FEATURE | The Joys of Mario Kart

Nintendo Switch 2 launches with Mario Kart World

It’s the summer. I’m with two of my closest friends in my living room. We’ve got beige food, sweets, fizzy drinks. The sun is beating down outside. We’re playing Mario Kart and ignoring the world’s ills. It’s, somehow, 2025, yet we’ve been doing this dance for the thick end of 20 years, give or take. It is excellent. 

Nintendo’s Switch 2 has arrived on the scene to much fanfare. Much like the first Switch it’s a portable screen thingy with detachable controllers that you can lob in a bag and play in the wild or you can hook it up to your telly and use it like a normal console. While the Switch 2 has an enviable launch line up (and can play the vast majority of old Switch games), if I’m honest it’ll be used for a handful of games: whatever the next Zelda is, a new Super Smash Brothers (unconfirmed, but new and exciting ways to punch Pikachu in the face are almost certainly on the way), Pokémon, a Mario Platformer, and launch title Mario Kart World. 

A comfortingly familiar experience

The game’s make up is the same as it’s ever been, only…bigger. Pick a Mario Bros character (the roster is huge this time round - if you don’t pick ‘Cow’ or ‘Concador’, you’re doing it wrong though), start a Grand Prix either alone or with friends, and sink yourself into bright, bouncy, drifty, jauntily soundtracked racing. In ‘World’ the tracks are on a hefty world map, and between each race you’re not magically transported from one to the next, but you race across the terrain to join the dots. After firing it up, my chums and I set off on a GP, unaware of this dynamic, and post-race one were confused about why the new game included a commute. That sort of thing works for Microsoft’s Forza Horizon, but in Mario Kart’s oversaturated world it’s jarring. 

Aside from the drive to work, stepping into the new game is pleasingly familiar. There are no jagged shapes, the colours tickle your brain, the music never approaches anything near ‘sombre’ (you’ll be humming various tunes for days), and the racing is both exciting and unfair in equal measure. You can be in first place, friends desperate to take your spot and claim a podium, when all of a sudden someone gets a green, red, or blue shell, knocks you over, and the next thing you know, you’re in the middle of the pack. You can be doing nothing wrong, and all of a sudden, lose your progress. It, much like life and real racing, is unfair. 

There are 24 racers on track at any given time in the new game, and the AI of the computer controlled characters appears to be harsh but fair. The game wants you to have fun, and if you can keep yourself on, or at least near the track it’ll do its damndest to make sure you don’t finish dead last. When you’re at the back of the pack you’ll be spoon fed effective weapons to knock karts ahead off their game so you can take precious places, when you’re up front you’ll be given useful things to defend assaults, but nothing too destructive. Balance is key to Mario Kart, and World has been tuned to perfection. 

Have I lost my touch?

With any group of friends and Mario Kart, there’s always the one who’ll confidently beast everyone else without hesitation. The dynamic of the game is always the same - nail it off the line, powerslide for extra speed boosts here and there (no, drifting in real life isn’t faster than a good line, but when you’re racing as a cow on a Vespa logic needs to go out the window), and try to use the various shells/bananas/flowers/mushrooms/whatever to make your way to first place. Historically, I’ve been the man/Mario at the head of the pack. Not so much this time. If you’re used to the Switch’s Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, you can’t treat World the same. New dynamics like wall riding and rail grinding (again, if you’re a cow on a Vespa… logic ain’t a thing) make moving around circuits more dynamic than before. Perhaps, for older hands, the new tricks will take a while to get used to. Or maybe I’ve lost my touch and it’s time to accept a life chasing third. I deeply regret sending a chum “I’ll still beast you” via DM the night before. Because I didn’t. He beasted me and was very polite about my previous bullishness. 

The cut and thrust of races remains exciting, and it’ll be a blast figuring out how to get around the new world quicker than everyone else. For now, I’ll be licking my wounds and noodling around the world map to find ways to get the upper hand over the group I’ve been playing with for decades. The thing is, win or lose, we’ll keep playing, laughing, and jostling for position until we’re well into our dotage. No matter what new mechanic comes into play, or how arthritic our hands get, you’ll find us gathered around a telly, beer in hand, having a good ‘ol giggle. Mario Kart is the same as ever, even when it’s changed. Thank goodness for that.

words: Alex Goy
pictures: Nintendo