Our third piece in our series covering the Nintendo Switch 2 Experience in London, following hands on with the hardware and its accessories, and a diary of the day as a whole. Here, we go into a bit more depth with Mario Kart World.

Mario Kart simultaneously feels like a strange decision to launch a new console with, but also an incredibly secure one. In the Nintendo pantheon of franchises, colloquially speaking, 3D Super Mario platformers, and 3D The Legend of Zelda titles, stand at the top in terms of prestige. Pokemon, obviously, stands alone, dwarfing all below it, but where has a console ever launched with a new Pokemon rpg? Either way, there’s a reason why Breath of the Wild was held back for a Switch release, rather than just getting on the Wii U in 2016. That’s a system seller. Mario Kart, while undeniably incredibly popular, doesn’t have the same feel to it. It’s a game you pick up when you have the console, but you don’t necessarily buy the console for it. People got the Switch for Animal Crossing, Zelda, and Mario. It just so happened there was the best Mario Kart ever out at the same time.

And yet Mario Kart, according to Nintendo’s own sales data, is one of the big boys. Only Pokemon and Super Mario platformers have sold more. Per Nintendo, again, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe is the highest selling game on the Nintendo Switch, clocking in at around 67 million at last count. In that sense, there couldn’t be a safer pair of hands to kick off the new console with, right?

Soft Sell

That’s the challenge Nintendo faces with Mario Kart World. The general perception of the franchise needs to change in order to justify it being considered a console seller. The early signs were promising. Joining the traditional grand prix and battle modes is a brand new racing mode called “Knockout Tour”. Each track can now hold up to 24 racers, potentially cranking up the mayhem by about a billion percent. And, most interestingly, the entire game is one connected map that can be explored at your leisure.

More on that later. The first thing Nintendo chose to show us was the Mario Kart we all know and love. Our first experience with the Switch 2, and we were thrust into a race on a traditional track, and, you’ve got to say, it looks absolutely gorgeous. Mario Kart 8 was always a looker; I remember describing it as one of the best looking games ever even on the Wii U. Mario Kart World takes those foundations and builds on them wonderfully. Every frame is super crisp, vibrant, and absolutely delicious. A real treat for the eye balls.

Lap 1/1

A repeated concern I’ve seen floating around is that the additional racers will make each race track less twisty and turny in an attempt to keep everyone on the track. Think how Mario Kart Wii’s tracks were a lot wider than previous iterations to accommodate the less accurate motion control options. It’s difficult for me to say with absolute certainty whether or not these concerns will be allayed. I played through two regular tracks, and there are likely to be around 30. And it takes more than a spin to really understand the intricacies of a Mario Kart track. In the moment, however, everything felt as tight and as hectic as what’s come before it. We won’t know for certain how these things play until June, but I’m not concerned, personally.

Image Credit: Nintendo

One of the aspects from Mario Kart 8 I most enjoyed were the one long track races. Mount Wario, for example, is a banger. It seems like everyone who played that game loved them, too. And it feels like Nintendo took notice. The pre-release coverage seems to have a focus on those types of tracks, and the second race I took part in, one where you literally drive from the end of one track to the start of the next, is exactly that. If the idea of Mario Kart World is that everything is connected, and that you will drive every mile in a grand prix, expect half the tracks here to be Mount Wario-esque.

One hit KO

Into the main room, and there was a huge 24 player area set up for Knockout Tour, the aforementioned new mode. Knockout is, in short, battle royale Mario Kart. A route consisting of 5 or 6 areas on the map is selected at random, 24 drivers start, and at every area checkpoint, 4 players are eliminated. Now, these are more linear, which I think is understandable. The goal is obviously to be the fastest, but effectively having a sub-objective of not being below a certain position when you hit a checkpoint doesn’t really lend itself to the more traditional track set up. 

Image Credit: Nintendo

This is the mode, by the way. Nintendo needs to get this in people’s hands as often as they can, pre-release, because it’s incredible. I lined up on three separate occasions for this, and had an absolute blast each and every time. Halfway through my second go I found myself saying to the attendant in charge of my console “I’ll fully just play this for a whole weekend”. I’m not really sure how this looks in local multiplayer, with a group of 3 or 4 in the same room. But as a full experience, there’s nothing really like it.

The most intriguing aspect of Mario Kart World, however, is in its open-world. Which, sadly, was one feature we never really got to go deep into. Prior to each Knockout Tour race, there was a period where you could just drive around the map, but we weren’t given anywhere near enough time to really understand what the hook of having an open world will be. The most recent direct showed some challenges dotted around the world. There are collectible coins, presumably used to buy new karts and outfits. But whatever is driving the open world idea forward has yet to reveal itself. I’m not anticipating a story campaign ala Diddy Kong Racing, but having something to work towards would be great. If the world is fully explorable, but also barren and shallow, I fail to really see the point. Again, we will see closer to the time.

This was always a title I’d get the day it released. With it coming out on Switch 2 launch day, in a bundle that effectively prices it at £35, well that’s even better. Nintendo have left enough behind the curtain to keep us intrigued, while having let us play around with just enough to ensure appetites are well and truly whetted.