After a grueling wait, the latest installment of the Mario Kart series, Mario Kart 8, will finally be racing into stores (and the Wii U eShop) on Friday, May 30. Despite beginning life as a spin-off, Mario Kart has solidified itself as one of Nintendo’s premiere franchises, kickstarting the mascot racing genre and making an appearance on every Nintendo console since its inception. 8 looks to be one of the most exciting installments yet, with a robust selection of characters, stunning visuals, and a new anti-gravity mechanic that is sure to make races even more frenetic and unpredictable.
With 8’s release looming on the horizon, we wanted to cast our gaze back on the previous installments of the series and ask which one you liked best. Cast your vote in our poll below, and be sure to tell us how you came to your decision in the comments!
[poll id=”182″]
I voted for 7, as much as I enjoy Double Dash!!. Now, I’m flip-flopping and think I made a mistake. DD did so much right that it’s hard to deny its importance in the series’ history, but 7 really felt like a breath of fresh air, and it’s the only installment I’ve played as much. Though, MK DS IS a close second to 7… my brain hurts…
To avoid a brain cramp, let’s handle this logically. Since the addition of Retro Tracks in MK DS, the latest episode would provide the most from new and old episodes. I’m going with MK7.
I had to go with sheer time-investment here, and Double Dash won out. I think the game has the best battle mode out of the rest of the series to date, and the character-specific powerups allow for a cool bit of strategy.
Mario Kart 64 all the way. My sister and I spent years going back and forth beating each others’ best times in Time Trial. There was just so much to love in that game and it set the course for the rest of the series.
Toadlord is right, time-investment is the main factor. I played Mario Kart DS with a group of work buddies almost every day for something like two years. We got _insanely_ good at it. I could skip blue shells about half the time, and I wasn’t alone.
I even created a webpage to track our stats and assign each of us somewhat-random character and kart combinations in an attempt to balance our odds. That just made us even better with the types of karts we used to be lousy with. :^)
Mario Kart on the DS was by far the greatest of them all. Most likely because it introduced retro tracks to us, had a bunch of cool characters, a great online mode and my all-time favorite thing in MK history: mission mode.
Double Dash, all the way. I miss the two-man karts. It added a lot of strategy, particularly in multiplayer mode.