Today I went and beat all the staff ghosts for the Wave 1 tracks, both 150cc and 200cc. Think i've got a good enough feel for these eight tracks at this point, so i'll share my brief thoughts on each:
Tour Paris Promenade - One of the less interesting city tracks in Tour, but it's really gotten a great upgrade here; in visuals, music and layout. The first two laps are a combination of PP1 and PP3, while the final lap follows PP2, which makes the track a lot more interesting than each indiviudal route was originally.
3DS Toad Circuit - By far the worst of the first wave; visually, but also just the track itself. Just an incredibly standard circuit track that goes by quick, especially in 200cc. There are better circuit tracks out there, there are better 3DS tracks they could've picked (3DS Mario Circuit is both). At least the music arrangement is great (though again, we could've gotten the same song with 3DS MC).
N64 Choco Mountain - I enjoyed Tour's additions to the track, and they've carried over faithfully here. Like this one a lot, especially the incredible arrangement; though I was never a huge fan of the original so the changes are all for the better to me, lol.
Wii Coconut Mall - Still great. Mixed on the changes to the track though; stuff like the parking lot cars being stationary, the escalators and the removal of a few other aestetic features just feel uneccessary; but they aren't enough to bring down the
Tour Tokyo Blur - This track came out of nowhere for me. From one of the more mediocre city tracks in Tour (both layouts and music) to one of the standouts of the first wave in both regards. This is one track that this interesting city course structure is working miracles for. Makes me even more excited to see how others like Vancouver, Los Angeles and Sydney are adapted.
DS Shroom Ridge - Always wanted to see this one come back, and I got my wish. It's as good as it was in DS, which some smart additional shortcuts which add a lot to the track. Music arrangement is fine too. Just an all-around solid track, made better thanks to 8DX's mechanics.
GBA Sky Garden - I already got through my initial letdown with this track thanks to Tour. A bit more interesting than Toad Circuit, really nice to look at visually, but the shortened and simplified track is still disapointing. At least the music track didn't let me down; what an upgrade over Tour's rendition!
Tour Ninja Hideaway - I always said this'd become a new fan favourite once it hits a console Mario Kart, even before the reveal of the DLC, and i'm glad to be proven right so soon. This course is great, one of the best in series history; so many alternate routes that feel different from a standard Mario Kart track due to the verticality of the upper path. The music arrangement is honestly the biggest letdown here; isn't too different from the original; but if that's my biggest complaint then there really isn't much to complain about on this one.
That's all of them! In all, I think Wave 1 was a fairly solid start for the Booster Course Pass; a few misses but mostly hits. Can't wait to see which tracks end up in Wave 2!
Speaking of, I should say a little more about these tweets I posted on the previous page:
We can now determine that the datamined prefixes for most of the upcoming tracks are not garbage data, but very likely intentionally added. This also shows further proof of Ninja Hideaway lacking the Tour branding in-game being a mistake, as it seems they could've accidentially left the console ID field as the default string. Also proves it should be a very quick fix for the devs, for whenever the next update happens.