This is so true. Hot take: Mario Kart Wii was such a step down from DS as a racing game that it made me give up on the series. So many gimmicks, so much item spam, and Mario Kart music never resonated for me after SNES (although N64 had a few jams) - and Wii was so not my thing. It felt much more like a party game compared to a racing game.MK8 on the Wii U was so far ahead of what was expected of it for it's time, and now, 8 years later, we get what we might have expected 8 years ago.
Always had a soft spot for it and really like the implementation of it here. It's also the one where the cartoonier aesthetic really works brilliantly as far as I'm concerned.Honestly Shroom Ridge is an S Tier track, easily.
Good point. It’s probably not a coincidence that their 2 best selling games on Switch have DLC that’s included in the subscription tier. And both games have existing multiplayer functionality so the likelihood of people already having the base subscription is pretty high.*a ton of NSO memberships
Mario Kart Wii was the best selling entry until rather recently. The sheer breadth of people that remember it fondly is huge.I didn't realize how Coconut Mall is basically holy to Mario Kart fans until very recently. I saw a lot of disappointment to the changes that were made to it, with someone actually saying they ruined "the most iconic track in Mario Kart."
Maybe it's because I didn't play Mario Kart Wii a whole heck of a lot but dang I had no idea Coconut Mall was this important to people.
This is where I'm at, too. Base Mario Kart 8 felt like such an elevation of the series. On the surface it doesn't seem all that special. Outside of the antigravity, the mechanics and structure are an iteration of a tried and true formula, particularly to its immediate predecessor, Mario Kart 7. But in practice, it was a real special game. Antigravity adds a lot to making the courses more engaging, adding more routes and allowing courses to be more dynamic, working strongly with 7's water and glider mechanics. Graphically, it took a series that looked nice but never top tier in the graphics (to the benefit of performance, mind you!) and turned it into a visual showcase for the Wii U (even arguably the Switch!) that still looks incredible. And the live instrumentation, following in line with trends in the Super Mario games, brought lots of life and energy to the races - it's arguably one of Nintendo's best soundtracks. All of this made it kind of alright that the battle mode was bad. The rest was at such a high quality. And the two DLC packs that came before kept up the quality, with great new tracks and wonderful reinventions of older GBA tracks. It took a series I really liked and made a game that I could legitimately call one of my favorites of all time.It's the strangest feeling - here we are 8 years later, yet this feels like playing the original Mario Kart 8 while the actual original Mario Kart 8 feels like the sequel. MK8 on the Wii U was so far ahead of what was expected of it for it's time, and now, 8 years later, we get what we might have expected 8 years ago.
Play MKDS please. If only for the mission mode, that’s the best single player in any Mario Kart and it’s a crime they didn’t make it a series standard.Shroom Ridge fan checking in. I love the combination of wavy terrain and traffic, and the course's layout is very enjoyable. Having never played Mario Kart DS, this is a great new track to me
wait wait wait wait waitWell it will be useful for the next batches haha
If they were on par with the Wii U DLC and we got a great set of new characters and parts (not to mention definitely new courses built with MK8D's full set of mechanics), it would feel small, but I'd be for it. Quantity vs Quality, I suppose. Both that DLC and what we have now is good, but they're different executions on the idea.Let's say we got 16 new courses in 2 waves of DLC, with new characters and karts, so just like in the wii u version announced in the march direct back in 2018 and it finished in Spring 2019 but that was it for Mario kart on switch. Would you be satisfied with nothing until the successor?
Yep! It's something new to 8. You just gotta do 150cc, Mirror, and 200cc.wait wait wait wait wait
So I don't have to suffer through the boredom of 50CC and 100CC if I want to "100%" the single player mode in this game? Are you for real right now?!
200cc does wonders for the more simple tracks and visuals. I thought 200cc in the original game was sensory overload, but here (apart from Ninja Hideout ) it works perfectly.Okay, playing these tracks on 150cc was a fun time, but playing them on 200cc?
They feel like they were meant to be played at top speeds. The visuals pop so much more and these courses just feel way more thrilling.
Following Shroom Ridge's racing lines while driving is like an eye massage.Glad to see so many Shroom Ridge fans. What a great course. Engaging even without antigravity or wild gimmicks.
it's a game with a lot of firstsWhy is Wii loved so much aside from nostalgia? Just an easy + active modding community?
Yes! One of us.......Shroom Ridge fan checking in. I love the combination of wavy terrain and traffic, and the course's layout is very enjoyable. Having never played Mario Kart DS, this is a great new track to me
The issue with Smash Bros. is sharing revenue with third-parties, who contributed to most of the DLC.So I’m sticking with my prediction that at least one of the Smash seasons ends up in the tier before end of year. Or BotW’s expansion pass.
This is some life changing shit right here.Glad to see so many Shroom Ridge fans. What a great course. Engaging even without antigravity or wild gimmicks.
If they were on par with the Wii U DLC and we got a great set of new characters and parts (not to mention definitely new courses built with MK8D's full set of mechanics), it would feel small, but I'd be for it. Quantity vs Quality, I suppose. Both that DLC and what we have now is good, but they're different executions on the idea.
Yep! It's something new to 8. You just gotta do 150cc, Mirror, and 200cc.
The cups are coming on in waves of two cups each. So we could have releases every three months, something like...What kind of rollout do you think we can expect for the next waves? I didn't do the math in my head on how it can be paced out until the end of 2023. Would that be one cup every couple of months?
Probably closer to the latter given the "end of 2023" wording on the pass.The cups are coming on in waves of two cups each. So we could have releases every three months, something like...
...or every four months, like:
- Wave 2: June 2022
- Wave 3: September 2022
- Wave 4: December 2022
- Wave 5: March 2023
- Wave 6: June 2023
- Wave 2: July 2022
- Wave 3: November 2022
- Wave 4: March 2023
- Wave 5: July 2023
- Wave 6: November 2023
nintendo usually has 3 big directs a year, so i'm thinking (each wave 2 cups, obviously):What kind of rollout do you think we can expect for the next waves? I didn't do the math in my head on how it can be paced out until the end of 2023. Would that be one cup every couple of months?
Nah it's in the pool of tracks online, you just haven't been lucky to see them pop up yet...Sorry if this has been covered already but I've been playing a bit of online and haven't seen a single new track show up for voting yet. Is the DLC only live in single player?
Yeah, 150cc ends up feeling like 50cc to me now, and 100cc and below are just agonizingly slow.200cc is perfect and also the worst as having gotten used to it makes any other speed feel so tedious
Nah it's in the pool of tracks online, you just haven't been lucky to see them pop up yet...
Ninja Hideaway is from Mario Kart Tour. Why they didn't point that out in the game despite them saying it in advertising is a mystery.Is Ninja Hideaway a new course? It doesn't say to which previous game ot belongs to?
It’s from Tour, and Nintendo refers to it as a Tour course outside of the game, but in game it doesn’t get the “Tour” prefix; seems like only the courses based on real cities will get that. So presumably Merry Mountain will be the same, plus any other non-city Tour original course. I think they might be trying to blur the lines when it comes to which game these courses truly originate from, and we might see some of these new non-city courses hit the MK8D Booster Course Pass before they’re even added to Tour.Is Ninja Hideaway a new course? It doesn't say to which previous game ot belongs to?
good pun lolfeels very phoned in
nintendo usually has 3 big directs a year, so i'm thinking (each wave 2 cups, obviously):
wave 2 announced in jun 2022 direct, released in july
wave 3 announced in sep 2022 direct, released in october
wave 4 announced in feb 2023 direct, released in march
wave 5 announced in jun 2023 direct, released in july
wave 6 announced in sep 2023 direct, released in october
just like smash was for a long time, i think MK DLC is going to have a consistent presence in the next several directs.
i can see splatoon 3 also having a long DLC roadmap.Makes me wonder if Nintendo plans on having at least one game with a steady stream of DLC for a couple of years from now on. First Smash, now Mario Kart 8, then maybe something else when Mario Kart 8's is over.