Fans looking to learn more about the latest entry in the Mario Kart franchise woke up with a smorgasbord of information as Nintendo aired the first and probably only Mario Kart World Direct on their various social platforms and even their Nintendo Today App! The 15 minute presentation ran through details such as courses, drivers, items, mechanics, modes and more and there’s a lot to unpack so let’s do a recap!
The first segment focused on some of the courses you’ll be burning rubber on. Keeping with tradition a lot of the courses are themed around a specific character such as Mario Bros. Circuit, Boo Cinema, Toad’s Factory, Peach Beach, and Wario Courses. Fans of older courses fret not, they will be returning to the game with some modification and can be raced on during day and night!
The roster was highlighted as mainstays such as Mario, Luigi, Peach, Bowser were confirmed and new racers such as Goomba, Spike and the one which caught the eye of plenty across the world…Cow. We also saw a quick pan of the character selection screen where we saw the baby characters and some really obscure (well for me…) choices like Conkdor and Sidestepper. This section also indicated that kart modifications that we’ve been used to since Mario Kart 7 have been done away with.
The initial reveal of the game focused heavily on Knockout style rally racing, but those looking to do some more traditional racing will be happy to know Grand Prix will be available as a mode. However you will need to drive yourself to the next course once you’ve completed a race. It will be curious to see if the game will force you to wait for all the other contestants to arrive. The presentation also alludes to Rainbow Road will make itself available once you’ve completed all the Grand Prix.
While Smash players love “Final Destination, No Items”, a Mario Kart race without items is like fries without ketchup…yeah you can do it, but it’s just wrong. Mario Kart World will be bringing back items from the past as well as introducing new ones which will surely make these races interesting! The Coin Shell will drop coins along it’s flight path which then can be picked up by any racer, there’s no word if the shell can hit and disable racers. The Ice Flower, an item which debuted in Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time pretty much acts like the Fire Flower, but leaving a layer of frost temporarily on anyone hit by the chilly projectiles. The Hammer, the iconic weapon of the Hammer Bros can be thrown in an arc and will stay on the road briefly creating a road hazard…so even if you overshoot your throw it might not be for naught! Wanna be the Big man on the road? Ingest the Mega Mushroom to protect yourself from attacks and squash puny racers who refuse to yield right of way! It might’ve been an OG item, but the Feather returns to give your character a lift…one which can result in finding an alternate path on the course. Finally Kamek will temporarily transform all other racers causing chaos on the road! These new and returning items will join mainstays like Bullet Bill, Lighting Bolt and many more to keep races wild and fun!
Mario Kart World is meant to be fun for all ages, but not everyone is adept at driving carts with the skills of someone who has completed 200cc mirrored courses. So Nintendo implemented plenty of accessibility options which you can use to cater the game to your preference. Smart Steering will ensure your racer stays on the road as it will gently guide you back on track, Auto Accelerate will ensure you’re always got a foot on the pedal…even if it isn’t your own. Auto item use will…well automatically use items you collect during the course of the race making sure your focus is the road ahead. Tilt controls will let you drive like you’re holding a wheel and there will be a wheel accessory which you can slot your Joy-Con 2 into to increase the immersion.
One of the first screenshots of Mario Kart World had a little detail in the world that many thought was just a decoration, but those Yoshi’s restaurants are actually an aspect of the game. Picking up food from a drive through and consuming it will unlock driver costumes. This will certainly incentivize players to take different characters around the game world in order to unlock all sorts of costumes!
Aside from drifting, there’s not a lot of official techniques in Mario Kart, but it looks like you will be able to do jumps without items with the Charge Jump. Holding drift while driving straight will charge up energy allowing you to do a hop over obstacles, land on grindable rails and even wall ride (No anti grav modules required!). The Forza Motorsports series has been allowing players to rewind their progress to redo a section and this feature is now coming to Mario Kart World. Mind you don’t let perfect become the enemy of good as just because you’ve rewound, the opposing racers won’t be affected by this time dilation.
Capturing the checkered flag isn’t the only thing you can enjoy in Mario Kart World, the game will feature single and multiplayer modes like time trials, vs races which have you racing solo or as part of a team and battle modes such as Balloon Battle and Coin Runners.
Free Roaming will be a big aspect of Mario Kart World and it seems like the developers have packed plenty of activities that will test your skills as a driver and collectibles to nab. You can even meet up with your friends online to go cruising around the island.
Speaking of friends, there will be multiple ways to play with others as there is split screen play on a single console, local wifi play across multiple consoles and online play with up to 24 players! Oddly enough there was no mention of GameShare, so it looks like everyone will have to shell out 80 bucks to drive.
The final section of this presentation focused on the game’s GameChat features…but the only notable reveal is that the GameChat Camera can detect and discern 4 different faces to assign to players.
June 5th can’t come soon enough and while we still don’t know when the Switch 2 will be available for pre-order in the states, you know I’ll be hitting the buy button on that console + game bundle.
