The Mario Kart Series Ranked
The MARIO KART series just might be one of the best, and most popular, video game franchises of all time. With one very recent exception (the impetus for this piece), I don’t think there’s a single bad MARIO KART game. And yes, I’m including MARIO KART TOUR, the recently released mobile game, as part of the official, nine-game MARIO KART canon. This is in opposition to the four, apparently good (!) MARIO KART arcade games, which I have been unable to play. Suffice to say, MARIO KART TOUR’s place on mobile systems is just a continuation of the handheld tradition; I would include SUPER MARIO RUN (2016) in a ranking of the mainline SUPER MARIO series as well.
Anyways, let me get out of initial qualifications. I have so many fond memories with nearly every MARIO KART game, and I’m not even remotely alone, including my “non-gaming” friends. Everyone (of a certain age under, like, 35 or something) has played a MARIO KART, and that speaks to its ingeniously simple take on racing games. It spawned a whole host of imitators, none of which could overtake the best the Nintendo franchise had to offer. Well, CRASH TEAM RACING (1999) just might beat out its contemporary, MARIO KART 64. But that’s a discussion for another day. For now, let’s air out some hot, sweaty takes about the MARIO KART series alone.
EDIT 11/12/20: Added MARIO KART LIVE: HOME CIRCUIT to the list at #9.
#10 — MARIO KART TOUR (2019)
Look, I get why people are saying MARIO KART TOUR isn’t a full-fledged installment in the series. The game isn’t like SUPER MARIO RUN, where you can just buy and play the game, although it is like the rest of Nintendo’s mobile output since. It leans into typical gachapon mobile game tactics, although MARIO KART TOUR is never as predatory as it could be. But yeah, unlocking characters, karts, and more is a slow process with the in-game currency, and speeding the process up by purchasing the real-world currency still sends you to a loot “pipe” that could yield duplicates (which go to powering up your already unlocked characters, etc). The game, so far, has only featured one original, real-world-based track per “tour” (New York and Tokyo, at the time of this writing). It is actually kind of cool to get a greatest hits (and misses) compilation of MARIO KART courses, but what’s not super cool is the auto-acceleration and forced portrait mode play orientation. Other than that, MARIO KART TOUR emulates the gameplay evolution that began in MARIO KART 7: just incredibly simplified yet, in terms of the meta game progression and its financial frustrations, needlessly complicated. Like a lot of mobile games, it’s a serviceable time waster. I don’t hate dipping into a MARIO KART approximation for a few minutes at a time.
#9 — MARIO KART LIVE: HOME CIRCUIT (2020)
Nintendo’s most unconventional MARIO KART yet is a tremendous fusion of RC car function, AR technology, and gameplay typical to the series. MARIO KART LIVE: HOME CIRCUIT is the second installment that doesn’t fit into the series’ mold, right on the heels of MARIO KART TOUR. Unlike that game, though, HOME CIRCUIT is incredibly impressive. Using a physical toy car, complete with a camera, and cardboard gates that the camera reads to build out your course, the game really displays Nintendo’s creative spirit. It was real fun to scoot around the house, seeing it from ground level, and generally disrupting my dog’s piece of mind (although she was only slightly bemused by the thing). The flexibility afforded by creating your own courses, augmented by, well, the game’s augmented reality, is really stimulating. However. For all the fun novelty that HOME CIRCUIT brings, it ends up being just that: a novelty. If given the chance, I would play most any other MARIO KART game because of the consistency and full-fledged experiences they offer. Because you see, I can’t see myself playing a MARIO KART game for long that doesn’t have multiplayer (as HOME CIRCUIT doesn’t, unless you have multiple, expensive real-life karts), and slight technical disruptions mar an otherwise impressive experience. MARIO KART LIVE: HOME CIRCUIT just doesn’t match what I want from a MARIO KART experience, and that really is OK; it exists in a world apart.
#8 — SUPER MARIO KART (1992)
I know people love SUPER MARIO KART. I know they do. I get it. Kind of. I don’t, though. Obviously, because I put it at #8. I just think the game, as groundbreaking and neat as it ultimately is, is just too stodgy for today’s standards. The premise would be updated and refined over and over. For racing games, I’ll be a “recency snob;” as novel as Mode 7 was and still is, admittedly, 2D isn’t able to communicate the sense of space and speed that makes the genre, at its best, breathless. I can’t fully knock SUPER MARIO KART, though, because I still have a lot of fun on its primitive tracks, and visually, I’m still fascinated by it.
#7 — MARIO KART DS (2005)
MARIO KART DS was impressive for 2005, a commendable 3D MARIO KART on the go! In hindsight, however, it’s, as indicated, in the lower echelons of MARIO KART greatness. It’s fine! It’s good. But games before it and since had just a bit much more going on. I’m almost always more in favor of console experiences over handheld ones.
#6 — MARIO KART: SUPER CIRCUIT (2001)
And yet, the technical inferior SUPER CIRCUIT for Game Boy Advance holds me in thrall. OK, there might be a nostalgia influence here; SUPER CIRCUIT was my first MARIO KART. But like many Game Boy Advance games of the era, it built so strongly upon a Super Nintendo iteration. SUPER CIRCUIT is the beefed up SUPER MARIO KART, a Mode 7-lookin’ 2D racing game with an improved sense of depth and speed. It’s the best “simple” MARIO KART, if we’re including the entries I’ve ranked before on this list.
#5 — MARIO KART 64 (1996)
The heir apparent to MARIO KART nostalgia, perhaps the absolute king, MARIO KART 64 is the evolution. It set the standard for all later games in the series, boosting the racing into 3D with great speed and solid, accessible, satisfying control. That is not lost on me. What is lost on me is how this template-creator, which is what it is, could be superior to the console follow ups. I’ve already mentioned that I think racing games, in general, are improved with every subsequent iteration, and that’s the case with MARIO KART. It’s hard to not have fun racing through MARIO KART 64’s imaginative courses with its expanded roster and item catalog, though.
#4 — MARIO KART 7 (2011)
MARIO KART 7, a 3DS game, is the MARIO KART form we are now experiencing through MARIO KART 8 and TOUR, and it’s not just because of the hang-gliding. It’s also because of the return of the coins! And the expanded customization of karts and such, introducing frames, wheels, and flyers, adds a new wrinkle to the MARIO KART systems. WII had introduced a roster of playable vehicles, divided between karts and bikes, specific to the three “weight classes” of characters, but MARIO KART 7 took it to the next level. And it worked, making the traditional MARIO KART fun just a bit more nuanced and enhancing the feeling of every race being unique.
#3 — MARIO KART: DOUBLE DASH (2003)
But the true dark horse, the most unique game of the entire MARIO KART series is DOUBLE DASH, the infamous and beloved GameCube game. As its name would imply, characters ride together, one driving and one using items, the latter using items specific to them. That caused issues for a number of people, but it added a wrinkle that made character selection more of a conscious decision, an element that would be recreated with WII and beyond. DOUBLE DASH also refined the drifting system into the way we know it today, and its courses are among the best in the entire series. DOUBLE DASH is simply a delightful game, and one of the best executions of MARIO KART’s party game atmosphere.
#2 — MARIO KART WII (2008)
I have a feeling MARIO KART WII’s height on this list might be “controversial.” But I have to go with my gut on this; MARIO KART WII is probably my most-played MARIO KART, just besides #1. And that’s because it is an incredibly polished, refined installment of the MARIO KART formula, given a perfect blend of absolute arcade equality and a bit of “strategy” with the selection of weight classes/karts/bikes. The tracks are among the best in the series, and before MARIO KART 8, WII had the widest selection of characters. It, like other Wii releases for long-running series (SMASH BROS., MARIO PARTY), may feel more “casual.” There are elements that reduce the game from a more competitive nature, such as the distribution of “cheap” items. But at the end of the day, MARIO KART WII is a near-perfect dip into arcade racing, no matter who you’re playing with.
#1 — MARIO KART 8 (2014)
But MARIO KART 8 is a perfect dip into arcade racing. Expanding its characters and tracks into the “Nintendo Kart” that has been asked for with characters like Link and Isabelle from ANIMAL CROSSING, MARIO KART 8 also brings numerous classic tracks into HD modernity. Oh, and yeah: graphics are never truly an important factor for me, but MARIO KART 8 is straight up the most beautiful game in the series, and not just technically. Its art direction is so refined and attractive, setting the racing action in the most lush tracks MARIO KART has seen. The wide array of customization, brought in from MARIO KART 7, is expanded, and with 8, online multiplayer in the MARIO KART series became easily accessible for the first time. I have played hours and hours and hours of MARIO KART 8 over the past five years, and it’s partly because there isn’t a huge reason to go back. For now, Nintendo has perfected the MARIO KART formula, and MARIO KART 8 DELUXE for the Switch (not considered a whole new entry, on my part at least) seems to be holding that down.
