If you're interested in Mario history or seeing what some of your friends might have grown up addicted to (if you didn't have it yourself on GBA), this is a diversion worth checking out for a little while. I basically just played through every cup to get a win on 100cc and roll credits ... had I spent more time with the game trying to take it seriously, I think the more frustrating aspects would have gotten on my nerves far more. But I don't need to unlock the SNES courses because I already played way too much SMK growing up (which may be why I was primed to cut this game some slack).

Still, I think the aesthetics and track ideas here are really nice, considering the limitations they had to work with, and started to lay the groundwork for some of the really cool ideas the MK series went on to explore. Intelligent Systems brought the same care and creativity for the Mushroom Kingdom that they were introducing in Paper Mario at this time (even literally including Bowser's floating castle from the first PM game). Including their love of Yoshi's Island elements and stylistic inspiration.

I dunno, people seem quick to write this one off, but I think it has its charm. There's very little reason to go back to it, of course, except as a curiosity. See what it's all about, and if you hate the controls, it's fine to leave this one in the past.

The only other 2D Mario Kart after the original Super Mario Kart, one of the nicest things to be said about Mario Kart: Super Circuit is at least it improves over its SNES predecessor (kinda?) The track variety is better at least, even though there's even more Bowser's Castles this time around.

One redeeming and better-aged attribute of Super Circuit is the track backgrounds, like the dynamic Sunset Wilds or the colorful Ribbon Road. They're vibrant and charming to look at on their own, but the moving and turning sprites on top of everything during the chaos of a race can make the screen into a headache simulator. The screen-shake effect on Snow Land is especially bad in this regard. The flat, 2D nature of some of these tracks can even result in jump ramps causing the player to go backwards in the course if taken at the wrong angle, pretty easy to have happen considering how many of these are placed right after turns.

The key problem here and most surefire way to kill a racing game is the poor control scheme. It's as if every road is ice while your tires have been coated in butter, drifting just does not feel intuitive or responsive, especially when coming from any later Mario Kart game. My goal with this game was just to beat all of the Grand Prix on 150cc, and it took some real effort learning the controls to have a shot at this. There's something to be said for a game not holding the player's hand and providing a challenge, but maybe the hyper-casual Mario racing game wasn't the place for it.

The Special Cup is a nightmare. Lakeside Park has multiple locations where taking turns the wrong way can send the player over 20 seconds backwards in the track. Broken Pier is one of the worst and most frustrating Mario Kart tracks I've ever seen. Parts of Bowser's Castle 4 are so cramped and narrow for no reason, awkward to drive and seeming ill-suited for a race with eight participants. Even Rainbow Road is a letdown compared to other iterations in the series.

Getting any place below 4th forces the player to use a continue (???) which just felt strange in a Mario Kart game. There's 3 total before a game over, even finishing the last race of a grand prix in 5th while still having enough points for first overall will force the player to try again.

On the bright side, some of the easier courses that actually have room to drive without fighting for your life on every turn feel anywhere from decent to enjoyable. There's also some decent music for what the GBA speakers are capable of, Sky Garden's track was always a standout to me.

Despite this review mostly being an onslaught of criticism, Super Circuit is salvaging a 2-star review here mostly on the grounds that any racing game on the Game Boy Advance probably wasn't going to hold up well 20+ years later. It was a solid effort for the first portable Mario Kart game on limited hardware, but alas, the gameplay is too slippery and not fun enough to rank much higher than near the bottom of the the Mario Kart franchise.

2.0/5.0

Uno de los mejores mario kart de todos, con la majestuosa jugabilidad de SNES (la más difícil de dominar por lejos), los gráficos de N64 (en ese entonces impresionantes), y presentando por primera vez mas copas y pistas, siendo el pionero de las "copas clásicas" hechas con pistas remasterizadas provenientes de otro mario kart anterior (en este caso todas las pistas de Super Mario Kart). Sin dudas el mejor juego de la Gameboy Advance, aunque haya pasado inadvertido y sea el mas olvidado de la saga. Para saber apreciarlo hay que aprender a dominar su dura curva de aprendizaje y lograr los derrapes imposibles, que aún siendo mas sencillos de dominar que el de snes (gracias a pistas sonoras, porque realizarlos es exactamente igual) siguen siendo una proeza de realizar. Hoy en día los últimos juegos de la saga derrapan solos sin ningún esfuerzo, convirtiendo el primer lugar en una suma de azares y atajos memorizables, pero ningun "buen jugador" de mario kart 8 puede dominar este juego. Razón por la cual es odiado por la generación de cristal. Mi MK favorito, seguido de cerca por MK7

I didn't think I'd rank this below Super, but at least that game had charm, this one doesn't even have that. The AI doesn't blatantly cheat like in that game, but my god are these levels the worst the series has to offer. When they aren't painfully simple, they feel deliberately annoying and hard to see because of the GBA's extremely limited screen space. Very little that I like in this, but I'll give the game some credit and say the terrible controls and slidiness might've been because I was playing Bowser. I don't care enough to check how the other racers play.

[played on the NSO GBA app]

Out of all the mainline Mario Karts, Super Circuit’s definitely the least talked about of the bunch. As a result, I went into it not expecting much… but lo and behold, the game managed to surprise me by being far better than I expected! And in my usual fashion, I’m going to talk about all the reasons why!


Due to the GBA’s weaker hardware compared to the N64, Super Circuit takes on a form more comparable to Super Mario Kart, although it does make plenty of improvements. First off, getting hit and falling off the track feel far less punishing, since Lakitu’s a lot quicker and you’re able to regain control after an item collision way sooner. The controls are also a lot better, and while they do feel a little slippery at first, they’re really tight and crunchy once you figure them out, which makes drifting around corners and navigating past obstacles a ton of fun!

Another way Super Circuit improves on SMK is with the courses. The original only had a few types it reused throughout the entire game, but SC keeps it fresh by having a bunch of distinct themes that aren’t constantly recycled! They’re also incredibly inventive, with tracks like Cheese Land, Sky Garden, Sunset Wilds and Ribbon Road being super cool ideas that hadn’t been done in the series up to this point. Each course is also fun from a gameplay standpoint, with lots of twists and turns that require good use of drifting and braking.


While I did have a lot of fun with Super Circuit, there are some criticisms I’d like to mention. The game’s generally good at not reusing track themes, but it does have four variants of Bowser’s Castle with not a whole lot to set them apart from each other outside of their backgrounds. It also does something similar with the three circuit courses, although Luigi Circuit has unique obstacles at the very least.

I also thought the game was a bit too easy, at least on 50cc and 100cc. Things do ramp up on 150cc, and I definitely appreciated the challenge, but it did get a little frustrating towards the end since the slippery controls made it hard to stay on-course. It’s nowhere near as bad as Super Mario Kart in that regard, but it did admittedly sour my last few sessions.


Overall though, Super Circuit was top-notch! I had a lot more fun with it than I ever expected, to the point where I honestly might like it more than both Super and 64! If you can handle a bit of jank, it’s definitely worth a playthrough if you enjoy Mario Kart or have a soft spot for these kinds of racing games.

To close out my quest of beating Mario Kart games I never quite finished as a child, I decided to boot up Super Circuit on my 3DS. I don't really remember if I'd ever beaten this game on the GBA as a kid. I do remember playing it a fair bit, but I also remember being confused on how new tracks were actually unlocked, so I'm doubtful if baby me ever actually properly completed it. It took me a bit over 3 hours to beat all of the normal courses on 50cc to 150cc in the English version of the game (but I didn't bother putting in the time to unlock or beat all of the SNES tracks, as I'd more than had my fill of those XP).

Being the 3rd entry in the series, Super Circuit is a weird beast in how it combines aspects of both the 2D SNES original with updates from the N64 title and beyond. For starters, it plays much more like the SNES title in that we're once again on flat tracks in a "Mode 7" style (although this isn't true Mode 7, of course). However, tracks have a bit more going on in them, a little like the N64 version, and items have been improved significantly (mostly in how the red shell FINALLY does not travel as the crow flies, so it finally has some greater utility as a catch up mechanic). Boasting multiplayer over cable connection and twenty tracks on its own (including an extra 20 in the form of unlockable SNES tracks), Super Circuit has quite the loadout when it comes to trying to outdo its console-borne predecessors.

As far as the racing goes, this is the first one that actually starts to feel fairer in a fun way. The AI does still feel a bit too rubberband-y when it comes to its competency, but it doesn't nearly feel like you're playing against a bunch of hackers like the first two games did. Sadly, the reintroduction of the Mode 7-like graphics style reintroduces the larger problem the first game had in regards to it being difficult to see gaps in the track. This is a problem worsened further by the small GBA screen (even playing it on my larger 3DS XL screen, it was still hard to do this). Another unfortunate callback to the SNES days is the reintroduction of the 3-life system, so even though your score in the cup can mean that you could get first place 3 times and still be assured a 1st place victory with 0 points scored in the last track, you still need to get 4th place or higher to not have to redo the track completely. That was a bad idea in 1992, and it is still bad in 2001.

One more small introduction to this game is that even though there are still only 8 racers, you have differences between them now in regards to their speeds and weights. The only issue with that is that it isn't balanced super great, and especially on higher difficulties, the way the AI spins you out if a heavier character bumps you can feel very overly mean when combined with their high-difficulty-cheat-speeds they can reach.

The presentation is very good, as would be expected from a Nintendo first party game. You have fast moving, colorful sprites, and very nice looking characters. The music is also very good, with lots of remixes of classics alongside new good tunes as well.


Verdict: Hesitantly Recommended. The jump from this to Double Dash!! would still be another massive leap in quality, but this is the first one of these three that I had enough fun with that I can actually recommend on any level. The later difficulties still get a bit too hard with how the AI can cheat, but it's nowhere near the level of how bad it can get in the previous two games. This is where Mario Kart actually starts getting fun beyond being a party vs. game, and it's a better game for it.

I first need to give a disclaimer that I started the MK franchise in 3D, having never played the original which probably biases my opinion a bit.
I paid ~$15 bones for this loose a few years ago, and now that I've played my fill, do I feel like I really got my money's worth? There's no unlockable incentives, and no reason for me to gold-out the cups on 150cc- getting all gold on 100cc felt like enough completion because of that. Additionally, with owning MKDS alone, I don't really know if I have reason to come back to this one, and I’m not even sure if it warrants a stay in my collection.
I do think this game is impressive in its pseudo(semi?)-3D graphics- always a really cool thing to see on the GBA, like with Monkey Ball Jr. and Spyro. However- and this is probably because I've never played the OG- the completely flat tracks became way too repetitive for me, even though there are so many of them. It feels contradictory to have so many tracks but for so many of them to be slight regurgitations of each other. Whatever, Cheese Land is my favorite track.

Super Circuit is the final game in this Mario Kart marathon that I had not played prior (sorry Double Dash). My friend Wheatie really loves this one but sad to say, I thought this was a big downgrade from 64 and is more comparable to Super in a lot of ways.

I know this is the first portable game in the series so I'd like to cut it some slack but honestly it's just plain unfun to play. Your movement, like Super, is just god awfully slippery. Maybe even moreso than Super at times. And again, the courses are flat and similar to Super in regards to its turns so the drift just sends you flying usually. I barely used it in this one and even still, on 50cc I had to take my finger off the gas a lot just cuz of the stage design and slipperiness.

Even though the courses are still boring design-wise like Super, I will say they definitely have a bit more visual flair than Super's even with it being a portable title. That and stage themes don't get reused as much (besides Bowsers Castle which gets reused a whopping 4 times) makes it better than Super in that regard. The AI was also better this time around in terms of cheating though I also only played on 50cc cuz I didn't even want to deal with the game's physics on 150. I played Peach Circuit on 150 and I just wouldn't be able to handle every cup on that lol. I did come in 1st on every cup on 50cc though which is more than I could say with Super.

I also didn't touch the battle mode at all so I don't know how that fares but I have a feeling it's not very good just cuz of the games controls. Also didn't unlock any of the Super stages cuz it felt pointless to play through those since I just did.

I also did find it interesting how this was a combination of both Super and 64. Super with the controls and stage design while most of the voice clips and character designs are from 64. Kinda makes it feel like it doesn't have much identity outside of some of the original course themes.

In the end, this is probably just slightly better than Super. But, even though this is the series first portable title, this game came out almost 10 years after Super so I'd expect it to be way better. Ah well, next on the Mario Kart marathon is DS and that one I actually did play as a kid and have fond memories of. So, I'm definitely looking forward to that one!

É um pouco acima do Super Mario Kart, mas ainda muito abaixo pro padrão da franquia (engraçado falar isso sendo que esse foi o terceiro jogo).

É um jogo sem uma dinâmica empolgante como o 64. Não possui nada que venha a ser um diferencial, tem gráficos que em momentos doem nos olhos, e só eu que achei o design de som HORROROSO?

Mas enfim, as pistas até que são legais, e o time trial continua sendo bastante instigante.