted to let my sister play Rainbow Road because she's a huge Mario Kart fan, but I had to get there first in the Grand Prix! That really pisses me off.

[Arcadenik]

Jan 20, 2012 0:10:47 GMT -5 Koopaul said:

Well characters are important to the fans. We expect to see the faces we love and respect over those who are pointless.

True.. but if we keep getting the same characters all the time and not get any new characters... I, for one, would get tired of seeing the same faces... and that's where the new characters, albeit some of them might be questionable (Baby Daisy, Honey Queen, Metal Mario, Dry Bowser), are refreshing to see. With that said, I wouldn't mind seeing a Mario Kart roster like this, mainly because it will make some fans go into a nerd rage. ;D

[Manspeed]

I'll say. You put Pom Pom there but not Boom Boom, Hammer Bros. there but not Koopa Troopa, and....Rex.

You did remind me how strange it is that Snifit has never been playable in spite of all the times Shy Guy has.

[Koopaul]

Well there are 12 essential characters I think.

Mario
Luigi
Peach
Daisy
Yoshi
Toad
Wario
Waluigi
Donkey Kong
Diddy Kong
Bowser
Bowser Jr.

You get those guys in, and I won't complain... much.

[TV Eye]

I'm just confused why E. Gadd or Toadsworth haven't been playable yet. Nintendo loves pulling out exposition characters like Rosalina and putting them in Mario Kart's.