After getting my Switch on launch along with Breath of the Wild, I was excited to see what games the console would have in the future. I bought Master Blaster Zero and eventually The Binding of Isaac for the third time, but a month and a half later Mario Kart 8 Deluxe came out. Now look, this may be a rerelease and all but it was for a portable console. Mario Kart 8 was great but I could only play it at home and with a game like Mario Kart, its more fun to play it on the go with friends. When this came out, I was nearing the end of my Junior year in High School. Let me tell you, me and my friends played this all the time during the span of the rest of my high school experience. We played it in lunch, we played it in study hall, we even played it in class whether it was sneaking it or just when we had free time. This was THE Switch game to play when it came to my friend group alongside Jackbox Party Pack 3. It's just a ton of fun and while I said it was a rerelease, it's not just a lazy port. They not only included the DLC tracks, but they also added some new characters and revamped the battle mode.

I said the character selection was a bit lacking in the original game but the ones they added here are all good. Bowser Jr, King Boo and Dry Bones are all good additions that were in past games. The completely brand-new addition tho is Inkling Girl/Boy. Now, I was a huge Splatoon 1 fan before this so I was hyped when they were added. I mained them a lot when I first played and honestly, they're a perfect crossover addition just cuz Splatoon was originally supposed to be a Mario game which I found funny. This isn't even getting into the characters they added from the booster course pass. Most of those are also great, tho I haven't used them myself since I don't own the booster courses. If you do though, easily the best roster in the series.

The other thing they fixed of course is the battle mode. Easily the worst part of the original game and the worst battle mode I've played, it's really good here. Not as good as Mario Kart DS since there's still no option to have it be elimination rules, however you're not forced into teams like Wii and there's a whopping 5 modes this time around. Balloon battle and coin runners are classics of course. Shine thief makes a return and it's also pretty fun here. Bob-omb blast apparently originated from Double Dash and that's also fun tho definitely the most chaotic of the bunch. The brand new mode this time around is renegade roundup and its basically cops and robbers. Pretty fun mode as well but the real reason these are all actually fun is they gave us battle courses again THANK GOD. The old courses are great and some of the new courses are awesome too like Urchin Underpass. Love to see a little Splatoon representation since it didn't get a race track.

So there you go, the character selection was expanded and while not my favorite battle mode, the battle mode was made actually fun again. The only other thing they added, and they added it 5 years after deluxe came out, are the booster courses. Now I don't own them but my good friend Quent has the expansion pass so along with him and my friend wheatie, we played a bunch of online races for this review and I was able to play pretty much all the courses I wanted to. I didn't play them all but I can see the course quality varies greatly. You have some really half assed tracks and then you have really great ones like Yoshi's Island or SNES Bowser's Castle. A lot of the returning ones are Wii courses which is a plus too. Obviously most of these are just straight up ported from Tour and the visuals on a lot of them are pretty unacceptable compared to the base game but, if you don't care about then then the value of 48 tracks for $25 is great. That's basically 50 cents a track plus the added characters. Not only that but they added the ability to choose custom items, plus a music player in the main menu.

With the slightly better character roster and the MUCH better battle mode, I can say this is definitely THE definite Mario Kart. Though I may end up liking Wii a tad bit more now due to it's wacky physics. Either way, definitely a must have as a Switch owner and as a Mario Kart fan.

Well, that's the end of the Mario Kart marathon everyone unless I end up actually playing Tour lol. Been playing Persona 3 FES this whole time alongside these games and I'm in December now so I think I'm nearing the end of it, stay tuned for that review!

Looking back now, I really, truly understand why Nintendo didn't make a new Mario Kart on Switch and instead opted to simply port the one from the previous gen and make it better, because honestly, how do you even begin to try and top Mario Kart 8? The pure levels of fun, innovation, and creativity present in this one silly Mario Kart game are insane and more than other games could ever even dream of. If Mario Kart 8 was on the brink of perfection, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe was the push that got it there.

Starting out with the gameplay, it's the same old tried and true kart racing formula that's worked for the series for many years now, only this time with a few notable inclusions that refine it to feel the best it ever has. The customizable vehicle parts system from Mario Kart 7 returns here and it works tremendously, there's so many interestingly designed vehicles and so many combinations to try. Experimenting with different combinations till you find the one that's just right for you can be a fun process and switching it up every once in a while to try a different playstyle or to impose a challenge upon yourself can be fun too. Then there's the game's main new feature, the anti-gravity racing. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe's tracks almost all have an element of anti-gravity infused into them, allowing you to drive on walls or ceilings of the tracks you're racing on which ultimately just leads to some of the most inspired track designs in the series. Some of my absolute favorite tracks in the entire series originate from this game and its legendary track design, such as Mount Wario, Toad Harbor, Wild Woods, Big Blue, and Shy Guy Falls just to name a few. The game is no slouch in its retro track selection either, choosing just the right amount of fan favorites as well as left field picks that got remakes that completely redeemed them. The base track selection is the biggest in the series as well and yet never at any point feels like it values quantity over quality, each track has the same expert amount of care and details put into it and that's what really sets this game apart.

In terms of content there's nothing really different from any other Mario Kart game here, but when the base gameplay is as fun and distinct as it is, I'd argue that there doesn't really need to be. The main mode is of course Grand Prix mode and there certainly is a lot to tackle here. There are 12 cups worth of races in the base roster of the game (being doubled entirely in the Booster Course Pass but I'll get there momentarily) which means you'll have a lot to do if you want to master them all over the game's five CCs, surprisingly though this process never felt tiresome or drawn out as it might seem to be (I should note that in this playthrough, I didn't go through and do all of this, as I had already done so and didn't feel like starting my file over again, I instead just opted to playthrough every course in the game once and call it a playthrough). The game combines the 50, 100, and 150 CC modes progress into one, meaning if you get the gold trophy on one cup's CC, you get it for all the corresponding CCs as well, meaning you don't have to tediously go through each grand prix three times and have roughly the same experience each time. The other two CCs are Mirror mode and 200cc. Mirror mode, being a staple of the series at this point, has you race through the courses on 150cc just flipped, so it does feel kind of similar but overall offers enough of a different experience to justify its existence I guess. The main event here though is clearly 200cc. 200cc is a blisteringly fast game mode that really captures the chaotic and fun vibes of Mario Kart perfectly. It made me not even care that I was completing the same tracks over again for the third time because the adrenaline pumping speeds made it a blast to play through. Apart from this there's also the online mode, which surprisingly enough for NSO, I've found to work pretty darn well. The online mode places you in a lobby with other players and allows you to choose between three different course selections or just choose random if you don't like any of the selections and honestly I've always been a fan of this system. In Mario Karts past the games online modes would allow you to choose whatever course from the roster that you want, the only problem being that everyone would always choose the same few fan favorite courses and there would be no variety, this system however lends itself to variety every time you play the game and lets you see more of the courses while playing online with people around your skill level and it's honestly just refreshing to see it work so well. In terms of unlockables Mario Kart 8 Deluxe takes a different approach than any other Mario Kart game before it. The game has every character unlocked already, which some might see as a bit of a bummer, and even I'll admit it does take a little bit of the excitement out of things but its also just kind of convenient at the end of the day. Apart from that the only other unlockables you get are car parts which you get by collecting coins in races and hitting certain milestones. While this is a bit disappointing as it doesn't really test your skill at the game, I can see understand why they did it and it doesn't bother me that much.

Finally I get to my last talking point about this game, being it's pretty great DLC in the form of the Booster Course pass. The Booster Course pass took the number of cups from the base game and doubled it in a massive expansion that's main goal was to bring back mostly fan favorite retro tracks from the series' past as well as sprinkling in some surprises like a few entirely new tracks, new characters, and extra game customization modes to really make this game the ultimate Mario Kart. This happened over the course of six waves of DLC, each introducing two new cups worth of tracks to the mix spaced a few months apart. This made the release of each new wave an event to look forward to and I have plenty of fond memories of waking up in the morning and seeing the reveal trailer on Nintendo's YouTube page of what 8 new courses would be in the next wave of DLC, it was a really exciting time to be a Mario Kart fan and one that I'm glad I got to experience as it happened.

Overall, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe is just the definitive Mario Kart experience in every way and definitely one that has earned its great reputation and sales figures. The game achieves nearly everything it sets out to do by being just pure unadulterated fun and having so many good ideas that it doesn't know what to do with them. The game's longevity is a testament to its staying power and even in a few years when we have the next Mario Kart in hand (hopefully) I'll still always look back fondly and appreciate everything that this near perfect video game did for the series.

You know how sometimes a thing that is obvious to everyone else just passes you by until suddenly you get it and you feel stupid for not knowing it all along? Like how the slogan for Kay Jewelers, “every kiss begins with Kay,” also means that the word “kiss” literally begins with the letter k? Or how Sister Act 2: Back in the Habit is a pun, as in she’s back in the traditional head garment worn by a catholic nun? Or in the second verse of “Psycho Killer” David Byrne sings about how you shouldn’t say too much and make the same point over again, while saying too much and making that point over again in the verse. Those are all real examples on my end. Let me tell you another one on the gaming side of things.

Years ago, back when I was still in college, the Mortal Kombat guys released Armageddon, which was kinda bad for a number of other reasons, but also had an inexplicable kart-racing mini game. I had no idea why. The game boasted a roster of every character to ever appear in a Mortal Kombat game ever, but no unique fatalities or ending screens for them. No room for the fundamental components of what makes a mortal Kombat game what it is, but plenty of room for kart racing? Who asked for Sub-Zero vs Scorpion on the Outworld track? Why does this exist. Why. Why. Why? I was a fairly large Mortal Kombat fan back then and that huge roster was irresistible for me, I was ready for it to be the best one ever but was let down by the weak core game, the create-your-own big tiddy fighter, and mortal kombat kart racing. I never figured out why it was in there.

That is, until this year, when my friends in Rotterdam told me to just get the latest dang Mario Kart so we can all play sometime. Well, I did, and it was fun, but then there must have been a screen in between races that showed something called MKTV. Must be something called Mario Kart T…

That was it. MK.

Mario Kart. Mortal Kombat. MK.

Are you fucking kidding me. For seventeen years. The goddamn LETTERS are the same!

I don’t even think I’m fully recovered from the shock of it. I shouldn’t have put it past Midway, I mean the reason why DC vs Mortal Kombat exists is because they really did just say once “well, there’s marvel vs capcom, there really should be one for DC as well, and it might as well should be vs mortal kombat,” so that’s the level of imagination and creativity they’re working with sometimes, but… MK, for christs sake.

Anyway, that’s the only unique thing I can bring to the discussion about this game on www.backloggd.com. It’s the latest iteration of the popular racing/party game franchise Mario Kart. You’ve played this game to death, you have like a hundred fifty hours logged on it, and I saw it on your switch profile so don’t even act like it’s not true. Even if you never have played it, you still know everything there is to know about it just by being alive in the year 2024. It’s like a review for Star Wars on letterboxd, or I dunno, the works of Shakespeare on Goodreads. It’s Mario kart, man, what do you want.

Easily the ultimate (dare I say Deluxe) Mario Kart experience. Not all tracks are stellar, but with 96 (!!!) of them there's bound to be stinkers here and there, with the last patch we also have a perfectly viable online experience where playing the game is much more enjoyable than trying to get better items instead. The game is fun, battle mode is finally an actual battle mode and it has a decent map selection, there's a load of characters and karts to choose from.

What's the catch? I don't feel like the last tracks really have anything to do with the game itself, despite being the most popular Switch game. It's all an advertisement for Mario Kart Tour, with a good 20 or so tracks being ripped off from the mobile counterpart. It feels lazy, like they hadn't really planned to do anything with the game until they wanted the players to move on, yet they still stuck with it for years and so they had to do something about it.

Mario Kart 8 Deluxe keeps selling, for good reasons. It would be extremely funny though if instead of developing a new title, they would port Deluxe the same way Todd has been selling Skyrim for over ten years.

After 65 hours and a good few years, this game is finally complete.

Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, with it's Booster Course Pass DLC, is without a doubt THE BEST kart racer of all time, and it's not close. It didn't start out this way, but slowly and surely, through updates and refinements over the years, it has become a modern classic and a must-have for the Nintendo Switch. It's hard to think that Nintendo will ever top this in the next Mario Kart game.

The gameplay is the series' best, the course variety is incredible, the visuals are great and the music is AMAZING. There are so many little details in every stage and even just little gameplay things that make this game special. After playing this game for so long, I just now realized TODAY that when you're in mirror mode, the arm that you throw items with switches as well. Unbelievable.

With all of that said, I have a couple of (minor) gripes that I would hopefully like to see improved on one day.

1. Being able to get a Coin from an item box is stupid. I understand their purpose as the main way to unlock kart parts, and as a way to nerf the person in first (and giving you a miniscule speed boost), but it's incredibly frustrating getting so many in a row when you're winning. You can keep coins in the games, but just don't put them in the item boxes.

2. The Booster Pass DLC is great, with the tracks pretty much coming out to $1 per new course. However, there were WAY too many Mario Kart Tour courses in it. I wouldn't really mind as much if they were good, but their gimmick of the course layout being different on each lap, with the only indication of where you need to go being floating arrows that aren't always clear on where they WANT you to go, I could definitely pass on some of them. There are good ones, and there are bad ones. But, like I said, at $1 per course, I can't really complain that much. And if you have a Nintendo account the DLC is free, so it's really a non-issue.

With the game in it's complete state, there's really no reason to play any other Mario Kart other than this one. A masterpiece.

The best Mario Kart game without a doubt, MK8DX brings everything to the table. The biggest roster of the series, the fantastic maps, and the sheer amount of DLC this game offers to you almost guarantees that you can sink countless hours into the title (if the arcade-racing genre is your thing, that is).

Sure while the maps of the Booster-Course Pass are almost directly ripped from MK Tour, at least we are given the opportunity to play them.

200cc gives players who want to challenge themselves just that, as the maps weren't made with this speed in mind. You can burn through hours playing the time trial mode trying to perfect your 200cc run on certain maps (my personal favorite is Ice Ice Outpost).

Fantastic game built for mindless fun.

The Definitive Mario Kart game. it has the most tracks out of the entire series and absolutely stunning visuals. there just seems to be a charm missing that was present in the older games that i cant quite put my finger on. might just be nostalgia talking. i do wish there were more items, and that the coin was not an item. also making 2 item slots was a very good decision for this game and significantly improves it. the fact that they added the battle mode that was missing from the original game makes it much better as well.

Mario Kart 8:
- No playable Boo
- No Boo item
- No Boo track (in name)

Mario Kart 8 Deluxe:
- King Boo
- Boo item
- GBA Boo Lake

I think it's pretty clear which version is superior.

I mean, how do you even review Mario Kart, let alone THE BEST Mario Kart? Truly, few games bring people together quite like MK, and MK8 is the apex of the series (so far), with an insane amount of customization in vehicles, solid variety in game modes, and a huge roster of maps from all eras. This game is the ultimate casual party game, and even solo, offers great depth in trying to perfect each of the games Grand Prix levels. Truly, gaming at its most pure. Anybody with a Switch should own this.

Not only a brilliant Mario game but an outstanding racing game.
You and many friends will have fun playing the races and then never speaking to them again when someone loses.
People of all ages from young children to old adults will enjoy racing on some basic to advanced tracks.
Highlight tracks for me are Rainbow Road (Wii U/Switch), Hyrule Circuit, Waluigi Pinball and Mount Wario.
I'm not a big fan of the tour tracks they added in for the booster course packs but that's just me.
Highly recommended for racing fans. But, they already own it.

Obviously it's the highest selling Mario Kart, hell, the highest selling Mario game at all, so they must've done something right. Totaling a solid 96 tracks and 50 characters, some even crossing over from different games entirely, there should be a little something for anybody and everybody. I dunno know, though, I just can't get into it as much as I feel like I should.

This is a very clean feeling Mario Kart, almost a little too clean. I guess it's the Double Dash fan in me, but Mario Kart 8 has always felt just a little too smooth for my liking, which sounds like it should be a good thing, but I definitely prefer the more chaotic gameplay of Mario Kart. Although, I can give them credit for this, 200cc does do a pretty good job of fulfilling that wish. Custom items as well to an extent, though that's a bit more on the ridiculous side than hectic. Big difference.

I digress, chaotic or not, MK8D still has some beautiful and vibrant tracks. Electrodrome was, and to this day still is, easily in my top 3 tracks out of the entire series. Mt. Wario is another really fun design and concept, which I'm sure has had its praises sung relentlessly by now. Even the retro selection is pretty damn strong, some remarkable glow-ups given to tracks such as GBA Mario Circuit, GBA Ribbon Road, N64 Rainbow Road, though I do understand the grievances to be had on that last one. Outside of the first page of cups, 8 Deluxe also introduced the Booster Course Pass line of DLCs, which, ah...

Sorry, I hate this concept in its entirety. I understand you have your sweet little mobile game and you need to preserve all of its tracks for when that inevitably shuts down, but I really don't think the way to do it was by adding paid DLC to your Deluxe rendition of your 8 year old game. Yes, I see why they did it, I get it, highest selling game on the Switch, it still just feels stupidly counterintuitive. Not to mention how wildly inconsistent the quality can be. For every GBA Boo Lake, there's a 3DS Toad Circuit. For every Yoshi's Story, there's a GBA Sunset Wilds/Sky Garden sorry i'm a super circuit fan and i will NOT sit idly by and let them curse my beloved tracks.

I won't call it bad, it's very clearly not bad. Good, even. I just don't like the feeling it evokes, which is, uh. Not much. Online works surprisingly well, battle mode is easily better than base MK8. Shoutout Reyn and Quent for the fun times and look forward to their reviews as well, assuming they both write one. If not, then at least look forward to Reyn's.

10/10 (excellent game, not close to a 9.5/10 at all)

as someone who lived with mario kart wii all my life and thought it was the best mario kart game i can’t deny and say that i loved this game even more than that. first off the physics and such are improved which makes the game so much more fun. the graphics are colorful and vibrant and while im not a fan of the first booster pass track graphics with each booster pass they got better. most courses are fun and amazing with great concepts and such. the soundtrack rocks and overall this is the definitive mario kart game. glad i got this for my 16th birthday :)

What made 7 great with some added stuff from Wii that makes this feel like the definitive Mario Kart, which is obvious, but still. There's a reason it's been the standard for 10 years now, there's not much else you can do that this game hasn't done. Great roster of maps both base game and DLC, remakes are consistently good to great (Coconut Mall is a rare exception), character lineup is good but definitely some weird choices (zero people wanted 5 Babies and also WHERE IS CAPTAIN FALCON), but the obvious winner here is the gameplay. Every bit as smooth as you'd expect from a 7 follow-up, plus anti-grav allowing for much more dynamic map layouts and the return of ramps just make this so much fun to play. I went through the entire roster of non-remakes with my friend and it was some of the most fun we've had in a while. A+ game, even if there are a couple aspects from the older games I prefer. Only slightly.

Everyone knows how this is a great gamemso here's my top 10 favorite MK tracks:

Number 10: DK SUMMIT. One of the best snow tracks, with a sense of adrenaline umparalleled.

Number 9: Waluigi Stadium. The best stadium stage and honestly too overshadowed by the other waluigi stage. Always a fun time.

Number 8: Maka Wuhu. Nintendo legit made a setting for a kinda tech demo gimmicky game and it became one of the most beloved Nintendo locations. The final section is incredible.

Number 7: Daisy Cruiser. One of the best way to showcase how much of a weirdo Daisy is. A nice classic from Double dash that was made justice with MK8

Number 6: Sky Garden. ONLY THE GBA VERSION, I dunno whatever they did to blud in the Booster pass.

Number 5: Airship Fortress. My favorite DS track, such a shame it didn't came back, they even opened a shyguy inside the ship, good for them.

Number 4: Music Park. I would love to have a game entirely themed around racing through music. I also wanna adopt the giant music notes, they are friendos.

Number 3: Cloudtop cruise. Daughter of Sky garden and Airship fortress, I love the theme and the music

Number 2: MAPLE TREEWAY. Not only a fun course to drive, but one with and incredible atmosphere that rivals a wolrd from Galaxy. The sole reason why Wiggler is one of my favorite Mario characters.

Number 1: BIG BLUE. THE BEST MK TRACK EVER MADE WITH THE BEST MUSIC AND THE BEST SPEED AND FLOW, NINTENDO CAN YOU FREE F-ZERO PLS?????

Keep in mind almost all of these are part of the roster of Mario Kart 8 tracks, alongside many other. This alone can twstify how good and varied of a title MK8 is

Mario Kart 8 Deluxe at the time of release was a 9/10. One of the better Mario Karts but still lacked in some areas that other Mario Karts had. Today, after all the updates and improvements and DLC, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe is a legitimate 10/10 and the best Mario Kart game hands down. With a whopping 96 tracks today, you will never get sick of playing any track in this game due to the sheer variety. All the newly added characters make this objectively the best character selection Mario Kart has had too. This is a result of what happens when Nintendo supports a game for more than 10 years. The only way this can be topped if is the next game is Super Kart Bros (I.e the big karting crossover we all want cmon Nintendo)

Genuinely do not see how Mario Kart as a franchise can get better then this, now that the Booster Course has doubled base 8 we got the widest selection of tracks we've ever had filled with mostly bangers (repetitive city courses aside!) and the most comfortable feeling controls in any Mario Kart entry. Was skeptical about the Booster Course going into it considering the copying of some Tour tracks and the general cheapness compared to the base 8 offerings, but I think the amount of bangers new and old combined with the quantity still made it worth the price overall and also they added back the two best things about this franchise (Wiggler and 3DS Rainbow Road) so yk I can't really complain at all! At this point I don't really know how things will go in the future, the inevitable Mario Kart 9 is gonna have to step back considering this whole package is like the peak peak amount of content in a Mario Kart game and at a certain point adding more is definitely gonna feel overwhelming. Or maybe Nintendo won't care and they'll do "8 Deluxe Deluxe" or some shit and it's like quadruple the course idfkjiefokofekfeok, this is like the highest selling Mario game ever now so it's not impossible! But uh idk I won't about that for now, was a blast down memory lane going through this one against and for a game I've been playing for nearly 10 years at this point it could be a lot worse! Once again thank you James Gunn for this and for making The Guardians of the Galaxy as we know them today.