Mario Kart is 20 years old today, here’s our best memories

On August 27th 1992, twenty years ago today, Nintendo released Super Mario Kart on the Super Famicom in Japan. Being the good old days of NTSC and PAL, we didn’t get the game here in Australia until early 1993.

Since then, we’ve had seven Mario Kart titles on Nintendo consoles and their series has branched out into the arcade as well.

Each Mario Kart title always brings out the best of each console it’s on. The first one showed off Mode 7 graphics to the world in a spectacular way, Mario Kart 64 brought 4-player split screen fun to the masses and online gameplay in Mario Kart DS.

Everyone always has their favourite Mario Kart game, track, character and memories.

To celebrate the 20th anniversary of Mario Kart, we thought we’d go over our memories with the series, the best and worst of it all. We would love for you to share your Mario Kart memories as well.

Daniel ‘VOOK’ Vuckovic

Favourite Mario Kart Moment.

I’m going to cheat here and name two, one of them is my personal one and the other is to do with my family.

First up has to be Mario Kart 64 multiplayer, although Mario Kart 64 isn’t my favourite Mario Kart game overall (more on that later) it is my favourite console one. This is due to the game’s kicking multiplayer of course. Single player was fun, but extreme rubber banding made it a little crazy. Having the mates over, playing not only the GP mode but of course battle mode. The best.

My other moment has to be my father. He’s racked up over 1200 hours of Mario Kart Wii online. He’s played it so much that the music, sounds (especially from the Wii Remote) got on my nerves every time he did it. All weekend he would play and all you would hear is “Wa-hoo, Wa-hoo” and the jump noise out of the Wii Remote all weekend. We rarely played it with him because he complained that the framerate was too low in split screen multiplayer, but he would always try and play anyone who visited. Here’s a photo from the Nintendo Channel on our two Wii consoles. I stopped him playing on mine and bought him his own to preserve the disk drive.

Favourite Track

Rainbow Road (Mario Kart Super Circuit). Why do I love this track? That’s because it had some great glitches and shortcuts in it that made a 17 second lap time possible, you can bounce off the edges all the way around the track but only if you have near perfect reflexes. I managed to do it only once. Since the internet though I’ve since learnt I wasn’t the fasted in the world, I felt a great shame.

Favourite Item

Triple Red Shell. Best defensive and offensive weapon you can get that’s not uber rare. Fire it forwards, fire it back or keep up the shield.

Character of Choice

It’s always Luigi, if it can’t be him then Luigi. Whenever Mario Kart is played at my house, I’m Luigi. That’s the rules. I don’t like any of the light characters and would rather go fast then be an oath like Donkey Kong.

Favourite Mario Kart Game

My favourite will probably be chosen by no one else, but it’s Mario Kart Super Circuit. Playing the game just came a good time in my life, myself and all my friends had just gotten Game Boy Advance units so there was plenty link-cable multiplayer to go around. Sure I had to struggle to see it on the Game Boy Advance’s terrible screen, but it was marvelous. It’s the only real time outside of Pokemon as well that the link cables got an extensive work out. It’s still the only Mario Kart game I personally have 100% getting the final title screen unlock on it. It’s a shame I can’t play it at ALL anymore, I just can’t go back to it, the kart control just seems so off.

Phantom Ganon

Favourite Mario Kart Moment

For me this one is actually fairly recent in the grand scheme of things. I grabbed Mario Kart Wii from the shelf to play along with some family who were visiting. They weren’t too great at it, but they were experienced gamers so I left the difficulty setting on Hard. So we were playing for podium places and one of my cousins required only a 5th placed finish or better in the final race to guarantee a podium finish. He was excited that he would finally get a podium finish as he was the one constantly egging us on to keep playing in search of his first podium finish. Suffice it to say, he finished the race in 11th place and he was branded the great choker of Mario Kart. Good times.

Favourite Track

I think the most memorable by far for me has been Baby Park on Mario Kart: Double Dash. Seven round laps where the mayhem just grows and grows.

Favourite Item

There’s not much greater feeling than aiming and timing a green shell to perfection to hit the person in front of you. Then again, there’s not much greater feeling than smashing the item button once you gain possession of a golden mushroom. Especially in Mario Kart 64.

Character of Choice

I always pick a different character as my favourite in each one. In DS, it was Mario. In Wii, it was Baby Mario. In Mario Kart 7, it’s Luigi.

Favourite Mario Kart Game

Mario Kart Wii has given me the most memorable moments of the series. Twelve players online? Crazy fun. Joining friends was easy for the most part and it had a some great original tracks like Maple Treeway and Koopa Cove along with a bunch of the best from older games.

Scott Dowson

Favourite Mario Kart Moment

I think my favourite Mario Kart moment was when I picked up Super Circuit at the launch of the GameBoy Advance. Firstly, it amazed the hell out of me that a handheld was capable of such amazing graphics and gameplay, that to me (at the time) seemed almost identical to Mario Kart 64. Secondly, being one of only two games I had at launch (Rayman Advance was the other), I played it to death and to this day it’s one of my favourite entries in the series. When I fondly look back at my experiences with the GBA system, Super Circuit regularly comes to mind as a perfect, portable Mario Kart. I also really loved how you could collect the coins to boost your speed!

Favourite Track

I’d say this one has to go to Mushroom Gorge from Mario Kart Wii (although honourable mentions go out to some really creative Double Dash tracks)! I just love the cave section towards the end of the track; it’s the perfect opportunity to bump someone off the edge, either via your own cart, a shell or a well-timed lightning bolt. I’ve made some epic comebacks from there, and also choked badly when in first place. Wonderful track!

Favourite Item

Okay yes, the triple red shell is amazing. As is the Bullet Bill Rocket and the Lightning Bolt… but I have to give it to the Starman. I love how it not only makes you invincible (and capable of blowing your opponents away), but it also gives you a speed boost, in general and over rough terrain. You can very easily go from an average position to a polling one by using a well-timed Starman and some smarts!

Character of Choice

When I was younger, I used to pick Luigi basically exclusively. I always liked him, and it was a chance for him to outshine his brother for once (under my guidance)! As I got a little older, Donkey Kong became my most used racer, just because it’s really fun to be a giant monkey driving a bumper car. Seriously, contemplate its awesomeness for a second, will ya?

However, now my go-to man is Wario. I picked up a bit of an affinity with him a few months back when playing Mario Party with some friends. You see, I liked the idea of just trolling them in Mario Party (as winning is almost as reliant on luck as it is skill) and in general, just be a bit of a jerk during the session. Who’s the biggest jerk in the entire Nintendo universe? Well, Wario of course. He cares only about himself, and isn’t opposed to making other people’s lives miserable simply for his own pleasure. So yeah this sort of general feeling has basically wormed its way into any Mario sub-genre. With the notable exception of Smash Bros. (I just can’t play well as Wario, no matter how hard I try)!

Favourite Mario Kart Game

I thought about this one for a while, and whilst I was initially going to go with either Mario Kart 64 or Super Circuit; I have to give it to Mario Kart Wii. Yes there’s plenty of nostalgia and great memories that the former two provide, but Mario Kart Wii is the best experience the series has to offer. Please note I’ve only briefly played Mario Kart 7, but I still think the series is designed for people to gather around a telly and talk smack. Mario Kart Wii is the definitive Mario Kart experience for this purpose, at least until a Wii U version is released (which it will; don’t kid yourself).

Also, I find it strange how some people complain so much about the motion controls. They’re probably the best implementation of motion control in any game, and they’re certainly very responsive and tactile. I do find it a little easier to control with some sort of plastic attachment though… must be a placebo or something!

Kirby102

Favourite Mario Kart Moment
My favourite Mario Kart moment was from Mario Kart 64 – Some of my friends and I have just unlocked Extra mode in Mario GP, we decided to experiment with playing one of the tracks that proved to the most difficult: Toad’s Turnpike. Not only is the course flipped, but now there’s oncoming traffic! We’d simply had a ball with all the chaos that is from dodging oncoming traffic and even then once you hit a vehicle, sometimes there was no telling when you would be able to drive away from crashing into other vehicles, because you’re still in mid-air because of the first vehicle! It was awesome because I had used the Star power-up and drove through the whole traffic ensuring a memorable win.

Track
Rainbow Road from Mario Kart 64. Back in its day, it was quite the spectacle that the Nintendo 64 offered. Although too many things wasn’t happening in the background, the main focus was on the colourful track and its soothing soundtrack. Also, it’s not often in the later games that you see people jumping hoping to clear half the course by flying through space now.

Item
Green Shells, not because they cannot home onto other karts, but because of the unexpected outcome it might have after you fire it. It takes great skill to be able to hit someone with a Green Shell, but it takes great responsibility of making sure that you don’t run into it when you miss.

Character of Choice
My first character that I started with was Yoshi from Mario Kart 64 and it seemed to stick on from there. He was considered as a ‘Light’ racer, which meant that he was among the fastest. So yeah, nothing too fancy.

Favourite Mario Kart Game
Mario Kart 64 is my beloved favourite. Having spent the most time on this amongst the rest of the series, the frantic mayhem of the multiplayer and some of the most memorable courses, there’s no reason to not to fallback on this version for nostalgia. I’m surprised Nintendo not only decided to not bring back All-Cup Tour in Mario Kart: Double Dash (as painful as it was to complete), but they haven’t made any cups purely consisting of all the Bowser Castles and Rainbow Roads. Here’s hoping that the Wii U version of Mario Kart brings something like a Bowser Cup or a Rainbow Cup, I’d definitely play that!

Liam ‘kksl1der’ Doolan

Favourite Mario Kart Moment

I can’t even begin to pinpoint my favourite Mario Kart moment. If you’re holding Diddy Kong’s Peanut Popguns to my head though, I’ll just go with a more recent, and general, sort of event. That point where you’re on your final lap in an online match. You’re in first literally meters from the finish line, and then you’re hit by a blue shell. This normally continues with you being struck by lighting and then rammed off the road by the dude in second. Before you know it, you’re in the ditch, Lakitu’s helping you out and you’re rolling across the line in last place. It takes a few seconds to register what just happened and this is usually followed by a series of expletives, and you either throwing the controller/system at the nearest wall.

Favourite Track

As boring as it may seem, I’ve always loved my road tracks in Mario Kart. I like how any technicalities are clearly displayed and how clean and professional the lines through these tracks can be when it comes to Time Trials. If I had to select my favourite Mario Kart track of all time though (in which case I do), I’d probably go with SNES Mario Circuit 2 (currently featured in Mario Kart 7). It’s got some nice corners in it, a cool little jump, and if you get really mad at your opponents during a race you can head to the nearest item block and camp out on one of the straights for them with some red shell ammo.

Item

In the past I’ve said my weapon of choice is the triple mushroom combo, so I better just stick with that. I’m not even sure why I like this item but I guess it’s just the feeling of soaring past fellow players like there’s no tomorrow. I tend to enjoy the more punishing items as well. I’m talking about the Bullet Bill, Lighting Bolt and Red Shell trio. These three items can be incredibly satisfying if you’ve had a tough day in the office (the Mario Kart office that is). I’m honestly frothing at the mouth just thinking about them…

Character of Choice

My go-to driver used to be Yoshi, but with Nintendo claiming he’s put on a few pounds (went from a light to medium weight in between a few games) I’ve been forced to reconsider. In reality, I never recovered from this loss and have been playing with deadbeats like Dry Bones even since.

Favourite Mario Kart Game

Once again, if you were to hold some sort of Nintendo themed gun to my head, I would probably cough up an answer. Since you’re not though, I’ll just be nice this time round and go with Mario Kart 64. Although MK64 is considered as a bit of low point by many Mario Kart vets, I still believe it was a shock to the system for most that the next generation of gaming, at the time, had finally arrived. Booting up Mario Kart 64 for the very first time with the golden Nintendo logo and then racing out on Luigi Raceway with the big screen capturing you as you went through the track’s tunnel, it was just magnificent! I guess this also partly qualifies an official Mario Kart memory, dammit!