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Mario Kart, ZA WARUDO

SpoonyBard

SpoonyBard

Threat Rhyme
(He/Him)
Oh hey this doesn't have a thread yet. Well too bad, now it has to be titled after a Jojo meme.

So I've spent a few days playing the newest Mario Kart for the Switch: 2 - The Switchening, and overall I've liked it a lot but I do have some quibbles. Most are too minor to really elaborate on (I wish alternate character costumes were a choice upon selecting the character, instead of getting a slot to themselves. Remember when we saw images of the number of character select pages in World and got excited about the quantity of characters? Those options are all costumes.) but there is one complaint I have that I don't recall reading anywhere else, so maybe I'm in the minority, but I feel it must be said.

I think it was a mistake to add the in-between track driving portions to the Grand Prix.

The open world part of World is, honestly, fun to drive around but not super interesting. They could've done more with it, I think. But another problem it has is its overexposure. In the standard Grand Prix you have to drive between each location, and that's super neat thematically but it has the effect of forcing you to spend even more time in the 'open road' part of the game and less in the 'elaborate wacky racetracks' part of the game. The actual tracks then get less racing time in the grand prix because some of that time is spent driving to them, I still don't have a full familiarity with the individual tracks because so much of the actual driving time in World is spent not on these tracks but on the kind of dull open highways.

Knockout Tour, meanwhile, should be the mode where they go all-in on the World part of the World. This mode could have felt all the more special if it were the only mode where you drive between tracks, having a truncated version of each track with driving in between would feel more special, I think, if you weren't already doing that in Grand Prix but with only four primary locations instead of Knockout's six.

Anyway, that's my absolute biggest complaint. Maybe I'll get over it eventually. We'll see.

Oh wait, one more. Enough with the babies. I don't know who enjoys them. I'm amazed they showed restraint and didn't give us Baby Pauline, but give it time I guess. I think I might even take the Koopalings back to ditch the brats.
 
Knockout tour is less frenetic than grand prix because it's less crowded and there's lots of chances for the front-runners to get an absurd lead, so it showcases less of the 24-player chaos. Grand prix tries to have a balance, but only doing one lap on most of the courses reduces the impression they make. I think I'm going to end up doing custom races more often, so I can get the full number of laps and really get to know the courses.

The challenges scattered throughout the free drive mode include a number of time trials in areas that feel like additional courses. Those ones are my favorite, rather than the ones that challenge you to do some stunt.

In the heat of the moment I keep forgetting about the option to charge up a jump and then do a wall slide. The gold shell is an interesting and nuanced new item. I like that there are a variety of different levels of collision possible, instead of just spinning out in the same way no matter what hits you. The rewind button is far too costly to use in a race in most cases, but it's the greatest convenience you could ever hope for in free roam.

I might just be imagining things, but I can feel a difference in how some vehicles handle, that goes beyond the old kart/bike dichotomy. I think the hidden stats are more consequential than in MK8.
 
It feels like I'm in the minority in not really having a problem with the way that Grand Prix and Versus Connected tracks are structured, or the density of content in Free Roam. Okay, maybe there's a little bit of a quibble with Grand Prix, considering that every time you play Grand Prix the tracks and connecting roads are exactly the same. But in Versus mode, depending on how you get there, the destination could be driven in reverse or on a different layout. I can understand why people would complain about the connecting roads sometimes being far too straight and not technical enough with curves, rails, etc., but I enjoy the journey and differences in perspective that each connection brings.

After completing all Grand Prix and Knockout Tours, I've found that I've been spending a lot of time in Free Roam mode. I know that many people wish that there was a checklist or a way to point out P-switch and Peach Medallion locations on the map. But I like just driving around and discovering these things organically, rather than likely being led from point to point and staring at the mini-map instead of the actual world around. Like with the Korok Seeds in the recent open world Zelda games, I've told myself to not be concerned with completionism and just enjoy exploration. It certainly helps that the game's soundtrack is amazing and great for just cruising around. I feel like the density of missions and pickups has been just right, though we'll see how I feel once I start to explore all of the area and the number of incomplete and uncollected content diminishes. But then again, I can always just put the game down and play any number of other games in my backlog until they (hopefully) come back and add more content or features to the game.
 
I can't play this due to my hand injury as it requires using the left stick so much but it's been fun to watch others. Lumber just got in a truck on a bridge and it's very silly.

So many fun easter eggs and callbacks.
 
Maybe it's just because I'm the weirdo kid who would explore Peach's castle grounds in time trial mode on 64, but free roam is the most fun I've had playing Mario Kart in years.
 
Becksworth said:
Maybe it's just because I'm the weirdo kid who would explore Peach's castle grounds in time trial mode on 64, but free roam is the most fun I've had playing Mario Kart in years.
Click to expand...

This was exactly my thought when playing around in free roam: this is the promise of a game we all imagined back when we scooted over to Peach's Castle in Mario Kart 64. There's some part of me that is downright excited that these amazing "track backgrounds" from years of Mario Kart design are now functional.
 
Baudshaw said:
Is it different depending on the biome or something? Or does it just play randomized tracks
Click to expand...
It's randomized AFAICT. It pulls from just about every Mario game out there, plus Yoshi's Island and some other oddballs.
 
Free Roam is lovely in short bursts but the primary appeal of it are the remixed music tracks from across the Mario spectrum, which are tremendous and good and I need OST yesterday. And I guess to practice my wall ride. The incentive of "job well done" has never really worked for me, I need a more substantial reward, so the P-Switches, ? Panels, and Peach Medallions don't mean much and I have, in fact, just stopped persuing them. I'll just drive on by a P-Switch, secure in the knowledge that completing the challenge rewards me with nothing. (I seem to recall getting a sticker or something from completing a blue coin P-Switch but "sticker" is just an alternative, funny way to spell jackshit in this case.)

I would love to see them add an adventure mode or something of the sort - kinda like Diddy Kong Racing's hub? - but that might be asking for too much when the game is already pretty ginormous. I'd also like to see them add 200cc. The game feels just a tad too slow.

Knockout Mode is the best thing, equal parts frustrating and exhilirating. Nothing like being in the top 3, getting shit on by a few well-timed items, being in the bottom 3, and then slingshotting back to top 3 with a few more well-timed items. The items, ridiculous. The tracks, scrumptious. The karts, Mario.
 
If my three day weekend retreat with a bunch of friends and their kids taught me anything, it's that Free Roam's main appeal is that little kids can play it endlessly and never become bored
 
Version 1.7.0 adds the first two of eight new knockout rallies, and adds the ability to use stickers in photo mode.


It has been observed that there are balance changes in knockout rallies as well: during the first 20 seconds of a rally, items normally available only to racers in the middle of the pack can be rolled by players in the front. Presumably this is to counteract the tactical advantage of holding back to get powerful items early in a rally.

The conspicuously absent alternate costumes for Donkey Kong and Pauline remain conspicuous in their absence, but since this is the first of a series of content patches, I guess it has finally Begun.
 
Bongo said:
The conspicuously absent alternate costumes for Donkey Kong and Pauline remain conspicuous in their absence
Click to expand...

donald-duck-angry.gif
 
the fact they're trying to take as long as humanly possible to add new content despite Void Kong and King K Rool's voice actors literally being in the credits is so funny.

i bet even Nintendo Switch 2 Welcome Tour is gonna get a major update before it.
 
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