Animal Crossing x Mario Kart 8 - DLC Review

This week saw the release of the second pack of DLC for Mario Kart 8 on the Wii U. This coincided with a slight lull in university work and a visitation from my friend Andy Dodd, who is also an avid Nintendo fan, both events forcing me to play (I tried protesting… honest).  

The DLC (for a explanation of DLC see Here) is named Animal Crossing x Mario Kart 8. It is the second pack of DLC for the game coming about a year after the games release. The staggering of extra content for Mario Kart 8 demonstrates Nintendo’s refreshing approach to DLC. Don’t worry I won’t praise Nintendo’s  DLC policy too much, I don’t need to when I did it in this post.

Animal Crossing x Mario Kart 8 infuses the game with elements of the Animal Crossing series of games. The DLC adds a total of three new characters, six new kart parts and eight new tracks. All of these come at the price of £7.00 which isn’t too bad, especially as it hasn’t come straight after the game’s release.

As mentioned I have played, and been trounced on (thanks Andy), the tracks and thought I would give a brief review of my thoughts. We were also joined by Amy in this, who terrified us both with a spot of road rage (‘spot’ may be a slight understatement).

Crossing Cup

Baby Park

Courtesy of Nintendo Everything

This track is a remake of the Mario Kart Double Dash track on the Nintendo GameCube. The track is a small oval and the normal three laps is increased to seven. Whilst in some racing games a simple oval can be boring, in Mario Kart they become gleefully chaotic. By the middle of the race you are often left unsure whether the person you have just passed was in front of you, or if you lapped them. Plus there is the potential for weapons overload, which can lead to both tears of joy and frustration. Either way the simplicity of the track hides the hectic fun to be had.

Image courtesy of Nintendo Life

Cheese Land

An impressive 3D remake of the 2D GameBoy Advance Mario Kart. This track didn’t make much of an impression on me, although to be fair, I have only played through once. It just seemed to pass by in a blur of cheddar-yellow and reminded me of Dry Dry Desert. Still a track made of cheese can’t be a bad thing, right?

Wild Woods

Image from Mario Wiki

This is probably my favourite track of the Crossing Cup, not because of the track, but because of the scenery. The track winds its way through a forest full of Shy Guys and Toads having fun. There aren’t many racing games where characters swing above you on tree vines or wave from rope bridges. But even though these are background elements, they add fun to the game. These touches demonstrate why Mario Kart can be such a fun franchise, as it combines endearing characters with gameplay that makes you want to Luigi ‘death stare’ your nearest and dearest.

Animal Crossing

A cool elongated figure of eight map which takes you around an Animal Crossing town. The cool feature of this map is that, like the game, the season changes randomly when you select it. All I have experienced is winter at this point, but driving through snowmen is rather entertaining.

Image from Nintendo Everything

Bell Cup

Neo Bowser City

A remake of the track from Mario Kart 7. This track goes through a brightly lit city under the control of King Kooper himself, Bowser. The track is cool in its design, but compared to the other tracks in the Bell cup, didn’t make much of an impression upon me.

Image from Nintendo Everything

Ribbon Road

Image from Mario Wiki

My favourite track of the DLC, due to it being made up of toys, including the titular road made of ribbon. Everything about this track screams fun, except when it makes you actually scream as a result of another Red Shell. The track reminds me heavily of Toy Story, right down to the wallpaper and bed in the corner. The best part, in my opinion, is the gliding section where you have to avoid two swaying jack in the boxes. Once again the playful element is a sure sign that you are playing Mario Kart.

Image from Mario Wiki

Super Bell Subway

A cool track which includes some formidable subway trains. These add an interesting element as they can be avoided, or boarded from above. This means that each lap is different as the trains continually move as you play. Just make sure that you mind the gap.

Big Blue

The final track is one long stretch of road broken into sections instead of laps. It is based on the F-Zero games series. This is a racing series featuring flying cars, and this fits in perfectly with Mario Kart 8’s new anti-gravity mechanism. A race along this road is filled with futuristic visuals and uncertainty as to which way up you are. I am glad that another single lap track has been added as it makes a nice change from the usual lap-tracks.

Image from Mario Wiki

As this is Mario Kart each of these tracks is accompanied by upbeat theme tunes that are sure to get stuck in your head. The best track of the bunch is probably the theme for Wild Woods.

I haven’t tested out the characters yet as I am still playing as Link from Legend of Zelda. After all what is better than when two of your fandoms combine?

A note on the character of Dry Bowser courtesy of Andy, can any of you imagine a Dry (aka firey-zombie) version of Mario, Luigi and Peach… shudder.