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In honor of the upcoming release of Mario Kart 8, I thought I’d write a blog ranking my favorite games in the Mario Kart series.  Mario Kart 8 itself isn’t on the list, since I haven’t played it yet as of this writing, but I am looking forward to it.  So read on to find out which Mario Kart game took first place, and which ones ate dust!

8. Mario Kart: Double Dash!! (GameCube)

A lot of people hold Double Dash in high regard, so I may catch some flak on this.  But Double Dash is my least favorite Mario Kart game.  Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think it’s a bad game.  It’s just my least favorite.  I will admit that Double Dash brought a lot to the table.  I appreciate the double karts as it showed Nintendo was trying to do different things.  And there were a few neat tracks, such as Daisy’s Cruise Ship and the Rainbow Road in this one was pretty slick, too.  However, since there were two people in a kart, it meant you could hold double the items.  And it got really frustrating being pummeled with more shells than before.  In fact, this was the first Mario Kart game that I stopped trying to get 100 percent on.  The other reason why I don’t like Double Dash as much is because there is a far superior racer on the GameCube, and that’s Kirby Air Ride.  Kirby’s racer trounces Double Dash in every way, and yet people still gush about Double Dash and forget that Air Ride even exists!

7. Mario Kart DS

Even though the DS Mario Kart is low on my list, it’s not a bad game.  It’s just not very memorable to me.  However, there are two things that stick out about the DS game.  One, it was one of the first online games I ever played.  Granted, I didn’t play it online very much, but I don’t really play too many games online, especially back then.  So that was pretty monumental.  Also, this game gave us Waluigi Pinball, one of the coolest Mario Kart tracks ever.  I always thought it would be a neat idea to have a race track inside a giant pinball machine, and it was cool to see my idea come to life.

6. Mario Kart: Arcade GP 1 and 2

When people think about Mario Kart games, they always forget that there were a couple of them in the arcade.  Even Nintendo, as Mario Kart 8 should’ve been Mario Kart 10 if they counted these.  I even heard one person on YouTube say that the arcade versions were irreverent.  Well I disagree.  Sure they were not as good and the tracks were not as well designed.  But it was meant to be an arcade game so it was made a little differently because of that.  One notable thing about these arcade games is that they were the first ones that I didn’t play as Toad.  In all the other Mario Kart games I always play as Toad because he’s my favorite.  Well, the arcade games were actually made by Namco, so one of the racers you could play as was Pac-Man!  Also Ms. Pac-Man and Blinky.  Sorry Toad, but it’s…Pac-Man!  There was even a Pac-Land themed race track in the first one.  When the sequel came along, Namco and Bandai had already merged, so one of the new racers was a Tamagotchi character.  Another cool thing about the arcade Mario Karts is that when I saw them in arcades, kids would just flock to them, and it warmed my heart to see kids enjoy an arcade game so much.  I would love to see a home port of Mario Kart Arcade GP 1 and 2.  Sure they wouldn’t be as good, but I bet people would still buy them and have fun anyway.  You could even use the Wii U controller to take your picture, just like how they did it with Tank! Tank! Tank! (another Namco arcade port).

5. Mario Kart 7 (3DS)

Just like Mario Kart DS, Mario Kart 7 on the 3DS wasn’t as memorable to me for some reason.  There were some cool tracks, and I liked how some races were more like rally races instead of circuit laps in that each leg of the race was different (like on Wuhu Island and Rainbow Road).  Driving underwater and gliding in the air with hang gliders and parachutes was different, but there is a kart racer that did that sort of thing way better, and that was Sonic and All-Stars Racing Transformed, one of the few kart racers to outperform Mario Kart in a few areas.

4. Mario Kart Wii

A lot of people bashed on Mario Kart Wii, but I really liked it.  Well, I didn’t like the Wii Wheel steering controller.  Thank goodness you could use a regular controller.  And even though it had online play, that part was much better implemented in, again, the Sega and All-Stars racing games on the Xbox 360.  But I liked how you could do tricks in the air to get a boost, and adding motorcycles to the mix kept things fresh, new, and fun.  Lots of cool tracks, too.  Some of my favorites include Toad’s Factory, Koopa Cape, and the shopping mall you could race through.

3. Mario Kart 64

Many consider this one their favorite, and it’s one of mine, too.  Even though there was more emphasis on item usage, it still felt somewhat fair.  Power sliding was way more fun, and a time trial contest even won me a gold N64 controller back in the day!  Lots of fun and memorable tracks, too.  I especially liked Toad’s Turnpike and the N64 version of Rainbow Road in all its neon beauty.  I have a lot of great memories playing this with my college roommate and his girlfriend (now wife) back then.

2. Mario Kart: Super Circuit (GBA)

It may surprise some of you, but the GBA Mario Kart game is my second favorite!  I loved how the tracks still used that flat ‘Mode 7’ effect of the original.  It made it feel more like a spiritual successor sequel to the original game.  There were a lot of tracks I enjoyed, like the one made out of cheese, Sky Garden, the Wild West themed Sunset Wilds, and many more!  I also appreciated the little details they added.  For instance, in Luigi’s Circuit track, you start out with it raining and you can see an airport in the background.  After the second lap, it stops raining and you can see a Luigi blimp take off.  Later in the Sky Garden track, you can see that same blimp flying above the clouds!  Best of all, Super Circuit let you unlock ALL the tracks from the original Super Mario Kart game.  This means that the GBA game had more tracks than any other Mario Kart game to date!  It’s too bad this entry gets forgotten a lot of the time.

1. Super Mario Kart (SNES)

Yup, my favorite Mario Kart game is the very first one.  Ever since I first saw preview screens of it in Nintendo Power way back when, I knew it would be a big hit.  And I was right!  I imagine it hasn’t aged as well now, but I don’t care because I enjoyed it so much in high school and again in college that it still earns my number one spot.  In fact, I like SNES Super Mario Kart so much that not only is it my favorite Mario Kart game, but it’s also one of my top five favorite games of all time!  The game single-handedly created a new genre of racing, for better or for worse.  I played it for a couple of years in high school before getting tired of it, but then we dragged it out again when I was in college and enjoyed it just as much as before!  That’s why I like it so much.  I appreciated how each racer controlled differently.  Even similar characters had slight differences (Koopa Troopa cornered slightly better, but Toad was just a teeny bit faster, for instance).  I can’t tell the subtle differences as well in current Mario Kart games.  Speaking of which, this was the game that helped me decide that Toad was my favorite Mario character instead of Luigi, since he was such an awesome driver in this game.  I also like how there was less emphasis on item usage and more focus on driving skill.  You usually only got one item per lap, if you were lucky.  Speaking of laps, I also liked the shorter, flat tracks in this game because they felt more like real kart tracks that you’d see in amusement parks and other places you’d find karts.  It just made the game feel more like a kart racer.  So anyway, that’s why the original first Mario Kart game is so special to me.

Finish Line

Before I finish this up, while I’m talking about Mario Kart I thought I’d mention that for the past couple of years, every time I’ve visited a toy store I’ve seen Mario Kart racing toys and slot car sets and they look really cool!  When I was a kid, I used to love slot car sets that you had to put together.  One year when I was little I wanted a Dukes of Hazzard slot car set so badly for my birthday, but was ultimately disappointed in it when I got it.  It had a ramp you could make the cars jump over, just like in the TV show.  But how many times do you think the cars landed exactly on the slots after the ramp?  That’s right, ZERO!  They would never make a lap.  But at any rate, if I were still a kid, I’d probably love the Mario Kart racing toy sets.  If I had kids who loved video games and were at the right age to enjoy them, I would certainly get them some of those Mario Kart toys.

So where would Mario Kart 8 fall on my list?  Well, I don’t know since I haven’t played it yet as of this writing.  But since it uses the trick system and motorcycles like in the Wii game, I would imagine it would fall somewhere nearby on the list.  But who knows?  It’ll be fun to find out, though, once the game comes out.  In the comments section, tell me what you think of my list, and let me know YOUR favorite Mario Kart games!  Later!  --Cary