Discussion Controversial topic: Mario Kart or "Smash Kart"?

[Simba1]

IMO Smash Kart doesnt make sense because "Smash" from N64 means fighting game, so doesnt make sense that Mario Kart become Smash Kart,
but I would love to see Nintendo Kart.
I mean MK8D has plenty of characters and tracks outside Mario universe (Donkey Kong, Animal Crossing, Zelda and Splatoon), so simple expand that by adding Kirby character and univers, Pikmin, Metroid, Xenoblade, Star Fox, F-Zero...but I dont think Nintendo would do that simple because Mario Kart branding is too strong, but I expect more characters and tracks from other Nintendo IPs in MK9.

 

[Sander RX]

Yeah I think people might be misunderstanding what proponents of “Smash” Kart want.

I can’t speak for everyone, but what I want is not “Super Smash Bros. the Racing Game”, what I want is Mario Kart, but with guest characters and tracks cranked way up.

Like it will still be Mario Kart, items will still be Koopa Shells and Fire Flowers, Mario characters will still dominate the roster.

There will just be a lot more characters and tracks from other games.

Think Sonic racers (the first two).

 

[CyberWolfBia]

Yeah I think people might be misunderstanding what proponents of “Smash” Kart want.

I can’t speak for everyone, but what I want is not “Super Smash Bros. the Racing Game”, what I want is Mario Kart, but with guest characters and tracks cranked way up.

Like it will still be Mario Kart, items will still be Koopa Shells and Fire Flowers, Mario characters will still dominate the roster.

There will just be a lot more characters and tracks from other games.

Think Sonic racers (the first two).

Yep; that's exactly what I suggested earlier in the thread;

Though I say go further and give characters their own karts/cars (in cost of customization; so characters can only drive their own vehihcles) and add to the item roulette a Special Move that can work like the All-Stars Move from SEGA All-Stars Racing.

 

[Mazzle]

The name Mario Kart is just too strong to abandon it.
But keep adding other chars to it, should be way easier than a Smash char and in todays market of GaaS,
continued Updates in terms of new Chars and Maps and Karts just make sense

 

[BGBW]

I don't get where this "it has to be a crossover with nothing uniquely original in it or it may as well stay the same" mindset comes from. It feels reductive. I think I and others are fully capable of wanting and appreciating both, but this response paints a notion that we don't appreciate Mario Kart already for what it is, which just ain't the case. Whatever Kart Nintendo makes next, I'm going to be interested, I'm super likely to buy it.
This response runs up against my feeling I posted about earlier that people don't seem to understand what folks like me are asking for when this idea comes up. It's like some only see subtraction, not addition.

So what's the difference between Mario Kart + Other Nintendo cameos and Nintendo Kart then?

All the guest characters in Mario Kart 8 came with courses based on their home series - it is the expectation. People would have been pretty disappointed if Link's course wasn't clearly Zelda themed but was instead another typical Mario Kart course with his name slapped on it like Link's Bowling Alley.

The beauty of the Mario universe is there are no expectation of what locations they can use so th epossibilities are endless. Toad owns a factory apparently, Luigi an airport and Waluigi has a giant pinball machine somewhere in this world.

I'm open to Mario Kart having guest racers and courses. I enjoyed them in 8, but I don't want them to come at the expense of the originality.

 

[Terrell]

So what's the difference between Mario Kart + Other Nintendo cameos and Nintendo Kart then?

All the guest characters in Mario Kart 8 came with courses based on their home series - it is the expectation. People would have been pretty disappointed if Link's course wasn't clearly Zelda themed but was instead another typical Mario Kart course with his name slapped on it like Link's Bowling Alley.

The beauty of the Mario universe is there are no expectation of what locations they can use so th epossibilities are endless. Toad owns a factory apparently, Luigi an airport and Waluigi has a giant pinball machine somewhere in this world.

I'm open to Mario Kart having guest racers and courses. I enjoyed them in 8, but I don't want them to come at the expense of the originality.

The difference is design around it from the outset, which includes crossover tracks in the main cups interspersed with everything else, perhaps adding more cups like they did with the DLC but right off the hop. This opens up other opportunities and expansion of ideas already implemented like SFX variation (like you hear when item roulette is active in certain courses), item variation beyond the boost currency (coins/rupees/bells), which they could implement by course or by character, while keeping certain commonalities with mild variation if they chose to go that route. It's a difference between intentional design choices vs. add-on/after-thought, as well as it being all-in right away rather than this incremental creep that's already been happening which will possibly (I'd almost say inevitably) bring the series to the same conclusion some day in the future due to positive consumer reception. Preferably before I succumb to old age and its requisite frailties.

In addition to character-themed courses (one of which was a Battle Mode course), we also got Excitebike, 2 F-Zero tracks and a callback to how crossover has been actually been happening since MK7, with the Wuhu Town Battle Mode course being remade.

And you say "all the guest characters" like there was this huge mass of them... as of Deluxe, it was 4 of them, and their respective gender clones.

And yeah, if anything gets sacrificed in such a transition, it'd probably be that there are a bit fewer retro courses, and there's nothing more original than not dipping into the well of past MK games as much.

 

[Ultrashroomz]

I'm fine with how Mario Kart 8/DX did it, and I just want them to focus on more obscure and varied Mario characters for 9.

 

[Twinsen]

Orthodox. They could mix every game if they wanted to. I just don't think it's nescesary.

 

[Puruzi]

Nintendo Kart please. Crossover games are fun and I would like to play more nintendo characters in a Mario Kart type racer