I played last week games I didn’t play a decade ago, like megaman legends 1 and 2 (the camera felt so different of what I remember), brigandine, azure dreams and parasite eve, that was my staycation xD . Such an interesting reading.

I actually find the gameplay to be quite unique in each entry, although all obviously in the same universe of physics. I feel Mario Kart games are so popular because there’s a familiar accessible gravity to the gameplay, but to really master the mechanics takes time to both learn the specifics of the physics and learn the ins and outs of the tracks.

My distaste for Mario Kart 7 had to do with its entirely counterproductive design. It’s deceptive to say “well x and y also have blue shell, so what’s the problem?” because in Mario Kart Wii, auto-boosting over a long jump makes you immune to lightning and a blue shell. In Mario Kart 7, I can be racing a perfect Grand Prix match, hit every drift and stay perfectly on the driving line, then I can be auto-boosting over a long jump – literally having no control – then get hit with a lightning bolt, get pulled back onto the track, and then get hit with a blue shell even though I’m now in 8th because I was in 1st when it was launched and after that I could continue race perfectly and come in a terrible position.

That is horrible, horrible design. It does exist in pretty much every Mario Kart for ages now, but in the better versions like DS and Wii, it’s not nearly as prevalent and destructive as it is in 7.

And I have no problem with unforgiving racers. Wave Race: Blue Storm is hard as fuck. On expert, you could have 3 perfect races, mess up the smallest bit on the 4th track, and have your entire tournament boned. It was extremely frustrating and the waves can be unpredictable, but ultimately, it was my fault. In my Mario Kart 7 scenario, it is taking the absolute worst development in the Mario Kart series and magnifying it to almost satiric proportions. I raced a perfect race and got near last.

Replayed Mario Kart Wii over my staycation, this happened once out of dozens of races. Still one time too often, but not with the frequency and severity of its occurrence in 7.

So yes, I actually loved the racing in Mario Kart 7 and loved the aggressiveness of the driving of the AI in ways that I feel the other games don’t have. I, counter to Lusipurr, actually enjoyed the track design quite a bit (although I do also overall prefer the SNES-style drift-heavy maps), but it didn’t end up mattering. It wasn’t just holding it back like in DS and Wii, it was rendering the game irrelevant.

On the other hand, MK7 for the 3DS is utterly derivative. It is literally the same formula again–in fact, I actually think that MK DS is better on the whole–and there is no imaginative spark at all. It is simply ‘more Mario Kart’, which is fine if that is all one wants. But if one expects each game to develop and grow, then it isn’t sufficient. And, I do expect that, otherwise I could just keep playing my old MK games. Why buy a new one which is effectively the same as the old ones?

Ultimately both games have a blue/purple shell which cannot be turned off, so I own neither. Instead, I play the original SNES mario kart, because that is easily the best game in the series, and represents a high point which they are unlikely ever to reach again.

I hate stupid typos.

Could you elaborate on your complaints with Mario Kart 7? I found that game to be quite enjoyable and pretty well balanced aside from the problems that all recent Mario Karts have (blue shell BS).

That said, it still has a blue shell which cannot be turned off, so I hate it on point of principle.