The launch of the mobile “Mario Kart” app on Sept. 25 put “Pokémon Go” to shame after a one-day download. By any scale, the game is the biggest out-of-the-gate success on the app market so far, with nearly 90 million downloads, but what do students at Arcadia think of it?

At its most basic, the “Mario Kart Tour” is a simplified version of the original “Mario Kart,” which you can play on your phone. It has clean graphics, all the iconic sounds, and familiar tunes, even with the ever-present red power-ups and banana peels! In terms of gameplay, the biggest change is that the entire game from start to finish is controlled by touch. Although your kart will drive automatically, the controls are extremely sensitive and sometimes imprecise, which means players have to do some specific direction reading. 

Sophomore Madison Yang stated, “I think the mobile ‘Mario Kart’ is fun because it brings back memories, but many aspects don’t make it the same. The format can be uncomfortable for many people who are used to playing the original version of ‘Mario Kart.’ It’s also sad that there is no way to connect and play with your friends. However, I still appreciate being able to play the game on my phone because I don’t have a Nintendo DS anymore.”

In a typical “Mario Kart” game, you progress through the game by racing a series of cup events, which includes a handful of races and earning stars to unlock the next cup to play through. With the well-known courses like Cheep Cheep Lagoon and Rock Rock Mountain, everything is extremely simplified. It doesn’t matter whether you’re speeding across a city or through an underwater course, all the creative parts of the “Mario Kart 8” are not present. 

“I think the new ‘Mario Kart’ is good because it is easy to use, and you can play it wherever you go. The only bad thing is that the controls are a bit weird, but once you get used to them, it’s pretty fun. Nothing beats the original though!” stated junior Kyle La. Through reading multiple reviews and getting feedback from our Apaches, everyone collectively agreed everything but the controls were easy to follow. Despite what people say on how confusing the buttons are, a simple video on YouTube or watching others can solve the trick. 

While many of the students playing “Mario Kart” agree that it’s an addictive game to play, others disagree and say it can get repetitive sometimes. Junior Joshua Fan agreed, saying, “It got boring for me really fast so I don’t really play it that much. I think that the original is better because it feels more nostalgic than the new one.”

Similar to other popular games like “Fortnite,” the mobile app offers a $4.99 monthly subscription to get more rubies or unlock new things, which can present itself as a bad deal to many people. Though it’s not mandatory and the game is free, many players may feel slightly tempted to spend some money and get up onto higher levels quicker. 

Though others may think that it focuses too heavily on unlocking virtual things to acquire, it appears that a full multiplayer mode is coming to “Mario Kart Tour”, providing much more excitement than chasing AI-controlled karts. The real question is, how fast can your fingers fly around the screen?

Photo courtesy of POLYGON.COM