Super Mario Kart

"King of the road."

Oh my god!, it is Super Mario Kart, the best of the best of the best among racing simulators for any consoles imaginable!, one of the most entertaining video games in history, this game is immortal, the game that never dies, that never ends, that is Super Mario Kart!

Gameplay 10/10:
Super Mario Kart is the best Mario Kart game ever, because it is the most entertaining as well as the easiest to play, I am not saying the other ones are bad, of course not, but they are not a match for this Snes version.

In Super Mario Kart the screen is horizontally split in two, always, even while you are playing alone, and there is no need of more, if you are alone then the second half of the screen will be the map, there you will be able to see where are your opponents.

There are eight famous Super Mario characters to choose from, each one has their own skills, some of them are faster but with a slow acceleration (Bowser and Donkey Kong Jr.) while others have a fast acceleration but then they are slower during the race (like Yoshi or the Toadstool Princess), etc. While all of them are useful because once you get used to them it is possible to win choosing anyone, Koopa and Toad are the best ones if you ask people, they are the most balanced, perfect speed, perfect controls, perfect acceleration... just perfect.

At the beginning we will have to choose between 50 cc and 100 cc (and later we will unlock a 150 cc), that is the game’s difficulty, the best thing is to play in 150 cc of course, that way the everything is much more challenging as well as much more entertaining.

What makes Super Mario the incredibly fun experience it is are the items we obtain during the race, making the each race an authentic battlefield, if you are the first one, it is the last lap, and one of your opponents gets a red shell, if he is close to you get on your knees and start praying, or, if you are a more temperamental person like me, if your opponent manages to hit you, just smash the controller against the floor while shouting and crying desperately, this last choice is more expensive in the end, but you will feel a little bit better.

Play modes:
We have four championships, the Mushroom Cup is the first one, then we have The Flower Cup, The Star Cup, and finally the Special Cup, in each new championship the tracks will get harder, longer, and with more obstacles, but the obstacles are not important, Super Mario Kart shows its true nature when you are playing against skilled human players, of course you need to be a pro also, but there is nothing better than playing with a friend that is as skilled as you to see which is the best, during my golden oldies I was one of the best Super Mario Kart players in the world, ah!, you can bet your butt about that!

The Battle Mode is very interesting (not to mention incredibly fun), there are special arenas to compete in this mode, and the objective is win by exploding (with the items from the Championship mode) some kind of balloons we will have floating around us.

The Time Trial is probably the only one I have never played, the other two are so fun and addictive that there is no point on wasting your time in this one. The objective is to do the best time in each track.

And of course we can’t forget about the Versus Mode, yet, even if it is hard to believe, after the Time Trial this is probably going to be the one you play the less.

Graphics and Music 10/10:
The game uses the Snes Mode 7, and it looks great, the backgrounds are very pixilaed sometimes, but they look awesome anyway, and the same happens with the music very nice and catchy. Excellent, simply Nintendo quality.

Replay Value:
Super Mario Kart is one of the games with more replay value you will ever find, because it is insanely fun in every single play mode, no matter which one you choose, all of them are great. Personally, I have played this game for so long that I am amazed my cartridge still works.

Buy or Rent?
Man, if there is game in this filthy world that is worth MUCH more than what you are going to pay for it that is Super Mario Kart, this game is priceless, no matter how much you pay for this game, it is never going to be enough considering the unlimited amount of fun you will get from it. Needless to say that there is no point on renting it.

Final toughs:
There better games than Super Mario Kart out there, but when to comes to entertainment, if we are talking about fun, about enjoyment, if what you want is to spend hours laughing, fighting, crying and sweating with your friends, I can’t remember a game better than Super Mario Kart.

”My lack of vocabulary and grammatical errors (if there’s any) are because I’m not from an English speaking country, sorry about that.”

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 02/16/04