Mario Kart 7

The multiplayer moments that Mario Kart games provide are always entertaining: it’s a chaos of exploding and flying items, no doubt, but it’s usually a controllable chaos. A rookie can take advantage of the stars to not finish in the last place, for example, while experienced players can decelerate when they realize that someone has picked up a blue shell, letting the new first place take the fall. That is, they tend to be games that manage to entertain any type of player and always maintain a good level of competition. In this sense, Mario Kart 7 is a new entry that tries to expand some ideas and improve existing mechanics, being superior to the Wii entry, but ultimately fails to offer enough content.

The additions to the franchise are varied and, for the most part, interesting. Karts can now fly, for example, with the use of a glider. Although it doesn’t come up frequently, the ability to glide proves useful in overcoming some ground obstacles more easily and gaining time in a race, as well as guaranteeing a certain variety in the tracks. A propeller has also been added in the aquatic parts, but it’s only a logical aesthetic move, since, besides some slowness, it doesn’t change the way racing occurs in the water.

A first-person view has also been included, but when the kart is hit the camera returns momentarily to the third-person to show the action, possibly not to cause vertigo in the player – not that most will discover this, since the game never bothers to tell you that this functionality even exists. And it is also possible to play using the 3DS motion sensor.

But the most impressive addition present in Mario Kart 7 is the vehicle customization. Now before each match, players can assemble their favorite kart after choosing their character. This option has its strengths and weaknesses. On the one hand, it gives players the freedom to create fun and bizarre combinations, such as leaving Bowser with a flowery glider inside Yoshi’s egg or uncovering optimal ones that make racing easier. But on the other hand, such an option significantly diminishes the individuality of each character, since, even with their initial statuses, players can make them identical to each other with the correct pieces.

Nevertheless, Mario Kart 7 also marks the return of coins. Disappeared since the GBA version, they are a highly positive addition, as they have a considerable impact on the strategy of a race. After all, in addition to being a way to acquire new kart parts – one for each fifty collected – each of them increases the top speed of the kart, which stimulates racing not only for item boxes but also for any coin scattered around the tracks.

Mario Kart 7, however, doesn’t mark the return of the mission mode of the DS entry, which extended the singleplayer part of the game and forced players to see the tracks differently – thereby limiting the content of this title. As for the Wii version, bikes were abandoned and the number of players dropped from twelve back to the usual eight. Mario Kart 7 doesn’t try to present any different or fascinating game mode, being limited to Grand Pix, Time Attack, Balloon and Coin Battle. It also lacks a customizable cup mode, where players can choose the tracks and the number of laps they want to race. Online multiplayer mode, however, presents the possibility of creating communities that let you choose the types of items used in a race.

As for items, the new ones are great: the Super Leaf fits perfectly with the rest, with a tail that can not only attack enemies but also protect players from shells, while Lucky 7 makes players get seven items at the same time, but it is so rare that it never comes to unbalance a race. But the main change is the fact that the infamous Blue Shell now goes follows the first place on the ground, hitting anyone who is in the way. Such a change is significant and mostly positive, because, as the item is usually got by players in the last positions and has the main function of knocking down the first place, now it actually is useful for the player who throws it.

The level design of the tracks, however, is the element that certainly jumps to the eye in Mario Kart 7. Crafted to explore certain mechanics while having an excellent art direction, they are certainly the game’s trump card. Music Park, a track in the form of musical instruments, is a prime example. Players’ vehicles will run over keyboards, fall on drums that will propel them upward, and players will even try to escape the impact of large musical notes, which have their sounds added to the music. But in addition to being highly creative, Music Park is also completely designed around the turbo achieved after pressing the jump button at the precise moment the kart is launched upwards. Therefore, since the black keyboard keys, the drums, and the impact of the musical notes all propel the kart upwards, the track allows this mechanic a moment to shine.

Even the choices of the old tracks are great, bringing the most creative of their respective titles. From Mario Kart DS, we have Waluigi’s Pinball, a track built inside a pinball machine that is based on long curves, encouraging the use of drift. From the Wii version, Coconut Mall is present, with its ramps that punish even more the players who get hit by items. And, from the SNES, the simplest and toughest Rainbow Road of the franchise was chosen, driving players crazy with its 90º turns. Several of them have also been revised to accommodate the new air and water mechanics and to slightly enhance their level design. Coconut Mall, for example, has the initial escalators replaced by ramps with shiny arrows indicating their direction – in the Wii version it was not uncommon to figure out which was rising and which was descending too late. However, some changes are negative: to add the use of the propeller, the developers flooded the great tube of Koopa Cave from Mario Kart Wii, eliminating its main attraction: in the original version, a small stream of water increased the speed of the vehicles to the point where players would lose control over them, thereby requiring a more strategic racing while inside the tube.

The soundtrack, in turn, is one of the best of the franchise. In addition to possessing energetic melodies, each lap completed makes the music intensify its pace, which conveys to the player the increase in urgency. Mario Kart 7 also benefits from the 3D effect that enhances the feeling of depth, useful for maneuvering in a racing game, and highlights the abundant effects of snow, rain and lava particles.

Mario Kart 7 has excellent tracks and presentations but lacks content. Its main negative point is its fear of taking a step further, as the DS version dared to do, and bring modes that really make a significant difference in the way it is played.

December 04, 2018.

Originally published in Portuguese on March 12, 2015.