#mkworld — Public Fediverse posts

My friend got a Switch 2 and let me play Mario Kart World on it while they're working. I've sunk around five or six hours into it, beat all the Grand Prix cups, and, like, I feel very conflicted about it. :blobbear_w: I'm not sure if I like it.

The open world really doesn't add much to the game. If anything it heavily detracts from the game and I'd go so far as to say it outright ruins the Grand Prix mode. The Grand Prix mode has you driving between each level in the cup. During each cup, you do the first course for the normal 3 laps, but, for every other race in the cup, the first two laps are the drive there, then the third lap is just one go around the actual race course itself. I've beaten all the Grand Prix's but I feel like I don't know the courses that well. Also, driving between the courses is mostly a straight line, so you don't get to drift or find many novel routes, it's really actually pretty boring.

As for the courses, well, they kinda suck. A lot of the theming had to be toned down so they'd fit in the overworld, the skyboxes can't be individualized, and each course has a lot of racing assets tacked onto them so it starts feeling extremely same-y. They also outright ruined a lot of the retro courses by inundating them with the racing assets from other levels (Choco Mountain seriously looks like a standard colosseum level with poop water fountains, it's a travesty). The only retro level that's an improvement is Sky High Sundae, but that was easily the worst level in the Booster Course pack so that's not saying much. Rainbow Road is also just, I dunno, really bland? It feels like you're driving on a neatly tailored stained glass window the entire time, except for one space station asset they randomly threw in. There are some good courses, like DK Spaceport, but I think they're more of an exception. I also want to make a special mention of Koopa Trooper Beach for being the worst course in any Mario Kart game hands down. It's just a tiny little circle. :neocat_what: It's awful.

The free roam mode is extremely boring. It reminds me a lot of Banjo Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts mixed with Sonic Frontiers. There's just these huge, empty spaces with not much in them and some moderately frustrating platforming to pass the time. There are challenges you can do, like enemies you chase or P switches to activate for a special mini challenge, but they're really shallow. To make it worse, the only thing it lets you unlock are stickers, which are pretty much worthless. You can stick one sticker on your cart and you don't get to pick where. So basically the entire free roam mode is there to unlock a bunch of decals you could never hope to possibly use.

Also, for anyone who played the Battle Mode on Mario Kart 8 on the Wii U, you'll unfortunately get deja vu. The battle mode in Mario Kart World is back to being garbage. There's only Balloon Battle and Coin Runners, and you can only play them on recycled courses from the racing mode. There are two dedicated battle courses: Big Donut from MK64 and Chain Chomp Desert, but they're both pretty bland and terrible. The battle mode is a shell of its Mario Kart 8 Deluxe counterpart; it's really sad.

The one really promising mode is Knockout Tour. It's basically a Mario Kart Battle Royale mode. It does a good job of taking advantage of the open world and, unlike the Grand Prix mode, this mode actually makes sense to have players racing across the entire map. It's not very fun offline, but it definitely seems to be the standout mode for online play, especially since the other modes are terrible in online play because they're dominated by the open world "driving between levels" maps and, y'know, the battle mode being bad. If you're going to play online, the only mode worth playing is Knockout Tour.

All the work that went into Mario Kart World feels like a waste. It should've had a single player story-driven campaign mode with special unlocks that really take advantage of the open world. Instead, the open world dominates the game in all the wrong ways while being completely underutilized at the same time. It's really the worst of both worlds. I would've loved a Lego Racers or Diddy Kong Racing style adventure set in an open world, but instead we got a huge sandbox that Nintendo told us to make our own fun in, because they sure didn't provide it.

This is all BEFORE considering that it's an $80 game. It is not REMOTELY worth $80. There is nothing here to justify that price tag. I think it's about on par with Mario Kart 8 on the Wii U, and even that had better courses. I'm not sure what Nintendo is thinking, but, to me, the decisions made for this game are an abject failure. It's not a bad game, I still had some fun, but man, it just feels like a big waste of potential.

#Nintendo #Switch #Switch2 #MarioKart #MarioKartWorld #MKWorld #Mario #Gaming