Topic: The Mario Kart Thread

[Mirby]

I know people were concerned when Yoshi Valley was announced but that the "what the hell place am i in" thing wasn't returning, but I think it works quite well without it. It's always interesting to see what routes people take, even if there is a de facto fastest route.

[Protoman Blues]

MK8 is my favorite in terms of its track design, and its part selection I'd say is...probably on par with MK7.  I think there are more actual parts, but a lot of them appear to be clones of each other.  Literally every one of the four sports bikes has the same stats.  It's nice in that it helps you choose a more personal aesthetic even when you're looking for a specific set of stats, but it also yields less variety in terms of performance.  Also I really wish there were more than three ATVs, or at least more than one that ISN'T modeled after an animal.

I really like the track design, yes. My point was more about the "personality" of the tracks. Like say, there's no Daisy Hills or anything like that. I think MK7 did a slightly better job with that. Also, MK7 Rainbow Road was the best. Otherwise the courses are really well done.

Speaking of which, if there is a "best" part, it probably is the Sports Bike (and its variants).  But there is a learning curve to it since it screws with the traditional drifting, so I'd still say they did a better job of getting bikes and karts to coexist than in Wii.  The "standard" bikes definitely don't feel any better or worse than karts and ATVs.

What made it unbalanced in Mario Kart Wii is that once you knew how to use the 3-4 best bikes in that game, there was no reason to pick the other bikes or karts, because you'd lose. But yeah, they're fine now. No more Wheelie Boosting, plus the items are distributed better. Honestly though, in terms of handling, I've found that the classic Pipe Frame Kart handles just as well as some of the bikes.

I don't really feel that traction is as important in MK8 as it was in 7, so  the "monster" wheels come off as being useless.  Maybe that's just me, but it seems as if MK7 gave you more reasons to try and get away with pushing through a few moments of off-road.  By the same token, handling seems a bit more vital.  In MK7 you could deal with some pretty stiff handling as long as you had decent foresight of the track, but in MK8 I found it more common to have a part combination that simply could not handle the curves that I needed it to once the competition got tough.

Agreed. But then, I've always picked handling over just about everything since Super Mario Kart.

Items are in and of themselves well balanced (even if Starman was nerfed), but I think the distribution needs a serious look.  Even beyond coins, which trip things up enough, the next most common thing you see is Mushrooms.  The two in tandem make it very rare and difficult to be able to go on the offensive even when you do fall behind, which makes the "only one item" thing a lot more frustrating than it really should be.  I agree it's a good format, but it could use some tweaking.  The overall balance leads to many of the good items being more situational than before; Triple Red is GODLIKE in the ideal circumstances, but will do you little good if a Boomerang is thrown your way.  Boomerang and Pirahna Plant are both incredible in the fray, but get substantially less useful if there's a distance between you and the guy in front of you.

Distribution could use some work, yes. I think MK7 handled it better.

And yes, N64 Rainbow Road needs to be 3 full laps again.  Otherwise it's a fantastic course; I wonder who thought up the coin-spewing steam engine running along the track?  I love that they picked four N64 courses, I love that ROYAL RACEWAY is finally among them.  Now we just gotta work on N64's Wario Stadium...

The course is so beautiful. That's why I want to experience it more than just once. And yes, the new Royal Raceway is gorgeous. Toad's Turnpike....I really like the new course a lot, but it's a little too big road wise AND no Mirror Mode cars coming at you.

[Mirby]

Here's another annoyance about N64 Rainbow Road being so short now: if you mess up on say, 150cc or Mirror Mode, you don't really have time to recover because it's so damn short.

EDIT: Huzzah!

[Protoman Blues]

SO yeah, we need to get some MK8 action going on in here.

[Mirby]

We totally do. I might even use that shiny new Gold Standard kart I just unlocked.

Who's gonna set up an RPM tournament? I asked this already but there wasn't an answer haha

EDIT: Also just saw your friend request, PB. I'm well aware of who SZIN is hahahaha

[Protoman Blues]

We'll have to find a day everyone is available.

[Mirby]

Indeed we will. At least we can set up a large amount of time for people to play when they can, so if only some are available in the morning while others in the evening the tournament can still work for them.

I'd also recommend capping off the amount of races one can play to keep things fair if that is the case. That way we don't have people who've been racing all day and have a lot of points, making it impossible for those who joined later to catch up.

[Protoman Blues]

Yeah. We shall see!

[Mirby]

Now all I need to do is get 10,000 coins total. I'll get that over time via online races.

[Blue Valkyrie]

Saturdays and Mondays are good for me, certainly wouldn't mind joining in on some online races. (Not that good though.)

[Protoman Blues]

Just three star'd every course on every CC. That felt good. Now for some Time Trials.

Also, congrats Nintendo. You've created a Mario Kart game in which I dread the Green Shell far, FAR above the Blue Shell. 

[Blue Valkyrie]

The A.I. is frighteningly accurate with those aren't they? Anyone else miss the days where DK span out on his own banana peels? 

[Phi]

The A.I. is frighteningly accurate with those aren't they? Anyone else miss the days where DK span out on his own banana peels? 

It wouldn't surprise me if DK is a masochist for bananas.

[Blue Valkyrie]

It wouldn't surprise me if DK is a masochist for bananas.

True, this is the Ape that punched the moon out of orbit just to get his bananas back. 

[Protoman Blues]

The A.I. is frighteningly accurate with those aren't they? Anyone else miss the days where DK span out on his own banana peels? 

Yes. Yes they are!

[Hypershell]

You know, for all the hours I sank into MK7, I never actually noticed the "acceleration tier" thing.  I just picked my favorite and ran with it (Barrel Train, Monster Tires, Gold Glider, Daisy/Yoshi as the driver).

Well, looks like it's back in MK8.  Partial bar in acceleration means nothing.  And seeings how MK8 both makes it harder to squeeze decent stats out of a lightweight and makes it rarer to get to actually attack with an item, I guess that makes it more worth considering now.

And oh yeah: Slick tires are great only if you're on dry land.  Turns out they suck underwater.

...does anyone here actually play online, BTW?  I just hit the 4000 point mark and I've seen, like, one person on my friends list (well, two, but I'm pretty sure the second one met me on MK8 to begin with).

[Mirby]

I mostly play online with friends and in tournaments.

[Hypershell]

What made it unbalanced in Mario Kart Wii is that once you knew how to use the 3-4 best bikes in that game, there was no reason to pick the other bikes or karts, because you'd lose. But yeah, they're fine now.

Eh...it may not be as obvious/drastic as the "pick this bike to win" of MKWii, but there's still an imbalance.  The high-acceleration parts are favorable, which creates a HUGE discrepancy between attaching high-acceleration parts to a heavyweight and high-speed parts to a lightweight, the latter being a good way to screw yourself.  Play online often enough and you'll start to take notice that very rarely do you see the Toads/Babies in the lead, and there is a reason for that.

From what I've seen, the most common leader of an online race is Morton/Bowser (Wario works just as well but seems less popular) on a Sports Bike or its variants (Comet, Jet, Yoshi).  After I read up on the acceleration tiers I understood why: Use that with Roller/Button wheels and a high-acceleration glider, you get 4.0 acceleration (2nd highest in the game; using Landship/Biddybuggy for 4.5 is meaningless) along with 4.25 speed, which is pretty damn nuts.  But, as stated above, Sports Bike drifting is a bit wonky, so it does take some learning in terms of how to handle it.  They're not unbeatable, either, but it's definitely an uphill battle.

The babies got screwed; I feel sorry for anyone who actually wants to race as them. 

[Protoman Blues]

At least in this game, the item distribution isn't so butchered to add to said imbalance.

[Blue Valkyrie]

Anyone still interested in playing online someday?

[Protoman Blues]

Yeah, definitely. Perhaps we could get something going later on tonight?

[Protoman Blues]

So, Blue & I are gonna play some Mario Kart sometime tonight, hopefully around 10PM EST.

Anyone else wanna join in?

[Blue Valkyrie]

RueCeles is anyone wants to add me! Hope to see some of you online!

[Sakura Leic]

If only I had a Wii U.

[Police Girl]

If only I had a Wii U.

They're literally just sitting on store shelves, waiting for people to buy them. At this point I'd just buy the games for when you actually do get the console so you don't have a backlog or anything.