What kart have you been using? I know you've been using Bowser or what not, but the kart you use makes a massive difference to how fast you can go, and if you've got one which is too focused on acceleration, it won't be particularly fast.

I Basically Dominate In My Sister's Mario Kart 7 Game. I Beat ALL Of The Cups, No Problem. I LOVE The Multi Player ^-^

@Articbird I'm sorry, but I don't add strangers. I have to get to know you 1st, then I might add you

When I race online Mario kart 7, it is 50/50

50%. Community racing. (Because lately my Banana Bonanza community has been doing very well.)
50%. World wide racing (Because I am near the 15,000VR mark. Current 14,700VR)

A stranger is just a friend that you haven't met yet Knuckles Anyway, a little about me. I'm a lover of the older games on the super nintendo system, the N64 and Gameboy. My top favorite games of all time are..
1. Donkey Kong Country series (Snes)
2. Starfox 64 (N64, N3ds)
3. Ocarina of time (N64, 3ds)
4. Perfect Dark (N64) Love the FPS type of games and this is the best one of all time!
5. Super Mario rpg: Legend of the seven stars (snes)
6. Banjo Kazooie (N64)
7. Banjo Tooie (N64)
8. GoldenEye (N64)
9. Super Mario World (snes)
10. Yoshi's Island (SMW2) (snes)

I dislike most newer games now because the artistic value, true innovation and magic
has been lost into a shallow world of flashy graphics and disposable character design.

I love racing games but personally I think that (now back on topic) MK7 is not as fun as MK64 was.
Still, I'm trying to give this game a whirl.

So..I found out that collecting coins and customizing the characters ride accessories can help increase your drivers
speed. But, it's still not helping me win any better. I know all the stages pretty good now. I even know of some good shortcuts.
But everyone that I race with is a speed prick! They all jack my ride and leave me in the dust with all my coins going sky high in the air.

What must I do to become a faster racer? Play 100 hours of monotonous racing??

The reason you keep losing is most likely because you're probably not taking advantage after every single moment every single lap which is a must in order to have a shot at finishing in the top half ranks. It's not so much about playing a ton but more about paying attention to detail during the race.

Here are some tips

• Always Drift only when you have to turn 50 degrees or more. Any less then 50 and you'll only be wasting time trying to drift when you could be going forward.
• Always collect coins unless you have 7+ already or they're to out of the way from the path you have already chosen to take. Coins increase your maximum speed which could really mean the difference between Victory & Defeat in a neck to neck situation. Coins are there for your long term benefit.
• Never allow yourself to be caught in the middle of a crowd of karts right before or after going through item boxes. Sometimes though it can't be helped, when caught in this situation you could Pull to the side, let go of acceleration, or speed up with a mushroom/drift to whatever area has less activity.
• Use your items at the right times depending on what you got and what your current place is. If you're closer to the front of everyone it's usually best if you save your items for defensive purposes rather then offense. If you're behind the majority of racers however the opposite is true.

That's all I got for now. Hope what I just shared helps. I found those to be some vital tips I've learned on my own from personal experience.

Thanks for the help but I think I'm about fed up with this game now. The only thing that you mentioned that seemed to do any good was to save items for later use with defense, instead of offense. But I still keep losing, despite the fact that I know how to play the game good. Maybe I have a defective game pack or something. I don't know. I just got Mario Tennis on the 3ds today and it seems to be easier to learn how to play good than MK7.

I think that they made MK7 too strategic! MK64 was just fine. It had good controls and it wasn't a mind to just beat a race contest and finish with at least third place.

If anyone is willing to race me to test out my skills, so you can make a fair assessment on how good I am as a racer and what I need to improve on, I'd be grateful.

Your game is certainly not defective, and honestly the strategy isn't all that deep... it's just a game that you get better at with practice. If you mean you're doing horrible compared to other online racers, that can vary wildly because some of the players are absolute pros. If you see their ranking numbers are 5000 and up, they've been playing for quite some time. They probably aren't the best competition to gauge yourself against.

All that really matters is get as many boosts as you can... tap the R button off of jumps, drift to earn boosts at almost every corner, and launch at the start of the race. Then, just use items appropriately. Hold items behind you whenever you have them, use the star or mushroom boosts to cut across bits of track, etc.

Practice practice practice!

All good advice Wobee. Thanks. I will keep practicing. Where are the amateurs on MK7?? It seems like 90% of the racers in every community and worldwide challenge are all pros.

The game is a year old... The people that like Mario Kart enough to play for a year also happen to be very good at it. There are certainly novices out there though.

If you're in a race with eight people, if you win once every eight races, you're average. Don't expect to win every race.

I haven't got first place once yet in a race. I did get second on one stage today though. But most of the time (95%) I get 6 or 8th place in a race, no matter how good I was doing. This sucks big time!

It just seems like everyone has some sort of simple secret advantage that I don't know about yet. Even the few spotted novices have better luck and speed than me.

I've been playing MK64 for a long time, so I know that I'm a good racer. What's so different about this mario kart 7? That's what I'm trying to figure out. I don't want to win every race, just some like everyone else gets.

how do you guys customize your kart?

i usually pick toad,zucchini kart, standard wheels and beast glider

I don't think it really matters what wheels you have or what kind of kart. Coins help a bit as the more you get (up to 10), the more better boost power ups you get, like tons of stars and golden mushrooms I think. But that still doesn't help me at all. I always drive slower than everyone else regardless of how many boost I get and good shortcuts that I take. Maybe everyone is using the Gyro and that perhaps accounts for a gain in speed dynamics.

The wheels do make a difference and the kind of kart you have does too. YOu can see on the side of the screen the attribute scores for each kart and each customization. When you make changes like the tires for example you will see the bars go up and down in the key areas.

And as someone stated a few posts ago that most people who play MK7 have been playing for at least a year now so they are going to be good.

I have a problem with online Mario kart 7 i can't play in other communities But if people join my community it works all fine. Help please :/

I know this is a silly question, but are the communities you're trying to play in active? Is anybody in there when you try to join? Are you sent to a lobby? What happens?

The kart parts really do make a difference and particular wheels suit particular tracks far more than others. Especially the wheels! Experiment with a few set ups and you'll soon realise. Going for a little more acceleration over speed is always worth it too. If you're getting involved in the mid-field battles all the time, acceleration will be far more valuable to you.

For example, take two tracks. First you've got say Airship Fortress, then you've got Neo Bowser City. For track 1, it's mostly stone and no off road, with high grip, so you need a kart wit standard wheels. But for the latter the rain lowers traction, so you'll do better with one with good offroad stats (like the Monster and Red Monster wheels). In fact, you can save about four or five seconds overall just by changing the wheels used to suit the track better.

I wish that they would let you change tires and such before each track. Rather than at the beginning of the circuit