Mario Kart World, Nintendo Switch 2 Welcome Tour – The Final Preview

A couple of weeks back, we were invited to Nintendo Australia’s headquarters to check out Mario Kart World and Welcome Tour—a whole day to just sit down and play the games without the hustle and bustle of a New York event. That was the last time we went hands-on and actually had time to sit down and play. Literally.

Mario Kart World

In New York, we got to try out the Grand Prix and Knockout Tour modes, and only briefly touched on Free Roam. Luckily, this time—with a whole day up our sleeves—we were able to explore Free Roam a little more, dive into Camera Play in VS mode, and even squeeze in a few rounds of Battle.

Aside from a few minutes while waiting for a Knockout Tour round to start, I didn’t really get the chance to explore Free Roam the first time. This time, though, we were off the leash—free to check out anything we wanted across the Mario Kart map. As you’ll see in the video, there’s a range of things to do scattered around the world: things to collect, missions to complete, and the satisfying smash of a P-Switch. We got through about 20 of them. Some are simple—almost too simple—while others required more advanced karting techniques that took multiple resets to master. Thankfully, if you fail, you can just click the left analogue stick to restart instantly.

On paper, a free-roam, open-world Mario Kart sounds amazing. I mean, it worked for Zelda, right? The difference is, Zelda has purpose and story to drive you forward. Mario Kart doesn’t really have those—but we’ll have to wait and see if the missions and secrets scattered throughout the map are enough to fill that gap.

Since we’ve already covered Grand Prix and Knockout Tour, you can check out our impressions of those modes here. Stay tuned for the full review. One thing I will say, though: Knockout Tour remains my favourite new way to play Mario Kart.

Mario Kart World supports multiplayer using the (sold separately) Nintendo Switch 2 Camera, and it all works rather well—though there is one small issue I’ll get to in a second. Setting it up is pretty straightforward: pick a spot to sit, move the marker to ensure your face is inside the circle, and you’re good to go. Step outside of that and it won’t track or follow you.

As you play with your couch mate, your face appears above your character on the map. It also pops up at the end of races or cups so you can gloat a little. The issue, though—and this is only a problem with local multiplayer—is that I can already see the person I’m playing against. They’re sitting right next to me. Sure, I have to turn my head to look at them, but Mario Kart is hectic enough—I’m not really going to be focusing on someone’s face mid-race. Then again, maybe that’s just me.

Down from five modes in Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, Mario Kart World features just two ways to battle: Balloon Battle and Coin Runners. Both are fine modes, but it certainly feels like a step backward in terms of variety.

So, how does it play—especially now in Mario Kart World’s “World”? Well, it’s big—almost too big. Even the returning Big Donut map feels oversized. I get that “big” is in the name, but normally when you revisit things from your childhood, they seem smaller than you remember. Not here. Big Donut, and the other maps too, just felt like it was hard to find anyone to battle, even with the massive number of players we had. The jury’s still out on this one, but it was like a cheeseburger with no sauce—left me a little disappointed.

Nintendo Switch 2 Welcome Tour

Confession — well, not really, since it’s obvious if you read our New York event coverage — we didn’t play Welcome Tour at all. With limited time, are you going to pick Donkey Kong Bananza and Metroid Prime 4: Beyond over this? Of course you’re not. But after the event, and with the stir it’s caused, we probably should have.

The good news is, despite the price, it does feel like there’s enough content here for $15. Whether it should be priced that way is another question — one that will probably never be resolved.

We played the game with access to most of the locations that the mini-games and tech demos unlock, which meant I could jump straight to the best ones — or so I thought. You still have to earn medals in some pretty basic games, like guessing where the HD Rumble 2 is strongest. Look, it’s easy to be cynical, but it was actually fun, even though it’s just a tech demo. The Super Mario Bros. 4K demo — which features all of World 1-1 on one screen — is fun too, but it’s still just one level of the game.

I think there’s a lot more to this game than people are giving it credit for. In time, I believe we’ll come to see it as something like Nintendo Land—a game people look back on and say, “Oh yeah, that one,” with fond memories. The whole price debate will fade eventually. But until then—until the 15-year-olds playing it now grow up and start to feel nostalgic—we’ll just have to let things be.

We’ll have more to say in our review once we’ve unlocked and played through more of the modes. There’s definitely a lot more to dig into with this one.

The Nintendo Switch 2, Mario Kart World, Nintendo Switch 2 Welcome Tour and everything else is out in just 24 hours from this article’s publishing. Be sure to check out our Switch 2 hub for everything you need to know now, and after launch.

Vooks travelled to Nintendo HQ in Melbourne as a guest of Nintendo Australia.