Wave 5 of the Mario Kart 8 Deluxe Booster Course Pass has brought a mix of surprises and one slight disappointment, placing it in a tie with Wave 4 in terms of track choices. This wave introduces three new playable characters: Petey Piranha, Wiggler, and Kamek, adding a fresh layer of excitement to the game.

The track selection for Wave 5 includes some classics and original additions. Athens Dash, initially slotted in this wave, feels more like a Wave 6 track, so in our alternate Booster Course Pass, we've moved it and replaced it with the exhilarating Los Angeles Laps.

Daisy Cruiser is a spot-on remake, skillfully blending elements from the GameCube, 3DS, and Tour versions to create an even more vibrant dining room experience.

Moonview Highway stands out as a surprising addition to the wave, as it hasn't been remade before. The thrilling feature of colliding with bomb cars from the past retained its glory. We've moved Moonview Highway to Wave 3 in our alternate Booster Course Pass to avoid overlapping with Dry Dry Ruins and Wii Rainbow Road, as they were in the same cup in the Wii version. We've placed Maple Treeway in Daisy Circuit's place and put Moonview Highway in Wave 3 to pair it with Koopa Cape, which feels like a more fitting combination.

Squeaky Clean Sprint offers a fun and detail-rich racing experience, making it feel like an exciting Easter egg hunt on the track.

Sunset Wilds, a beloved Super Circuit track, was a bit of a letdown in its remake, as it removed the signature sunset element that defined the track. In our alternate Booster Course Pass, we've replaced Sunset Wilds with Delfino Square, as Airship Fortress is already in our alternate Wave 4, and Luigi's Mansion is in our alternate Wave 1.

Koopa Cape, a standout track from Mario Kart Wii, retains its charm while incorporating features from the Wii and 3DS versions. The only minor concern is with the track's texturing, but the underwater area in Koopa Cape looks fantastic, and the reintroduction of anti-gravity and halfpipes adds to the fun factor.

Summing up Wave 5, the gameplay gets an 8, the track choices receive a solid 9, and the graphics also earn a commendable 9. With an overall score of 8.6/10, Wave 5 ties with Wave 4 as one of the best waves in the Booster Course Pass.

Gameplay: 8
Track Choices: 9
Graphics: 9

Wave 5 Score: 8.6/10

Athens Dash - one of the coolest Tour tracks just due to its location compared to the usual city-theming Tour tracks go for. quite good! :3

Daisy Cruiser - another cult classic returns! i haven’t actually played the original so I can’t really compare the remake here to that version, but from what i can tell this is a great remake :D it is a little bit odd that the tables slow down as the laps progress instead of speed up, but it’s whatever

Moonview Highway - ANOTHER classic returns, but this one i have played! the location is absolutely beautiful on this track, i’m such a sucker for anything night-themed with big fuckin atmospheric ass moons. probably why i love castlevania so much. but goddamn this is a good remake with even better music! such an upbeat synth groove that adapts to a more laid-back jazzy tone when under the bridges. amazing.

Squeaky Clean Sprint - the new track of the wave and goddamn is it good! i love the setting of this one and all the little detail put into it. another one of the new tracks that almost feels criminal to be in a DLC. the music is really great, albeit not really fitting for this track imo… still bops tho so i can’t complain toooo much

Los Angeles Laps - probably the weakest track of the wave but it’s still alright. i love Arlo’s review of this one when he was really loopy and pretty much sums up how i feel about it. those poor guys are so brave for visiting LA.

Sunset Wilds - a great, beautiful remake. it’s kind of unfortunate most of these GBA/SNES remakes have the multi-colored borders from the original, but at least it’s faithful :p

Koopa Cape - another classic returns! not as stunning as some of the other ones (mostly due to MKWii still holding up well visually), but quite good nonetheless.

Vancouver Velocity - a great closer for this wave, as per usual. as you may know i’m a complete sucker for snowy levels so the first lap of this one had me awestruck. a beautiful track and, while i feel like i say this a lot, one of the better ones from Tour!

another great round of DLC with some fantastic remakes and an incredible new track! the inclusion of Kamek was a great surprise as well, welcome back(kinda lol) buddy!!

While still a good wave, I don’t think it’s quite as good as the last one. First of all, I do quite like the new playable characters added this wave! I’m so happy Kamek finally gets a chance to shine in a mainline Mario Kart game, and having Petey Piranha reunite with King Boo brings a tear to my eye. However, if I were to nitpick, to my eyes, the character models look just a tad bit lower fidelity than the characters for the base game, specifically with Kamek and Wiggler. It’s not incredibly jarring, but my ADHD will never let me not notice the slightly more apparent polygon edges on their character models. Regardless, Wave 5 still has some good tracks included. Squeaky Clean Sprint was a surprise hit for me. It’s very creative and full of charm. Other classics like Daisy Cruiser and Moonview Highway are done well here thankfully. However, starting with Koopa Cape, this is where I have some issues. Fist off, with Koopa Cape, ignoring the changes made first in 7, I think the camera can be pretty awful sometimes, specially with the pipe section and the half-pipes. It’s still a fun track, but it’s not perfect Imo. Besides, it looks a bit play-dough-y visually. Speaking of play-dough visuals, Athens Dash has some really rough visuals. The background trees and buildings look straight out of something like Mario 64 if I’m being honest, and really stick out to me in a bad way. And on Athens Dash, there is one turn in particular which is really bad and almost impossible to see coming on your first playthrough. Not a bad track but I think it isn’t a great one either. And of course, we can’t ignore the tragedy of Sunset Wilds, de-emphasis on “Sunset”. Like, why bring back this track if you’re going to end up gutting it of what made it special in the first place? At least with something like Sky Garden, it could just be chalked up to a difference in interpretation. With this, it’s straight up removing a gimmick that helped the track stand out. Fingers crossed this gets updated in the future. Finally, there’s LA Laps and Vancouver velocity. While I think the latter is very good, the former is a bit on the eh side in my opinion, especially with that one section where you drive through the oil field. On the whole, I still think it’s a solid wave, but it’s really brought down by the stinkers imo.

Also, I just wanted to rant really quickly. With the announcement of Daisy Circuit for Wave 6, it really helped me realize how oversaturated Wii has been in this DLC. Yes, I do agree that Wii has a strong selection of courses, but there are plenty of standouts from other games that could use some love. Luigi’s Mansion, Airship Fortress, Wario Coliseum, these are all tracks that would’ve been awesome to see. But no, another circuit track from a game with an already high number of tracks included. I just hope this kind of thing doesn’t happen again.