According to Nintendo’s latest sales reports, Mario Kart World has sold 9.57 million copies at the time of writing. Its predecessor, Mario Kart 8, sold 9.22 million in 12 months, according to an older Nintendo report. That means the new game is outpacing its predecessor by a big margin, which is ultimately a big win for Nintendo.
All that information might sound like it contradicts the title of this post, but good sales figures don’t always translate to a masterpiece. A significant portion of the nearly 10 million players obviously enjoy Mario Kart World, but some dedicated players also have some very valid criticisms.
What’s All The Fuss About?
On the surface, Mario Kart World is at the very least a good game. I doubt anyone out there can tell you otherwise with a straight face. The core mechanics are solid, Knockout Tour is a great, fun mode, and both the performance and graphics are excellent. When bundled with the Switch 2, that’s more than enough to nearly sell 10 million copies, especially when it’s the newest Mario Kart game in 11 years.
However, this was also Nintendo’s first $80 game. When you set the price that high, expectations are bound to be even higher. If you go on YouTube right now and just search “Mario Kart World is bad,” you’ll find nearly 30-minute-long videos of people absolutely trashing this game. On one side, you have a gigantic audience; on the other, a very vocal minority seems to hate the game.
One of the common complaints is that the gameplay focuses too much on intermissions — connecting routes that players have to race through to reach standard three-lap tracks first. Many people say that these intermissions just feel like waiting around for the actual race to start. A good chunk of the connector tracks are just straight lines, with little challenge.
Another complaint is the wasted potential of the open world. The game has a ton of incredibly creative main tracks, but free roam doesn’t add much to the gameplay at all. There are also not enough cosmetics for all the characters, no structured story like the upcoming Kirby Air Riders, and there is a severe lack of new content since launch.
Alas, Nintendo Probably Doesn’t Care
In my personal opinion, all of these complaints are valid, especially when you factor in that this is an $80 game. The game isn’t hitting as hard as it’s supposed to, but a good chunk of people won’t care. Mario Kart games have always been a casual-player first sort of ordeal, like it or not. To be frank, I just can’t bring myself to hate on this game a lot when modern Pokémon exists for me to direct my anger towards. That doesn’t mean the complaints people have are invalid; it’s just that it won’t affect Nintendo much when a game is selling this well.
