Topic: Mario Kart World

Looks cool but why $80? Yikes…its making me worried their newer games will also have that high of a price tag…I get inflation and all, but why?

So it is open world. Nice, I've always wanted to see one. And I do think the way they're handling it works for Mario Kart. The tracks are linear but you can drive off road. You drive to the next track after finishing the previous one. And there's a free roam mode outside of races. I am concerned about the retro course situation, but MK8D has so many that this game needs little to none of them, and it seems to be focusing more on quality over quantity.

And yeah, that $80 rumor is bonkers. But this game might be worth every penny.

Okay, looking at the Direct again, I'm already wrong about retro tracks, there do seem to be a few (it's hard to tell because they don't indicate the original console like they normally do, but I think they are retro courses). Here are the tracks and cups confirmed:

Mushroom Cup:
Mario Bros. Circuit (appears to be the desert course shown in the first trailer)
Crown City
Whistletop Summit
DK Spaceport (seems to be the classic Donkey Kong track seen in this trailer)

Flower Cup:
Desert Hills
Shy Guy Bazaar
Wario Stadium (hard to tell if this is new or old. If it's an old course, it's probably the DS one)
Airship Fortress

Star Cup:
DK Pass
Starview Peak
Sky-High Sundae
Wario's Shipyard

Shell Cup:
Koopa Troopa Beach (seems to be the N64 version)
Faraway Oasis
Crown City (interestingly it has the same name as the Mushroom Cup track, but the splash art indicates that this may be a different track)
Peach Stadium

So a pretty solid mix of nitro and retro actually.

EDIT: There's also been some mentions of hearing the Toad's Factory theme in the trailer.

It seems to have air and water racing too like Diddy Kong Racing and Sonic Transformed. I wonder if it will just be for certain sections of a track or if there will be full races like this?

Anyone else catch the SMK motif at 0:56?

https://www.nintendo.com/en-gb/Games/Nintendo-Switch-2-games/...

The UK Mario Kart World page shows the map in more detail. For example there's a SNES Mario Circuit area that contains 1, 2 and 3.

Gamers: Nintendo can't top Mario Kart 8 Deluxe. No way.
Nintendo:

I wasn't expecting to like the concepts shown off for this one so much. Not sure how the open world driving aspect will work yet, but I'm definitely looking forward to Mario Kart 9 World! I'm normally not a big racing game person, but it's amazing how many times I get pulled into brief Mario Kart sessions on Switch now and then.

Man this game looks so cool. It's Forza Horizon Mario Kart, which is exactly what I wanted.

Mario Kart World looks incredible! I'm super excited for this game. Loving the plane and boat segments and how you can grind on rails, Tony Hawk-style. The tracks also look awesome. Knockout Tour looks like a fun mode and Free Roam does look like it would be interesting. The whole game just looks amazing, honestly. It's been 11 years since we've got an original console Mario Kart game and it looks like the folks at Nintendo are nailing it. It is surprising that the game costs $80, but it does look like it would offer quite a lot of tracks/content.

@Dev-N There are a couple areas on the map that look like they could be battle courses including one that looks like Big Donut from N64

I had a dream last night about driving in an updated version of Wario stadium from the N64. I've never really loved that course, but Mario Kart World is the opportunity to make it fantastic! (Also, I'm so excited to play an updated Airship Fortress.)

Also, I know Nintendo absolutely did not use AI for this game, but the image for shy guy bazaar looks a little bit like an AI image lol. (2 min 38 sec.)

@skywake the almighty creator of this thread, can you rename this thread "mario kart world"?😁 It's time!

Is anyone else skeptical that open world roaming will be compelling for Mario Kart World?

Every time I see trailer/gameplay, the open world driving looks like they're driving 100cc 150cc, which looks slow for the non-race-track environment. Forza Horizon roaming, or roaming any open world racing game, is fun because you can go real fast, fly off hills, smash through bushes & small trees & stone walls, general high speed hijinx. I don't think 200c will be fast enough for that? I don't know if I've seen any MKW doing 200cc. And depending on power ups or drift boosting, so far, doesn't seem to do the job for open world Mario Kart.

I'm hoping to see how they make open world mario compelling off the race track.

My issue with Free Roam is what's the incentive to explore? They haven't really shown that off well. Treehouse tried to pitch it as a way to practice the course and scout out shortcuts which is nice, but once you've learned the course you're not going to want to explore every nook and cranny so that might not last long. I hope there's something to collect in the open world, exploration focused games tend not to be as engaging without some kind of collectible (looking at you Skyrim).

Most likely. Back in February 2024 when rumors were flying around about the Switch 2 being internally delayed, the reason they gave was that the launch games weren't ready. I think in particular they were talking about Mario Kart World and Donkey Kong Bananza, they're both open 3D adventure games that probably took a lot of time, money, and resources to develop and they both seem to be positioned as major Year 1 games. I wouldn't be surprised if they refused to launch Switch 2 without those two games. Really, if those two games were removed from the lineup, how excited would we be about the Switch 2's games? There's... not a lot else to be excited about.

@Jam777 Well yeah, there's a lot of IPs that feel due for new entries soon and I do think there are multiple games lined up for the first few years of the Switch (I think within the first 3 years we're getting 3D Mario, the 10th gen Pokemon games, Animal Crossing, Metroid 6, Xenoblade Chronicles 4, Fire Emblem, and Luigi's Mansion 4). But I think Nintendo feels Year 1 is pretty important in generating momentum for the console. That may be a factor in why the Wii U failed and the Switch 1 succeeded, the Wii U didn't have a lot that was compelling in its first year while the Switch 1 had banger after banger in 2017. I think Nintendo is trying to create a similar dynamic for Switch 2 this year (albeit a bit more limited because of increasing development times), that's why I think they wanted Worlds and Bananza this year so badly. They want those to be killer apps that get people interested immediately so that they generate sales momentum and positive press to snowball the Switch 2 into another success (now the pricing situation does hinder that, but I think as far as the release calendar they've done about as well as we can expect in the year 2025).

Watched Treehouse footage and wow... this game looks phenomenal. That's really all I can say. It looks so fun. I love that races don't loop closed circuit tracks anymore.

@CobaltFan
Wario Stadium on N64.

I've got a little boast about that level. I was about 12 yrs old and subscribed to Gamepro at the time I was chronically hooked on Mario Kart 64.

Gamepro had world record times posted for a number of courses. I beat the world record time of 22.00 seconds with a time of 21.92 seconds utilizing the wall jump shortcut off the first ramp then jumping the tall wall back again behind the starting line, and did all 6 jumps flawlessly beating the printed record (took me DAYS of trying over and over again).

I took a pic to send in, but the film got exposed to light which ruined it (salute to those of you old enough to remember cameras with rolls of film that had to be developed at your local drugstore photo center).

That's what I'm hoping for as well. The free roam is a really cool idea but there needs to be some compelling reason to actually play that mode other than driving around for the sake of it. I'm hoping that that's just something they're saving for the Mario Kart Direct.

Whoops my bad didn't realize we had two threads for this game.

Anyway forgive me if I missed something, but I don't have time to sift thought all direct notes and articles but is this game open world like the Forza Series or is that a rumor??

Did the treehouse presenter drop an f-bomb during the presentation?🤣 It's just after 3:12.

"Mario's ready, are you ready? Eff yeah! I hope so!"🤣👌