Super Mario Kart

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Super Mario Kart
Where racing becomes an adventure!
Genre(s): Racing
Platform(s): Super Nintendo Entertainment System
Release Date: JP: August 27, 1992
NA: September 1, 1992
UK: October 1992
EU: January 21, 1993
Developer(s): Nintendo EAD
Publisher(s): Nintendo
Series: Mario Kart
Successor: Mario Kart 64

Super Mario Kart is a 1992 racing video game developed and published by Nintendo for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System. The first game in the Mario Kart series, it was released in Japan on August 27, 1992, in North America on September 1, 1992, in the United Kingdom on October 1992, and in Europe on January 21, 1993.

Why It's Where Racing Becomes an Adventure

  1. There are eight available drivers, divided into statistically identical pairs of two. Each pair of characters have different engine sounds for their karts, which reflect their appearances and characteristics. All drivers also have a unique theme music whenever they finish a race with a good position.
    • The Mario Bros are average drivers with a high top speed.
    • Yoshi and Peach have the highest acceleration with low handling.
    • Bowser and DK Jr. have low acceleration and handling with the highest top speed and weight.
    • Koopa Troopa and Toad have high acceleration and handling, which makes them recommended for beginners.
  2. Innovative presentation.
  3. The game has 20 race courses and 4 battle courses, the former being divided in four cups.
    • Mushroom Cup
    • Flower Cup
    • Star Cup
    • Special Cup
  4. There are three speeds which affect how fast you and the AI will go.
    • 50cc: Easy (You will easily lap the AI).
    • 100cc: Normal (The AI can keep up a little bit, but you will be a bit faster than they are).
    • 150cc: Hard (You and the AI race incredibly fast and it's difficult to keep a lead on them).
  5. There 8 different tracks with different terrain (from sand to ice) and hazards (from thwomps to lava): Mario Circuit, Vanilla Lake, Donut Plains, Bowser's Castle, Ghost Valley, Choco Island, Koopa Beach, and Rainbow Road.
    • Rainbow Road would become a traditional finale track in each Mario Kart game known as the hardest track in each entry.
  6. Great soundtrack.
  7. The game has three multiplayer modes.
    • Mario GP: Plays just like the single-player version, but with one less computer-controlled driver. In order to proceed to the next track, only one player must rank in the top four. The first player will receive a Game Over if they rank out three times, and the other player continues alone.
    • Match Race (later known as VS. Mode): Pits the two players in a one-on-one race on any track.
    • Battle Mode: Two players choose from four battle arenas specially designed for Battle Mode and try to pop the three balloons surrounding the other player (representing their lives) by hitting them with items such as Koopa shells or banana peels. The last player with at least one balloon wins.
  8. There's a Time Trial Mode where the player must race through one track of his/her own choice, with the racer of its choice, in an attempt to set a record for the best lap or overall course time. All the items are taken out in this mode, and so the times achieved rely solely on driving skills. If the driving session is perfect (no falling, spin out or off-road), the ghost can eventually reappear on following sessions, allowing the player to further improve his/her driving skills.
  9. Introduced randomized items. Unlike the other racing games of its time, this game uses items from the Mario universe to make the gameplay more intense and chaotic, something that would also inspire other mascot kart racers. There are 9 items:
    • Banana: Can be dropped on the track, or thrown in front of the driver. Any racers who run into it will spin out (unless using a Star or Boo). It can also be dragged behind the player to block Koopa shells coming from behind.
    • Coins: Coins are found on track and in item boxes. They slightly increase the speed of a kart and give you a Coin.
    • Feather: Allows the player to make a big jump, and provides it the ability to perform several shortcuts by jumping over walls or empty gaps.
    • Boo: This item allows a racer to turn invisible temporarily and steal an opposing player's item.
    • Green Shell: A green shell can be thrown either forwards or backward at other racers and makes them spin out if hit.
    • Red Shell: This shell homes in on the player directly ahead.
    • Thunderbolt: Best and rarest item in the game, it shrinks every other player on the track. When shrunk, racers are vulnerable and can be crushed by others. Racers return to normal at the order of ranking they had when the lightning struck, reversed.
    • Mushroom: Gives the player a short, single-speed boost similar to zippers, that can be used to cut through terrain, gain seconds, or be used upon jump bars for very big jumps.
    • Star: As in every Mario game, stars make players temporarily invincible. They can't be harmed or slowed down in any way except falling, run faster and make others spin out on contact.
  10. It was the very first cartoony racing game ever released at that time and helped to innovate many other companies and franchises to do the exact same gameplay formula as this game but with their own twist to them that makes them stand out from this game and it's 7 sequels that were released in the following years, though none have had the success that this game & it's successors would have and received weaker reception with some expectations though.

Bad Qualities

  1. While it was good at the time, there are many elements that haven't aged well making it inferior compared to later entries.
    • Unlike the later Mario Kart games, the AI per character only use one item: Mario and Luigi use the Invincibility Star, Peach and Toad only use the Poison Mushroom, Yoshi uses Yoshi Eggs, Bowser uses Fireballs, Donkey Kong Jr. uses Banana Peels, and Koopa Troopa uses Green Shells (but thrown similar to Banana Peels). On the other hand, these particular items: the Poison Mushroom, Yoshi Egg, and Fireball are not available for the players to use.
    • The steering mechanics in this game are slippery and sensitive. Very delicate input is needed just to stay on the road and not end up hitting the walls or falling off. Mario Kart: Super Circuit carries on with similar mechanics. And instead of the traditional item boxes, there are item tiles, which each can be used up once per track, and since there's only one batch of item panels on each track, players will under most cases be limited to only one item per lap.
    • Power sliding works differently. You just tap the L or R button to jump while turning, and you'll do a power slide. There are no mini-turbos in this game, and power sliding in this game requires different timing. If you mess up, you're more likely to lose the race than win.
    • The yellow question mark panels (replaced by item boxes in later Mario Kart games) become red smiling faces when touched and cannot be reused. Fortunately, later games resolved this problem where the Item Boxes can reappear once hit and still be re-used in the same places.
    • There are only a handful of racing environments and instead a single setting can host several track configurations. Later games set each course in its own unique environment (the only exception being Super Circuit, which had four Bowser Castle courses).
    • The game uses lives, and it's possible to not even finish a grand prix due to running out of lives for not placing in the top 4. The following two installments would keep this feature before dropping it altogether in Double Dash!!.
    • Item boxes (or panels, in this case) were one-time-only uses. In all future games, item boxes respawn after use.
    • Out of all the Mario Kart games, this game has the worst roster. Even though it's the first game, there's only 8 characters and DK Jr. is here instead of Donkey Kong.
    • DK Jr. was a confusing character choice over Donkey Kong, though, this can be somewhat excused, as the game was released a few years before Donkey Kong Country, which would introduce the modern iteration of Donkey Kong that would appear in the later Mario Kart games.
      • Also, this game was released in 1992, 10 years after Donkey Kong Jr. was released.
        • On that note, this is the ONLY Mario Kart game with DK Jr.
  2. The Feather is so useless that it didn't return until Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, and only in Battle Mode.
  3. The Vanilla Lake tracks have extremely annoying ice blocks.
  4. The Poison Mushrooms intended to shrink racers down to half their size behave similar to the Super Mushrooms if racers run into them while small.
    • As mentioned, only the CPUs can use the egg, fireball, and the poison mushroom for no reason.
  5. Artificial Difficulty: If Mario or Luigi are CPU characters, they can become invincible whenever they want due to them having the Invincibility stars. This is especially a problem on both 100cc and 150cc difficulties.

Trivia

  • It's the first game where you can fully play as Yoshi and Koopa Troopa.
  • In the Japanese version during the trophy presentation, Peach and Bowser are shown drinking from an alcoholic bottle. This was obviously censored to have Bowser hold the bottle in a victory pose, while Peach throws and catches it several times in the Western versions.

Reception

Super Mario Kart has received critical acclaim and proved to be a commercial success; it received a Player's Choice release after selling one million copies and went on to sell 8.76 million copies worldwide, becoming the fourth best-selling game ever for the SNES. In Japan, it was a multi-million seller in 1992, and sold a total of 3.82 million in Japan.

This game has been credited with inventing the "kart racing" subgenre of video gaming and soon after its release several other developers attempted to duplicate its success.

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