Aside from Mario Galaxy (where i /had/ to get 121 stars) it has been the most played game i own.
<jaw drops> You got all 121 stars in Super Mario Galaxy?
I quit after Star #101 and after reading that the game gets absurdly difficult after that. I beat the main game, but I didn't have the endurance (or, from another perspective, masochistic tendencies) to see it through.
But is it worth it? Is the online play good and not "too" laggy? does it have new styles or inevation or is it just mario kart with better graphics?
It's definitely worth it. I felt I got my money's worth out of the game in the first week I owned it. Like Rizz said, the online component is what makes the game.
In my opinion, the DS and 64 iterations of Mario Kart had better tracks and a better local multiplayer experience.
I played hundreds and hundreds of Mario Kart 64 matches against my friends at youth group and can assure you that there is no track in Mario Kart Wii that comes close to taking that special place that Wario Stadium has in our hearts.
The new tracks are good, but not great.
The tracks selected for the Retro Cup were chosen by either (a) drunk monkeys playing darts or (b) people who hate gamers. Whose call was it to pick N64 Sherbet Land, N64 Bowser's Castle, and SNES Ghost Valley 2? That person should be fired, re-hired a week later, then re-fired a day after returning to the job. Seriously, I don't know what these people were thinking. The absence of N64 Kalamari Desert and N64 Koopa Troopa Beach and the presence of
any DK tracks (seriously, I've never felt anything but loathing for any DK track) in the Retro Cups were stupid, stupid, stupid decisions.
Mario Kart DS was fantastic and the online play would have been terrific, if not for two problems:
- Player loss. When players drop out of a race, no one is able to "sub in" for the remainder of the four-race competition. This doesn't sound like a big deal, but consider that only 4 players can play together online at a time--which means if two drop, it's just you and a single stranger racing around the track. In Mario Kart Wii, if players dropped, they're replaced by whoever is joining the fray next race.
- Snaking and cheating. Snaking is the bunny hopping of Mario Kart DS: it's not technically cheating, but it's widely considered an exploit. You either have to learn to snake (which, for me, sucks all the fun out of the game), put up with snakers, or not play online. My strategy is a cross between the second and third options. Then there's the issue of straight-up cheating, when players use the Action Replay DS to score an easy win and ruin the experience for everyone else.
Still, local multiplayer for Mario Kart DS (the little I've played it; my wife doesn't really like the game) is excellent.
Multiplayer Mario Kart Wii is an entirely different story. While the game can be a blast (especially when you take a friend online in Nintendo WFC 2P mode), it can also be infuriatingly frustrating. I know the Versus Points shouldn't matter, but it still makes me want to throw my Wii Remote across the room when I'm in first on the last lap, only to be hit by a Blue Shell and fall to 9th place out of 12.
What's even more aggravating is when you're near the front of the pack, get hit by a Red Shell, then, before you can accelerate, get hit by a POW Block, then, a second after you've recovered, get hit by a Lightning Bolt, then, two seconds after that, get hit by a Green Shell. You think I'm exaggerating, but I'm not. Hitting every corner and mini turbo boost perfectly only to place 8th--and lose over 100 Versus Points--because you kept getting bombarded with Red Shells is enough to make a casual gamer quit playing online and enough to make a hardcore gamer turn off the system to go play Rogue Galaxy on the PS2.
Mario Kart 64 with 4 players was a contest of skill with some luck thrown in for good measure.
Mario Kart Wii is like a craps table on wheels (which is one of several why I think the points Versus Points system is pointless).
Still, despite its flaws, it's still Mario Kart online with 11 other people. There's very little lag, the Friends feature is excellent, and, if you don't take it too seriously, it can be fun.
On a side note, the controls in Mario Kart Wii are, IMHO, the best ever in a Mario Kart game.
I can't say it's the best Mario Kart game ever, but it does have better online play than the DS.
So, even though it sometimes gets me so angry I have to reboot the Wii to play Streets of Rage 2, I still recommend buying Mario Kart Wii.
Heh, you all thought the wrist strap was to keep the remote from slipping out of your hand. In Mario Kart, you put on the wrist strap to keep yourself from throwing the remote.
Haha, i own rainbow road. I can see all your ghost times on the stats
Err, yeh, about that...There are several tracks that I played through for the sole purpose of posting a time trial--no matter how many times I fell off the track, ran into walls, and, well, fell off the track. I know my time for Rainbow Road is abysmal, but I can't care enough to force myself to play it again. Seriously, racing on Rainbow Road is painful for me.
