YOUR DOING IT WRONG!

The new Mario Kart smacks of mediocrity. Quite simply, it plays like Mario Kart DS, looks like Double Dash with bloom and tastes stale to say the least. A sprinkle of new items, a dash of new courses, a liberal dosage of gimmicky crap Nintendo and have made themselves another money-making pie.

No more food metaphors, I promise. On with the hate!

The plastic hulk that is the Wii Wheel (Wiil?) again highlights the technological shortcomings of the Wii. While it is amusing and actually works some of the time, serious racers will quickly replace it for the good old joystick.

The course design is insulting. Boosts, jumps and even waterslides are far too prevalent. Nintendo seems to think that if you are not boosting enough, you are not having enough fun. This is all well and good, that is, if you are a sugared-up twelve-year-old. The complication with this particular formula comes when you take into account the new 12 player races. That means there are now four more players down the bottom of the rung who get access to serious weaponry. Items like the new POW Block, which causes all racers in front of the target to spin and lose their items, seem far too potent for the prevalence of which they occur. The gameplay is frenetic as a result, but also extremely frustrating at times. Often it seems like skill takes a back seat position to blind luck. The catch-up effect that annoyed players a decade ago is not what plagues us today. It is winning the entire race until being brutalized by five or six different items on the final corner and having to settle for a podium-finish. It feels great when you are dishing out such a humiliation, but being on the receiving end causes one to get angry. And violent. And then people die.

The battle system has been shaken up too, both for better and for worse. The beloved Balloon mode is gone, replaced by a new Red vs. Blue team melee. There is also a new Coin mode which is mildly amusing. But the absence of split-screen free for all battles is extremely frustrating. One can only scratch their head as to why it didn’t make the cut. When the good Nintendo giveth, it also taketh away.

But enough hate. Now for the love…

Truly the strongest motivation for anyone to pick up Mario Kart Wii is the online multiplayer. It is refreshing to participate against other players from around the world, especially with a friend in two-player split screen mode. A ranking system keep things nice and competitive. It’s simple, it’s fun and it works.

Seeing little digitized versions of your friends and the usual mix of dictators, actors and genitalia-faced freaks that inhabit your Mii Channel cheering from the sidelines or inhabiting billboards is a nice touch. The ability to play as yourself is also pretty cool.

There are bikes. And tricks. And the Wii Wheel. But only minor refinements to game play and graphics when you look at the grander scheme of things. Nintendo is once again playing the safe card. As much as I hated Double Dash, I really long for a more audacious Mario Kart in just that vein. But the game I long for would deliver a less retarded racing experience than said title. I feel that Mario Kart Wii is patching up the various ills bought into the series by Double Dash, rather than playing on the older titles strengths.

Nintendo’s changes are a double edged sword. Mario Kart Wii offers cheap racing thrills but lacks the sophistication and finesse of other titles in the series. It’s mediocre, yes. But it provides reasonably solid entertainment. At times, a little frustration as well. And if your Wii is collecting dust, or if you live in the dark corner of the earth known as Australia and Smash Brothers isn’t out yet, Mario Kart might just provide enough nourishment to keep you going through the famine.

Pie.