Review: Mario Kart 7
It is time for another video game article, or just an article in general- with content been lacking the past few weeks I thought it would be best to return on a big bang, by sharing my opinions on some of the top video games which came out this holiday season. First up Mario Kart 7.
The latest 3DS title which is worth buying is a shock among many fans who thought the system would remain a paper weight, an actuarial game you say? Yes the 3DS seems to have games and Mario Kart 7 is the first one from Nintendo which isn’t a remake or a tech demo. So that should mean we should expect good things from Mario Kart 7? Wrong, it is a bastardised version of Mario Kart Wii and Mario Kart DS. The two titles in the franchise which have a strong stigma of been playable and enjoyable attached to them. In short good games, so when they were mashed together it just didn’t happen- they became a shadow of what just went by and took primarily the bad things from the two titles instead of the good things.
Don’t get me wrong, Mario Kart 7 is a good game, but just like many other releases this holiday season especially from Nintendo fall to the simple factor of “you will enjoy it, however tech and design wise- it is a huge disappointment”.
Let’s start off with the new features in the game which are meant to be the biggest things to come to Mario Kart since the banana was introduced. I think you know what I’m referring to, the swimming and the flying- the thing Nintendo says will revolutionise the series. So the big question is does it?
Overall I was happy with the new flying and swimming features. However my big complaint here is that I don’t believe they were fully taken advantage of as core features. Flying seemed to be more gliding and essentially gave a few second boost to what normally a bunch of boosts on a slope would give you lift from. What I’m trying to say here is that the feature really could have not existed at all and it would of still given the game the overall basic functionality that the feature promises. Moving on to the swimming I felt it was more in tack than the flying portions of the title. However for the most part levels took it as an opportunity to have “underwater sections” rather than give it any reason of purpose to existing. Again the feature fell short and didn’t really grasp any desire to want to go underwater, it more the fact the level was going there so you have to go there. However I do have to commend the best parts of the swimming function was when there were just little holes in the level and you would fall through into a whole massive world under the track. Or in some of the retro levels with beaches you could go out much further before you died, with an underwater section existing alongside the level it seemed to add a new dimension and twist to the game. It was a shame that these functions didn’t always add depth to the edges of the map and instead were treated as a gimmick. Essentially I wanted the ability to jump back into the race even if I fell to the ocean bellow, maybe more caves and alcoves designed to get to the player back on the main track, or even include short cuts- that would have really enhanced the feature enough to be subtle and amazing.
While I’m talking about the levels I want to talk about the levels in general, there is one word which the kids throw around a lot which I think fits perfectly- they suck.
My primary issue with the levels is the new ones just feel unimaginative and quite boring. There isn’t really many levels which I can defiantly with 100% certainty say I like. For me the winners were the sprints, which are a new feature to Mario Kart 7 where levels are not just the run of the mill 3 lap tracks. There is only a few sprints in the game, which is of course Rainbow Road, which I believe is the best Rainbow Road ever in a Mario Kart game, it isn’t boring and flat like the SNES one, and also isn’t over the top like the Wii and DS ones had become. It also has a moon and a planet you race on, clearly that alone should make it a top track in anyone’s books. The other sprints are of course the Wuhu Island levels, of which are two an island loop and a mountain loop. These have had mixed reactions from fans, but at the same time I believe these are strong levels in Mario Kart 7. The only complaint I have with them is maybe they could have had more variety in music. Such as Smash Bros style music system where levels can have multiple music tracks. My other favourite levels include Melody Motorway, which I think is pretty creative and Shy Guy Bazaar. The rest range from been acceptable to downright boring, such as the predictable levels such as Alpine Pass. Also Koopa City which is called Bowsers something a rather in America is also a good level, but I feel it’s out of place in a Mario game and feels more like FZero then Mario Kart. On the path of small complaints and nit-picking I believe Rosalina’s Ice World has the biggest issue in the whole game, the music you see sounds more like Pokémon then Mario.
Retro Levels are amazing, okay maybe not. First impressions have always been “best retro lineup in the whole series”, but slowly people have been saying “but these where the worst levels in their respective games”, so it occurred to me, maybe they are so good because the new levels are so bad? It’s refreshing after playing hours of the new levels to move onto the retro cup which has much more solid race tracks. Besides Mushroom Gorge which I hated on the Wii for the same reason as Alpine Pass, aka it is predictable, boring and generic. The retro lineup features solid tracks such as Coconut Mall, Walugi Pinball, Kalimari Desert and Maple Treeway. I even enjoy Dino Dino Jungle and Airship Fortress at times.
Moving on to the motion controls, I feel while I’m dismissing the levels I should mention them. There is only one option to use motion which is in the first person mode, which is quite different to the third person motion controls which the Wii version offered. This new first person mode feels a bit odd and works at some points in the game, but in others it doesn’t. It limits the view the player gets much more drastically than the third person mode, which wouldn’t be a problem if motion controls where quite “easy” to achieve. In that line of logic what I’m trying to say is if you tilt the 3DS ever so slightly you will be running into a wall when you have a good combination cart customization. I feel as if the paths in the levels are not as wide as the Wii version, which is a problem with motion controls as tight cornering is almost impossible at times.
Well you might even ask, why even use the motion controls at all? Well I find them to be much more fluid then the slider. Which just feels wrong when playing the game for long periods of time, you will find you will slip off or can’t really get the slider to point in the right direction at times after long periods of play. In the end I would have been much happier if there was a way to play third person and have the motion controls in place.
So we have covered motion controls, levels and the new level features. Lets move on to another big hitter, the community functions. I believe this is a great step for Nintendo when it comes to online games. That been said it is overly disappointing after all the hype associated to the function, when all it does is make a room with limited customization features which sets the features as locked to the room once decided. It’s really disappointing how it is set up. However like I said before, a step in the right direction.
Also while I’m nit-picking, does anyone really play the 3DS with 3D on anymore? I know I don’t, and after hearing that Mario Kart 7 was meant to be “super awesome” when it came to 3D, I just knew I had to try it. Well it was even more disappointing than any other game I’ve played with 3D functions. Even James Noirs crossed eyed hyper set 3D is better than this. At least in that game it seemed to have a purpose. But in this, it’s either so good it doesn’t seem like it’s on at all, or it’s so bad that it just doesn’t make anything pop in a meaningful way.
Overall I feel that Nintendo should make a franchise which tries to be a successor to the Mario Kart range, because it’s getting time for a reboot and fast. Maybe make a game which is more all-stars or Mario but an array of third party characters like Fortune Street is. Which I’m disappointed isn’t taking over the Mario Party franchise. That aside, before I finish off, one major annoyance was the shooting items back for me. I found I couldn’t do it for a long time for some reason, then today I did it once and I don’t know how- because I just did the stuff I’d usually do when trying it. Maybe it was because I was more impaintaint with the feature and did the “move” over and over.
