Topic: Mario Kart 8 Deluxe

BRO I JUST WANNA PLAY THE UPDATE 😭

Wow, after 20 minutes of downloading the download is about 25% complete, but it now ways "37 minutes" to download. Oof. I'm guessing it's server traffic.

Mine says over an hour. Yeah it's probably because of traffic, a lot of people are probably downloading the update right now.

Now that we may have had the last major update to MK8, time to start waiting for MK9 again. 😝 I'm hoping for a track-maker; I want to do some 150 cc online multiplayer races on the most unfair garbage tracks ever created! 😀

@Croctopus I started downloading the update pretty much the moment it came live and it's still not done downloading yet. 20-ish minutes left on my end. If it's not traffic, then it's probably my low internet speeds or something.

Finally installed the new update and played on the last two cups. It's another solid lineup of courses that ended with a bang... which I'll get to later. The Tour courses were once again brand new to me... Rome Avanti is probably my favorite of the bunch since I love its music, but Piranha Plant Cove and Madrid Drive are both great in their own right. DK Mountain is a classic for sure, and Daisy Circuit and Rosalina's Ice World are gorgeous-looking courses. Bowser Castle 3 is really good for a remake of an SNES course, and I love its rock remix of the original theme. Wii Rainbow Road is easily my favorite of wave 6! The entire course looks incredibly beautiful in HD, and it has a fabulous remix of an already great music track. They certainly picked a great course to cap off the Booster Course Pass... and Mario Kart 8 itself!

(Spoilers for the new ending. Don't click until you've rolled the credits in their entirety.) The new staff roll has a photo album look to it, and there's a remix for Super Mario Kart's staff roll theme. There's also a medley that has music from a handful of different courses, kinda like the ending themes for the original Sonic games to give another example. Now, I'm not gonna lie... I've played the Mario Kart series since Mario Kart 64, and this new ending got me pretty emotional. SMK's staff roll theme remix already made me feel that way from the get go, and I especially got touched by this wonderful group photo at the very end... I'm gonna sound sappy, but gosh, this picture makes me wanna cry in happiness. What a way to wrap up a game that's been nearly 10 years in the making... I can't wait to see what the next Mario Kart game will bring!

That shortcut on DK Mountain is tough to pull off, jumping the gap in the switchback turns. Not sure how to do it and still be quick around the turn that follows. I think my record time is 3:31.

I updated the game last night, just gotta survive work and then I can play the game tonight with the wife and kids.

I've played the tracks a fair few times now and my rankings are:
1. Wii Daisy Circuit
2. GCN DK Mountain
3. Wii Rainbow Road
4. Piranha Plant Cove
5. Tour Rome Avanti
6. 3DS Rosalina's Ice World
7. Tour Madrid Drive
8. SNES Bowser Castle 3

I really like they did with the first 3 courses, in the case of Wii Rainbow Road they even kept the comet effect when you fall off the course. Piranha Plant Cove was a really fun new track though I do slightly prefer 3DS Wario's Galleon (a track it seems inspired by). The real city courses were fine but there are much better ones in previous waves (e.g. Vancouver Velocity). Adding ice physics to 3DS Rosalina's Ice World (pretty sure MK7 treated ice and snow the same as any other surface) makes the track feel really cramped at times due to worse control. SNES Bowser Castle 3 while very impressive visually, feels very underwhelming for the penultimate track. Definitely feels that DS Airship Fortress, GBA Bowser Castle 4 or 3DS Bowser's Castle would've been better penultimate track options.

Wave 6 tracks are nowhere near common enough in the online rotation which is very sad.

A shame that Piranha Plant Pipeline is missing and GBA Sunset Wilds' sunset wasn't fixed but info from Nintendo's most recent shareholder meeting gives me hope that we'll get Booster Course Pass 2 announced next year. If such a thing was to happen, I have no doubts that Pipeline would be included (I don't see the course being left to rot in a mobile game that'll likely be shut down next year).

Played through the 8 courses earlier and here what I think:

Tour Rome Avanti - Another fine city! I love how winding it is and the abundance of enemies makes it a recipe for chaos.

GCN DK Mountain - Even though I was a diehard DDJ supporter, I must say I have nothing to fault here. It's a lot less janky than it was on Wii that's for sure! One tiny little nitpick is that they used the modern Mario Kart logo on the start banner where it should be the old one.

Wii Daisy Circuit - I do like the aesthetic of this track and it plays very well here in 8DX, but this would be the track I would sacrifice in this wave if I were to add a different course

Tour Piranha Plant Cove - I think I will warm up to this one, I remember it feeling a bit empty although that might be because I was playing on Grand Prix mode as opposed to a hectic online race where I'm sure the course will come into its own

Tour Madrid Drive - My preferred city from this wave! I love the variety of buildings and locales to visit in this one, from the mini-Coconut Mall to the Goombas playing football😂 this is right up there with Singapore and Vancouver for my favourite cities

3DS Rosalina's Ice World - A perfectly good snow course, one of the better ones in the series in my opinion. Nothing much to add apart from the cool risk/reward of going for the dash panel route near the end even though that's nothing new

SNES Bowser Castle 3 - If only every SNES remake looked and played as good as this! Even though I knew how much a revamp this course had been given, I still very much thought of it as "just a SNES course". Boy was I wrong! This stands proudly alongside the other seven tracks in the wave.

Wii Rainbow Road - Everything about this track was pulled off perfectly! From it being 3 laps (those who've played it in Tour will know what I mean) to details like your characters burning on their way down to earth just like it was 15 years ago.
But then the final lap arrived; the music changed key and suddenly I'm flooded with memories of playing this track as a kid on my first Mario Kart game, playing Mario Kart 8 with friends online during COVID and the hype and sheer wonder that this (somewhat) unpredictable DLC brought with it over the last couple of years!
It's been truly a blast.

The mii costumes are a nice extra and is the music player new?

As much as mk wii is always my favourite game its nice seeing rr wii in mk8

I hear alot of murmers about mk9 heres my wish list

Release it on switch 2 but please we need xl joycons and a bigger wheel(mk wii size is best) and uimproved gyro

Tracks based on specific. Mario corses like an underground smb1

Alternate costumes (or at least colours)
Helecopter shroom power up
Ice flower power up
Moterbikke handle acessory
Auto drifts for gyro steering like on wii where the trade off was mii boosts it made it fun for a non gamer
Cel shaded art style
Retro tracks with all the new or mk8 gimmicks heavly used to keep it fresh
Drafting i'm sure they removed it after wii

@D20Nat20 Yep, they added the music player for this latest update.

Played the new tracks today, very surprised by the music player that @MarioLover92 and @D20Nat20 mentioned. Was vibing to Toad Harbor's music earlier.

As for the tracks themselves. Really love the look of Madrid Drive, and drifting around the coliseum in Rome Avanti. I'm really liking the reimagined Bowser's Castle 3. While it's not Merry Mountain, I like how Rosalina's Ice World is fitting for the upcoming holiday season with the wintry theme.

Like the new set of tracks. Nice way to end the Booster Course Pack.

Is there a character comparable to Peachette? Because man, this character is so smooth to control. I like Diddy, Funky, and Pauline more (as characters), but I will keep playing as Peachette from now on because playing MK8D never felt that good.

Love the music test, it has all variations, even 5 variations for that music note course.

The new Mii costumes and new ending were a lovely surprise. I was jokingly saying "Now where's my new ending" after beating the last dlc cup, and instantly it came up. Didn't expect it.

My favourite new track is GCN DK Mountain, since it's my all time favourite Mario Kart (not just Double Dash) course.

All in all a great end to this game.

@SKTTR Peach, Daisy, Yoshi and Birdo all have the same stats as Peachette.

@NeonPizza It's perfectly possible to go around corners tightly in 200cc. It all depends on your kart part combo, and careful management of drifting and braking.

My advice is to ignore the stats completely and experiment until you find something that feels right. You can't play it like other speeds, some turns you're gonna have to bail on your drift early in order to make it, carry one long drift around multiple corners or even take daring shortcuts at times. If I can just about do it with auto-accelerate turned on, then I believe you can probably do it too.

It definitely takes time to learn it, but I almost exclusively play 200cc now and it's an absolute blast, 150cc feels too easy now and I like the challenge even though I still make a lot of mistakes

Can't fault any of these tracks, honestly. They're all good in my eyes. Wii Daisy Circuit feels like one too many Wii tracks, especially considering almost a quarter of the second half are Wii tracks, but it's still a good drive, so I'm not complaining too much on that.

Overall, this has been a brilliant two years of great track additions, and a few surprises along the way. If a second Pass does exist, then I'll look forward to enjoying even more additions in the future. I just can't see it happening, though. Probably because I'd want it to be a surprise if it does.

@NeonPizza God, yes! A Mario Kart VR experience would just be amazing. I recently booted Assetto Corsa to play on my VR, and racing games are just instantly transformed into such an immersive experience with it. Mario Kart 7's first-person mode was a great start for something like this. Now it just needs VR implementation to make it an awesome one.

200cc does feel crazy at first. It took me a while to learn it, but my gosh it's fun after you get the hang of it, and it opens up new shortcuts. You have to play differently for 200cc. Take wider lines, and fat finger your thumb onto the brake to slow down & turn sharper for the sharp turns. I think I watched the 200cc time trial staff ghosts to see how they drove around the tricky parts of tracks.

Switch 2 should come with a vr headset(with cooling fans) thats at least psvr1 visuals and for controlling vr motion tracked bigger joy cons

OOORRRR

a switch 2 that has a 3d screen

3d was cool on 3ds but the og 3ds lacked eye tracking

I just want to say that my first time playing Rainbow Road Wii on this (with CPUs), I got the worst item combo'd since I played...Mario Kart Wii. It nearly cost me first place after a giant lead.

I find this to be hilarious. Perfect ending to Mario Kart 8's new tracks, perfect representation of Mario Kart Wii.