Summary
These days,Mario Kartis one of the most ubiquitous racing game franchises out there. And why shouldn’t it be? It’s fun, easy to get the hang of, and features the iconic cast ofMariocharacters, plus a few other Nintendo favorites. They’re perfect games to play with friends, balancing real skill at the controller with the luck of the random item boxes, ensuring that even beginner players have a fighting chance.
But while Nintendo’s racing titles nowadays may be all about easy accessibility, that wasn’t always the case. Back in the days of pioneering the video game industry, Nintendo was still figuring out the inner mechanics of a fair and balanced racing game. This led to several titles that, while fun, werenotoriously difficult to master.
5Mach Rider (1985)
A Challenging Mix of Combat, Survival, and Racing
Mach Rideris an arcade-turned-NES classic that’s often overlooked in the modern day. While its gameplay and graphics are pretty simple by today’s technological standards, it’s difficult to overstate just how important this title was formodern racing games. It was one of the first that allowed players to customize racetracks, something even most modern Nintendo racing games today are sorely lacking.
The game also included combat mechanics, which were justified by the game’s setting in a post-apocalyptic future, where racers were equipped with machine guns to take down alien invaders called Quadrunners. Players had to blast enemies and obstacles in order to complete each course, and different game modes prioritized survival over speed.Mach Rideris a classic example of aretro gameusing difficulty to keep players popping quarters, but it proved fun enough to eventually find its way onto home consoles.
F-Zero GX
Power down the straight. Lean into the hairpin bend, twitching the steering at the perfect moment to edge past two rivals. Manoeuvre onto the boost pad, just avoiding the smouldering shell of an unluckier racer’s craft. Power up and scream up, around, and back down the 360° loop. Check the speedometer. 2000 km/h. It can only be F-Zero.F-Zero GX brings Nintendo’s much-loved F-Zero series - born on Super Nintendo, matured on Nintendo 64 and Game Boy Advance - roaring into the next generation. Devotees of earlier versions will be right at home with F-Zero GX’s familiar controls and strategies; magnet-o-racing newcomers will be tearing around the rollercoaster tracks like experts in no time; and everyone will be on their knees in awe at the speed and splendour of this Nintendo GameCube racing wonder.
Captain Falcon is best known nowadays for punching opponents clear across the screen inSuper Smash Bros, but it’s good to rememberwhere he originally came from. Back in the ’90s and early 2000’s,F-Zerowas the go-to series for fast-paced, futuristic racing games. They started out as arcade classics before making the jump to home consoles.
F-Zero GXis one such adaptation and is universally considered one of the best and most difficult in the series. The newly introduced story mode is notoriously difficult, with players needing to focus on memorizing the course layout and having lightning-quick reflexes to progress. Despite its extreme difficulty,F-Zero GXremains a classic, thanks to its high-speed racing, futuristic setting, and stellar graphics.
3Wave Race (1992)
Balancing The Weight And Feel of Racing on Water
These days, most Nintendo racing games focus mainly on classic go-karts, while other vehicles like gliders, ATVs or cars are usually sprinkled in as more of an extra. TheWave Raceseries is unique in that it takes place exclusively on the water, capturing the thrills of riding jet skis at breakneck speed. Players can either compete against three computer racers, or against other players using the link cable.
This first entry in theWave Raceseries manages to capture the weight and feel of personal watercraft, which is impressive for a 16-bit top-down game. This unique approach and setting for a racing game gives an added challenge to speedster players who aren’t used to slaloming across the sea.
Collecting Coins Never Looked So Tough
Diddy Kong Racing
Diddy Kong Racing focuses on high-speed, entertaining racing action as well as a large dose of adventure and exploration. Diddy Kong and seven other characters - including Banjo the bear in his debut N64 outing - race through 20 beautiful 3-D courses on one of three vehicles: a cart, hovercraft or plane.But pushing your foot (or paw) to the floor is only half the story - you’ll also need to explore the nooks and crannies of each track to find shortcuts and hidden items. These in turn open up new courses, time challenges and races against turbo-charged bosses - if you may find them in the game’s sprawling island hub.Diddy Kong Racing also features Rare’s proprietary Real-Time Dynamic Animation Technology (RDA). This programming technology allows the game to include a wealth of large, colourful and highly textured characters in a massive environment, so even with multiple kart-riding animals on-screen the action is suitably fast-paced.Real-Time Dynamic Animation Technology squeezes the most out of the Nintendo 64’s hardware, allowing for sparkly reflections and mirroring effects whenever appropriate. Diddy Kong Racing also features a Versus Mode that allows two to four players to compete using any combination of vehicles - and a variety of multiplayer scenarios makes for unrivalled depth of play.
In between their coreMario Kartgames, Nintendo needed something new and fresh to roll out to boost their 1997 holiday sales. This led them to make a new racing title based on Donkey Kong’s miniature counterpart, Diddy Kong. Little did they know,Diddy Kong Racingsoared higher than they could have ever dreamed, becoming one of thebest-selling Nintendo 64 games of all time.
But for all the game’s fun graphics and gameplay, including the introduction of hovercrafts and planes, it was also the bane of nine-year-olds everywhere. Every new stage gets gradually tougher, although still manageable. It’s the dreaded Silver Coin mode that makes the game almost impossible. Coming in first place is tough enough, but doing so while collecting eight coins in randomized locations? Forget it.
Mario Kart 64
WHERE TO PLAY
Three… Two… One… GO! The signal light changes and you drop the pedal to the metal. Take on up to three friends in the split-screen VS games, or race solo in the Mario GP. Tell your friends to bring it on in the highly competitive Battle mode. Advanced features allow you to race with your “Ghost”. The driving data from your best run appears as a transparent character on the screen. No longer must you simply race against the clock - you’re able to actually race against yourself!
ModernMario Kartgames are usually both praised and criticized for their easy difficulty. With each new installment, Nintendo puts increasing focus on simplifying the controls so that younger or less dextrous players can still join in on the fun. While this is great news in terms of accessibility, some more experienced racing game players are left yearning for more of a challenge. When these players reminisce about the “good old days” ofMario Kart, they’re usually thinking about the days ofMario Kart 64.
ThisNintendo 64 classicrepresents an important growing period in the franchise. It was the first entry to include 3D backgrounds (although the racers themselves were still 2D-rendered sprites), and this graphical change introduced a whole host of challenges. Let’s just say that hit-box detection was tricky to figure out in those days. The game also struggled with fine-tuning its difficulty scale. Last-place racers getting the best items might feel unfair now, but it’s nothing compared to the days ofMario Kart 64.
