Mario Kart Wii is the 6th game in the Mario Kart series, and as you can tell, it was released on the Nintendo Wii in 2008. As you know, Mario Kart is a kart racer with fun tracks, tons of havoc because of the items, and great multiplayer fun. This installation of the series doesn't disappoint. Pretty much everything that made all previous Mario Kart games are here, making what I think is the best game in the series.


   First, I want to go over the new thing introduced in Mario Kart Wii. Aside from the obvious graphical improvements, you can now control your car using the Wii remote like a steering wheel. This is a really fun mode to use, and brings new life to Mario Kart. You can also now use motor cycles alongside the normal karts. When using the bikes, you can no longer get the red sparks when flying for a mini-turbo. But instead you can use wheelies, which improve you speed. Although I liked the initial thought of them, the fact that they are much more useful the cars is a little disappointing, especially since “karting” is the name of the game.


   Mario Kart Wii also added some new items. The POW block from the classic Mario Bros. game is an item for those in the middle of the pack, and can spin all opponents in front of you spin out unless they shake the Wii remote (or do the trick action with another controller). But unfortunately, the added what is probably the worst item ever created. The Thunder Cloud will automatically equip itself, and will shrink whoever is holding it after a certain amount of time. The only way to get rid of it is to bump other players. This item is really annoying, and doesn't add to the game whatsoever. And what’s worse is they replaced the Boo item for it, which was probably my favorite from the DS version.


   Another difference is that now there are twelve racers instead of the usual eight. This gives a greater variety for when the items appear. There is something about it that makes it feel so much more fun with all the extra racers. But although there are some great things, one thing that was surprising was they removed the co-op player from Double Dash. I loved playing with two people in one car because of all the different combos you can do, and was fun to try to play with friends together.


   And one more thing I want to go over is the motion controls that were introduced. You can now do tricks over ramps, which give you speed boosts when landing them. This added many new opportunities to add some new shortcuts, and are helpful for a quick little boosts.



   Gameplay: 9 – The gameplay in Mario Kart Wii is probably my favorite of all of them. It has tons of cars and bikes to choose from, with most cars having a motorcycle clone, with similar speed, acceleration, off-road, etc. I loved this, even though it somewhat limited your options. I liked it though, because if there was a good car that had good stats, there is most likely a bike that has stats almost exactly like it.


   Something that is kind of underrated in the Mario Kart series is the retro tracks. They take old tracks, like the GBA and SNES tracks that don’t seem to work anymore with the way that the series has gone, and redo them perfectly. It’s great to see these old tracks again. However, not all of them were taken well. I am talking mostly about Super Circuit’s Shy Guy Beach. It was one of my favorite tracks on the GBA title, but in the Wii version, the water is now half off-road, making it sometimes a pain to race on.


   Actually, there is another one that I feel disappointed to play. DK’s Jungle Parkway was one of the hardest levels in the N64 version, and was still pretty hard here. But there is something that really was strange: they removed the attacking coconuts. If you remember, if you ever went onto the grass after the big ramp, going on the grass would cause a spiky coconut to fly at you, which was both funny and made it so you have a bigger reason to stay on the track. I don’t know why this was removed, and it did make me a little sad.


   Another big change from all other Mario Kart games was the battle mode. With the extra racers, the team mode can be a much bigger focus. Unfortunately, because of this, solo was removed, but I never really played battle solo anyways. Unlike DS, you can no longer hurt your own team, and now the balloon battles are timed, instead of balloon based. This was probably mostly because of the heavy focus on multiplayer. I found this to be a change for the better, because it made me feel like battle mode was not just a tacked on extra.



   Graphics: 9 – The graphics look beautiful. As usual, Nintendo made use of every piece of technology they could get out of the underpowered Wii. The items all look great, and so do all the characters. If I were to make a complaint about the graphics, it would be that the Miis look bad. If you look to the right at the beginning of Luigi Circuit, the Miis look like paper. It’s kind of disappointing that they were done like this, especially when you use the Miis during racing, they look great.


   Now just like how the retro tracks worked really well as far as tracks, they were also great visually. It gave tracks like Ghost Valley 2 and Bowser’s Castle 3 the beauty they so rightfully deserved. The graphics is probably the biggest reason that the retro tracks are so fun to play on the newer systems.



   Story: N/A: It’s Mario Kart. What do you expect? It’s about racing, and racing only.



   Sound: 9.5 – The sound in Mario Kart Wii is immersive. It keeps you in the game, and has some really great tunes. All the retro tracks music didn't disappoint. From the two classic SNES and GBA levels, to the N64 tracks, and also the more modern DS and GameCube tracks; they all sound terrific, and don’t let down what the original music was supposed to be. There aren't any complaints. As for the new tracks, I liked them as well. As for the new tracks, there were some great new additions, including Koopa Cape, DK Summit, and of course Rainbow Road. They drew you into the game like no other Mario Kart game before.


   As for the other sounds of the game, they are all very nice. From the honking horns when you bump into another car, to the simple sounds of hopping when drifting, and the picking up of items, they sound like how Mario Kart should be done.



   Depth: 10/ Addictiveness: 9.5 – There are a total 32 different tracks to chose from, with 16 being from previous games, and 16 brand new tracks. And for the first time, there are 12 battle courses. Like DS, half are retro and half are new. There was a good variety of different types of tracks. They vary from small, more competitive tracks like Cookie land, to amazing, big stadiums like Funky Kong Stadium.


   And of course the biggest reason the depth gets a 10 is because of the Wi-Fi game. Much improved from the crappy online racing from the DS, you can now fight up to 11 random people from either around the word, or just from your region. You can pick from any track you want as well. No limits to your choices. You can also choose any battle course from battle mode. However, the battle mode suffers from fewer players than race, so bigger groups are harder to come by. And the fact that it switches between balloon and coin runners each time is a negative. To be honest, I find the Coin Runners mode to be cheap, especially online.


   One more thing that was part of the Mario Kart online experience was the tournaments. They are set up like how the DS missions were. A variation of a normal track was presented, and you had to complete the challenge. Kill enemies, race backwards, and other fun challenges were all included. I never got into them, and the fact that they took a while to gather the worldwide results was a minus, because you couldn’t do a new challenge during that time. But the challenges themselves were very fun to play.



   Difficulty: 6 – Unfortunately, the difficulty of the GP mode has gone down since the N64 days. Although the CPU can be pretty smart, and can even take shortcuts, they still weren't as challenging as before, although you will get much more difficulty on Wi-Fi, for obvious reasons. And if you play with other people, the screen being smaller will also make it more difficult. Not really on purpose, but this does make it harder.


   And the other problem is that a lot of the difficulty comes from one item. And of course, this is the dreaded Blue Shell. Unlike the GBA and N64 versions, this Blue Shell flies above everybody, and instead of simply hitting you like a normal shell, it will blow you up like a Bob-omb will. But that’s not all folks! Above all this, it is impossible to see when people have this item, and by the time you figure out it’s coming, it’s too late, and the best you can do is try to take the 2nd place racer with you.



   Controls: 9 – I am only really going to talk about the Wii wheel controls, since that is what the developers intended to use the most. The controls are really well done. I was skeptical at first how it would work, and unless you turn so much your Wiimote is perfectly vertical, it will not mess up. The controls are tight, and, especially the inward drifting (which is where you will turn in when first drifting) is controlled perfectly.

   There are some small flaws in how the motion controls were structured into the game. For instance, tricks are preformed when shaking the Wiimote. It worked well, but shaking incorrectly could cause a slight change in trajectory. And the other flaw was with the POW item. Like I mentioned before, it will spin you out unless you shake the remote. Like with the tricks, you could lose your control when shaking, because a pretty good amount of waggle is needed to shake the item off.



   Overall: 9.6 – Mario Kart Wii is by many considered the best Mario Kart game. However, most people say this because it is easy to glitch and hack, and as gotten a hacked version of it that has over 100 tracks. It also has some crazy physics, which like the hacked tracks, were not intended, so not included into my rating.


   With its huge selection of tracks, and improved battle mode, this game will keep you playing for hours and hours. It has great gameplay, and is great fun with multiplayer. It has some great music, and you will find it hard to the game down. I feel that the charm of Mario Kart is at its highest point in this game. I haven’t played another racing game that could beat Mario Kart Wii in terms of being a “fun” game.




   Thanks for reading my review, and don’t forget to rate the review and to comment if you have any constructive criticism or any feedback. Thanks, and God bless!

This was a great review, but I did not finish reading it do to me having a hunger for posting. I wanna keep on with the spree, and have no time to was .  I also actually played this. It was really fun.

linkmaster99 : Please don't reply next time if you aren't even going to finish the whole review. If you don't read it all, fine, but replying to it is useless if you didn't read it all. Thanks for the compliment though.

Nice detailed review, showing all the details of the game bit by bit. Good job!

MKWii is an alright game, it has it's flaws, but overall a very enjoyable game and a pretty good online play with friends. Kind of wish you could get more from this, but oh well.

pacman1755 : Thanks! I appreciate the feedback! Yeah, it has flaws, but something about it made me enjoy it more than the others. I know others like Mario Kart 64, lots like Double Dash, but I like Wii. I somehow had the most fun with this one.

This is a great review, it is really lengthy and detailed as well which I try to aim for in my reviews as well. I think this is an awesome job and this may be the first review I have read from you. It is awesome though. I think that you did an awesome job of reviewing this game and I have yet to finish reading this huge review. But from what I read, you had excellent detail, great descriptions, nice organisation and you executed your points perfectly and you really showed what a good review should look like. Overall, I enjoyed reading this and I think that you have great reviewing skills. Keep up the awesome work and keep making more reviews!

wow this review its wonderful I enjoyed reading it you did a great job here

I have finished reading the rest of your review, and am ready to give my final feedback on it. You did a really great job, it had lots of detail, and it was very long, and lengthy. You explained all your categories, with a satisfying score, and overall you rocked out with this review. Nice work, and I know I have said this, but I haven't really gotten into it much, but I actually did play this game. It was really fun, but I played the firs thing as multilayer. My first time playing well sadly I got no mercy. They killed me. Anyways I hope you continue to write inspiring works of art like these. Great job, and good luck until next time. 

Excellent review! I like how you added a gameplay and controls category. You went into lots of detail and you did a great introduction! You were so close to 2000 words... maybe next time

PacmanandMariofan : I was kind of shooting for 2,000, but I eventually couldn't really come up with anything else to say. But I was playing it earlier today, so I might get to add some more stuff to it soon. And thanks for the feedback!