Mario Kart World makes a strong first impression. As any prior player of the franchise would expect, the vibrant and action-packed world is immediately fun and engaging. It only takes a few minutes of play to see that, beyond a bevy of new courses and some fancier graphical flourishes, there’s also a lot of new features under the hood that help the game make strides. While my early evaluation of the open world structure suggests that it lags behind other racing games that have tried similar feats, there’s no doubt after several hours of racing that this is a strong and worthy follow-up for the franchise.
We’ll have a complete scored review in the coming days. In the meantime, here are some big takeaways.
Drop straight into a sequence of Grand Prix races, and any kart racing enthusiast is likely to start having a great time. The courses are varied and fantastical, filled with strange and sudden twists on expectation, rocketing you high into the sky one minute only to splash you down into rocky ocean waves the next. The music also deserves a special call-out. I’ve sometimes found prior entries in Mario Kart to lean too heavily into pure frantic speed in musical tracks (especially on final laps) in an almost annoying way. The new installment is still high energy, but there’s more variation to the musical score, and is far more listenable.
I’ve always enjoyed playing Mario Kart with friends or the kids in my family, but it was never a game I turned to for an especially compelling racing feel beyond simple fun. This is the first time I recall finding the controls explore a level of depth that makes me dig in and truly develop my karting skills to the next level. New rail riding, increased focus on jumps and wall rides, more natural gliding while in the air – I’m really enjoying the flow of races. Especially on the higher CC runs, I have to pay close attention to snag the win.
Does this version of Mario Kart look profoundly better than what came before? I don’t think so. Some of the character models (I’m looking at you, Princess Peach) have an exaggerated facial modeling that I’m having a hard time adjusting to. But over time, there’s no doubt that Mario Kart World offers an impressive sense of speed and some exciting visual splendor. Light flashing off moving water, the sense of speed for incoming projectiles, the rich variance to the color palette – it’s an arresting game to look at, even if I haven’t encountered any graphical personal highlights that sell me on Switch 2 as a powerhouse, despite the attached buzzwords of HDR or higher FPS counts.
Mario Kart World’s most significant innovation from prior entries is the free-roaming map. I love how this structure naturally creates an array of new courses that interconnect the primary locations around the map. And I like dropping into free roam and getting to navigate a vast Mario-themed landscape while trying to find hidden pick-ups and take on scattered challenge missions.
However, Mario Kart World arrives at the free-roaming race model many years behind other racing competitors. At least based on the hours I’ve played, it lags behind most of them, including titles like the Forza Horizon series, or even other family-friendly fare like LEGO 2K Drive. The approach to accessing one’s map in Mario Kart World is confusing and unhelpful, seemingly only easily reachable from the top-end menu (though I do like dropping straight into the driving location shown on screen). There are too few activities to keep me engaged as I explore. It’s a beautiful game world, but it feels a bit barren. Perhaps I’ll change my mind on that front as I spend more time driving, but it’s one trouble spot in my early engagement.
Even with a less-than-stellar free-roaming experience so far, Mario Kart World is the most fun I’ve had playing solo with a game in the franchise. And the multiplayer sessions I’ve tackled with friends and family so far have the same frenetic energy and fun you’d expect. It’s energetic, family-friendly, and approachable, but it flirts with some greater depth than we’ve seen from the series in the past.
Is it a game that’s going to change your opinion on Mario Kart one way or the other? Almost certainly not. But is this a game that you can feel good buying on day one, with the knowledge that everyone at home will have a blast? Absolutely.
