Mario Kart World Review – Rocket-Powered Launch Title

Mario Kart World Review

There’s a lot of pressure on launch titles. They’ve gotta be incredible stuff, you know? Mario Kart World carries this weight pretty easily. This game is slick, shiny, and super fun. Better still, it feels like a serious upgrade, taking all the good of MK8 and pumping it up to continental proportions. The tracks are bigger, the roster is bigger, and the skill ceiling is much higher.

A good Mario game gives you room to play and experiment. Jumps lead to wall hangs, slides, and speed runs. Mario Kart World has a similar set of tools. You can dash, wall-ride, drift, and slipstream your way through every race. While a lot of these tools are familiar, this game breathes new life into every one. It feels like every second you spend just driving is a second being wasted. Why not dash, drift, leap, and spin your way instead? Movement is so celebrated, so joyous, so very Mario-coded. I got the urge to perfect my performance on every track. A good race is downright artful. And yet, this is still a Mario Kart game.

Colorful Chaos

That is to say, your average race is still a cacophonous mess of power-ups and crashes. Especially since races have so many more participants. That first lap is always pure chaos. Waves of explosive force hitting you from every angle, bright bursts of colorful violence knocking you down to 4th, 8th, or even 13th place. It feels like an incredible achievement to survive, even though you do survive, every single time.

Sometimes certain courses can feel massive, empty, and a little slow. This is by design. You’re supposed to be fighting through dozens of colorful psychopaths, bursting koopa shells, and glittering fireballs. Anything less than that is a waste of the space.

The Knockout Tour mode is a natural extension of this chaotic vibe. You’re clamoring for ever higher positions, with failure getting you kicked out of the race altogether. This ratchets up the tension and makes every victory feel momentous. Even the single-player version of Knockout Tour feels like a major upgrade over the traditional Grand Prix format. Amidst the ordinary chaos of power-ups and shell assaults is a simple contest of skill. You’ve very little room for error, it’s downright invigorating. It’s one enormous race, but it zooms by very quickly. I like to think I’m not bad at Knockout Tour races, but that’s only in single-player.

The Online Gauntlet

Playing online is, as always, a totally different experience. Humbling, to put it more succinctly. Single-player races are straight-up cake by comparison. I think, with a lot of practice, I could win a single online race. Maybe some luck thrown in for good measure? I’m not talking about the Knockout Tours, of course. Those are a brutal gauntlet that chews up racers and spits out chunks. Even finishing a Knockout Tour online feels like a real accomplishment for someone at my skill level. I look forward to slowly improving, however.

The difficulty is immaterial, however. Racing online is pure madness. That first lap feels like trench warfare. Single player is first or nothing. Online, I take my 5th place finish as the victory that it is. Maybe this is just my inherent scrubness shining through, but I love it all the same. Those online races are almost as chaotic and frantic as the Free Roam mode is peaceful.

Chill Out And Drive

There’s a lot of new content in Mario Kart World, but Free Roam mode is a gigantic departure from the rest of the franchise. And it rules, honestly. Races are pure lunacy, an assault on the senses. Free Roam is meditation on wheels. You explore the whole interconnected map, zipping through empty streets and enormous regions at your leisure. Not that there’s nothing to do! You activate question blocks, find princess coins, and complete tiny challenges. You know, collect blue coins, race through obstacle courses, and complete improbable feats of dexterity, speed, and precision. It’s a great way to let multiple hours slip through your fingers unnoticed. You can also collect alternate outfits and test out the various racers and vehicles.

I’m impressed by the variety of racers available. You’ve got a ton of old favorites, a bunch of enemies to pick from, baby versions, alternative outfits, and ordinary animals. Even if you’re determined to stick with, say, Princess Daisy, you’ve got half a dozen versions of her to choose from. It’s an excellent selection that dwarfs the previous game. When combined with the vehicle variety, you’ve got a ton of possible combinations to test out. I’m a handling-over-speed guy, but maybe you like to live a bit more dangerously.

Top Tier Soundtrack

The music selection is also enormous. I’m constantly hearing tracks I’ve never heard before, and all of them are top-tier. If you’ve been playing Mario games for long enough, you’ll also hear tons of classics given new life. Songs from Mario Bros. 3, Mario Sunshine, Mario Odyssey, and more. All shined up and set to glitter on a bright new stage.

Somehow this game feels both huge, and a little undersized. The world itself is massive, but this resolves into 7 sets of races. That’s one less than the original version of Mario Kart 8. The existing content is chopped and remixed in a lot of fascinating ways, to be sure. And connecting all seven cups in a single gigantic map is pretty impressive. But it’s still a tiny bit smaller than I was expecting. Also, I wish the borders on certain courses weren’t so militant. If I slip outside the lines for a second, just let me flounder there! There’s no need to black out the screen and fast-forward to me being six places behind. That will happen organically, I promise.

Already Wanting More

On the other hand, the Battle courses feel too big? Having 20 people crammed into a tiny space filled with power-ups would be amazing. Instead, there’s a lot of driving and searching for a target. At their best, the Battle courses are a minefield of green shells and bombs, but this isn’t as common as I would like. Although it’s nice that the Battle arenas are more compact than the actual race tracks, they still feel a little spacious for my liking.

As far as launch titles go, Mario Kart World is a real banger. The races are more chaotic and intense, the world feels huge, and there’s a ton of racers to choose from. Also, the skill ceiling feels higher. I wish the world were as big as it feels, but we’re in pretty early days yet. I’d also love a splitscreen Free Roam mode, but that’s pure wishlist stuff. Buying a new console is always a little intimidating, to be sure. And racing games aren’t for everyone. But if you’re into Mario Kart even a tiny bit, you’d be a fool to pass on Mario Kart World.

***A Nintendo Switch 2 code was provided by the publisher***