The Chronic Consumer

My five-year-old son is a big fan of the entire Mario franchise, and loves playing Nintendo games featuring that character and his friends. From New Super Mario Bros. to Mario Party DS and Mario Kart DS, they are by far his favorites. So when we heard that Mario Kart Wii was coming out at the end of last month, you better believe we made arrangements to buy it right away. After playing the new title every day for a couple of weeks, I’m finally ready to give a review.

Overview: Mario Kart Wii is an updated version of the beloved Mario Kart franchise. As with previous titles, you race karts as Mario or one of his friends around cool tracks while hammering each other with various weapons. In Grand Prix mode, there are 8 different cups to compete for, with each cup consisting of four 3-lap races at different circuits. That’s a total of 32 unique tracks (64 if you include “mirror mode”, which allows you to race the same tracks in the opposite direction), so that’s quite a variety. There are also Balloon Battle and Coin Runner modes, minigames that provide a nice change to all the racing, along with WiFi mode that allows you to compete against players from around the world.

Characters and Karts: From what I’ve read, there are 25 characters available in this game, with more than half of them being “unlockables” that you have to win by achieving various milestones. You start out with 12, and work your way up from there. In addition to the usual crowd, we get the baby versions of Mario, Luigi, Peach, and Daisy, plus the ability to play as Miis.

There are a wide variety of karts to choose from and unlock as well. I think I read that each character can have up to 12 karts and bikes (that’s right, you can even ride motorcycles in this version!), but we’re nowhere near that number yet.

Controls: Mario Kart Wii comes packaged with a Wii wheel that houses the regular Wiimote. With the Wiimote placed in the wheel, you actually “drive” around the tracks, which is hard to do at first, but players quickly get the hang of it. I had to help my 5-year-old turn for a couple of days, but now he’s playing with the Wii wheel all by himself. The game can also be played with a Wiimote and nunchuk setup, a classic controller, or a GameCube controller. We haven’t tried any of those, though, so I can’t say how they work.

Gameplay: There are a couple of notable differences in gameplay in Mario Kart Wii compared to past versions. For one thing, it’s much, much harder to gain a turbo boost by drifting. I was very good at drifting in Mario Kart DS, where it’s relatively easy, but here, I can hardly ever do it, so I just use Automatic drift mode whenever I play.

Also included in this version is the ability to do midair tricks and stunts that end up giving your character a turbo boost when you hit the ground again. To accommodate for these tricks, almost every track now has ramps and halfpipes scattered throughout the landscape. This is actually a very fun addition, and now when I play the DS version, it seems kind of boring without tricks.

Finally, there are a few changes to the items you get from the item boxes. Now included is a mega mushroom that grows your character and vehicle to giant size and flattens anyone you hit; a POW box that sends everyone in front of you into a spin; and a thunder cloud that will zap you with electricity and shrink you unless you pass it off to someone else by bumping into them. The mega mushroom is fun, but the other two are kind of annoying while playing — especially since they seem to appear A LOT.

Online Play: The WiFi mode is fun and seamless. There’s a points system that automatically places you with players of like skill level instead of having to manually choose beginner or expert, so that makes things much more even. Plus, since it’s nearly impossible for people to “snake” their way around the track with mini turbo boosts, WiFi gaming in Mario Kart Wii is a lot more fun than in DS.

Verdict: Mario Kart Wii is an exceptional game that will lead to hours upon hours of fun for the whole family. Players of all ages and skill levels can quickly get up to speed on how to handle the karts and bikes to start racing, and everyone can win at some point. This game was a great purchase for our family and is highly recommended!