With Mario Kart World on the way, I couldn’t be more excited. Not counting the Deluxe release of Mario Kart 8, it’s been 11 years since we got a new Mario Kart release. Alright sure, if you don’t count Tour or Live: Home Circuit either, which I don’t. They’re their own thing, and World is really what we’ve all been waiting for.

Anyway, so I was watching Kyle Bosman stream through all of the Mario Karts and it got me pretty nostalgic, so I figured there was no better time to do the same thing. And for a little extra flavour on this post, I brought my wife along for the ride, and included her unfiltered, unedited thoughts on most of the entries here.

Super Mario Kart (1992)

I didn’t have a SNES growing up, so I only played this on the occasional visits to an uncle’s house who had it. As such, going back to it as an adult has always been tough. It has the most unwieldy controls of the series, and since you have to place above 5th to continue, it was usually hard to stick with it very long. This time wasn’t much different, though since I was motivated to play, I spent a little longer figuring it out.

The frequently repeating track settings and being able to get Game Over because of limited retries meant we didn’t see this one all the way through. But we did make sure to play Rainbow Road, don’t worry.

Wife Thoughts

crunchy garbage, the ghost song is atrocious

Mario Kart 64 (1996)

Now I did have a Nintendo 64 as a kid, so this was really my first Mario Kart that I grew up with and spent a ton of time with. I’m incredibly nostalgic for my time with it. But as it goes up against what followed, it certainly has its rough edges. You kind of have to work against the game’s jank sometimes to succeed here. There was one instance where I knew my turn wasn’t quite good, but that I’d bounce off a wall a certain way and end up where I need to be. That kind of thing.

Red shells do not work in this game also? If the path is clear in front of you they’ll work, but any obstruction will kill the shell, and if the targeted racer is around a corner or through a wall, it’ll hit the wall and that’s it.

But I do still love it. It was fun to go through and see the series’ first shot at 3D, and all the limitations that came with it.

Wife Thoughts

how come I’m always in last place. You have to know the tracks to do good at the tracks and I think that’s really kinda dumb

Mario Kart Super Circuit (2001)

I never owned this (until the other day), so I’d only ever tried it on Nintendo Switch Online, which is where we played it this time. I found I had a hard time staying on the track, so I ended up using rewind a bunch to unlock the Special Cup so we could play all the way through. I found the approach to Rainbow Road here interesting also, with the edges being a jump, and the one path that’s full of boosters so you have to nail the landing for the shortcut to work.

The voice recordings are a weird mix, with Mario from Mario Kart 64, Toad from Mario Party, Luigi…seemingly brand new and a high pitched voice I’ve not heard before? Different from his Mario Party voice even.

Super Circuit’s an interesting one, but doesn’t have a lot redeemable for revisiting it over others really. Still, I enjoyed it!

Wife Thoughts

falling off the course: game-costing devastation. Somehow I’m good at this one. Just because I’m good at it doesn’t mean it’s not garbage.

Mario Kart: Double Dash!! (2003)

Spent a lot of time with this one back in the day. The multiplayer options here made for some fun times, plus being able to play through the Grand Prix cups on all difficulties with 2 players on one kart (and even another player on a separate kart) was so great. Revisiting it, I love a lot about this game. Great tracks, great music, and yeah it’s cool to have the option to have 2 of us on one kart. We played most of it separate and each picked our two characters, but we tried a few rounds on the same kart also. What a cool idea this game is.

The physical nature of how items work in this game is interesting, mechanics, such as holding items, are designed around the physicality of being able to hold items physically while hanging off the back of a kart, so you can’t hold items behind to defend yourself, and getting hit means you drop items. These changes have obvious downsides, but interesting nonetheless.

Wife Thoughts

This button takes me to all the tracks in order? What the hell would I need any other button for ever again? (This turned out to be incorrect, it shuffles the tracks, disappointing). Best game in the series. this was so nice because we were playing the game together and had to collaborate and press the button at the same time to swap and schoomp we switch spots so I could drive sometimes

Mario Kart DS (2005)

After the more experimental approach in Double Dash, this is clearly where they laid the framework for the modern Mario Kart. Drifting, boosting, controls overall, all feel closer to what we’d get going forward. This was one I really enjoyed revisiting in particular, something about the DS feel has been pleasant to me.

Though we didn’t play through it here, Mission Mode is, of course, a highlight in this entry as well. Single player content throughout the series usually doesn’t veer far from winning every Grand Prix, so it’s nice that this entry put in a bit extra.

Wife Thoughts

let me finish the race

Mario Kart Wii (2008)

The introduction of bikes and Funky Kong. Weird that you can’t do Grand Prix in multiplayer, but nice customization options for multiplayer. You can feel this game gradually approaching the culmination that is 8. I played on a bike this time, because I did that for much of my time with this game back in the day as well. That wouldn’t be the case when they returned later though.

I tried motion controls at first, and this was a lot harder than I remembered. I guess this is the way Nintendo expected a lot of casual audiences to be playing, and I suppose that was probably the case even. But it was no good, I had to dig out the Wii’s Classic Controller.

Wife Thoughts

bikes? I don’t drive on those. Motion controls are atrocious. Not as atrocious as the ghost song.

Mario Kart 7 (2011)

I thought I’d have more to say on this one because it’s been awhile, but 8 really did supersede this one in all ways. Lots of tracks I’d just totally forgotten about.

Wife Thoughts

finally a modern game, I think I was good at that one

Mario Kart 8 (2014) and Deluxe (2017)

Really not much to say here since we’ve all been playing this for the better part of a decade. It’s absolutely the culmination of Mario Kart as we know it. It was interesting to play through them all to remind myself how they got to this point with the series. Everything perfected in a huge, definitive package.

I spent most of the 8 and 8 Deluxe era playing as Ludwig in the pipe frame kart. It’s a shame he doesn’t seem to be returning at all in Mario Kart World.

Mario Kart World (2025)

Though I’ve just started playing, I already love what they’re doing here. Faced with outdoing Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, they’ve gone for a different approach with an open world and travelling between the tracks. So far, I’m very impressed.

Specific Highlights

• Best Soundtracks: 8, Double Dash, 64
• Best Rainbow Road: Double Dash
• Most Nostalgic For Me: 64, Double Dash
• Most Enjoyed Revisiting: DS, Double Dash
• Worst Item: Lightning Cloud (Wii)

Rankings

As a final touch, I thought I’d provide a tier list ranking by both me and my wife of all of the games in the series. Here’s how that went.

My Tier List

• Best: Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, Mario Kart World
• Pretty Great: Mario Kart DS, Mario Kart Double Dash, Mario Kart 8 (Wii U)
• Good: Mario Kart 64, Mario Kart Wii, Mario Kart 7
• Rough: Mario Kart Super Circuit, Super Mario Kart
• No thanks: Mario Kart Tour

My Wife’s Tier List

• Best: Mario Kart World, Mario Kart Double Dash
• They’re good: Mario Kart 7, Mario Kart wii, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe
• Old and kinda annoying: Super Mario Kart, Mario Kart 64, Mario Kart Super Circuit
• 🙅🏽‍♀️❌: Mario Kart DS
• Did not play: Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit, Mario Kart Arcade GP 2, Mario Kart Tour, Mario Kart Arcade GP DX, Mario Kart 8 (Wii U), Mario Kart Arcade GP

–

It’s been really fun going through all of the Mario Kart entries. It’s a series that I don’t think about revisiting often, because the latest entry just tends to be what gets picked up to play with friends most easily. But it was really nice revisiting old favourites and seeing how far the series has come. With that, it’s time to go play some more of Mario Kart World. Safe travels on the road ahead!