Mario Kart Arcade GP

 MARIO KART ARCADE GP

If you're thinking the Mario Kart arcade games are going to be the same experience as a regular Mario Kart games, you're . . . going to be surprised. The first arcade game was released in 2005 and was primarily developed by Namco as will become fairly obvious. You mostly do play the same: drive a kart, throw items, but they're not quite the items you've come to expect from the series. Let's get into it and you'll see what I mean.

First up, our roster is a mix of Mario and Pac-Man characters. On the Mario side, we have our main eight (shocker!), and on the Pac-Man side, we welcome Pac-Man, Mrs. Pac-Man, and Blinky (the red ghost). Obviously, as with the regular Mario Kart games, none of this really matters, as what matters is how the car drives and the items available.

Speaking of items, they are mostly divided into eight main categories: lock-on shots, basically homing projectiles like the Red Shell; shoot forwards, like the Green Shell; drops backwards, like the Banana; shoot backwards, like you can do with the Green Shell; shoot forward and backwards, so the Green Shell with no limitations; melees, that attacks opponents at close range, like the Piranha Plant or the Super Horn; statuses, that affect the user, like a Star or Mushroom; or other. Some of these are Mario or Pac-Man specific, some seem to be just everyday items. The lock-on shots include bombs, tires, Boos, a basin, clouds, bananas, trash cans, and a bazooka. The shoot forwards include shells (shocker!) and a tornado. The drop backwards include bananas (shocker!), tacks, oil slick, firecrackers, and smoke. The shoot backwards includes a pie. That's it. The melee item is a thunder stick, and the status items are shields and mushrooms. The other category includes a high beam that blinds opponents and a magic hand that steals other people's items. All of the characters also have "specialty" items unique to them, but at the end of the day, all still fall into all of these categories and the differences tend to be fairly cosmetic.

Bowser appears also as a boss at the end of the game, standing on a pedestal and breathing fire at you, like he does. But we also have another boss entirely unique to the arcade games, a robotic doppelganger of Mario named Robo Mario (oh, you better believe my brain has already pegged him for gimmick rep/echo fighter).

As for stages, this is a definite divergence from the main Mario series, but understandable given the needs of an arcade game. The game has six cups, with two stages each, but the stages mostly seem to start out pretty much the same but end up diverging at a certain point before coming back just before the finish line. The Mario Cup features Mario Highway and Mario Beach, both set in a tropical setting. The DK Cup features DK Jungle and Bananan Ruins, both set in the jungle. The Wario Cup features Diamond City and Snow Panic, both set in a city, supposedly the city from Wario Ware, but I didn't really feel like it really was, and honestly had more E. Gadd references than anything in Wario Ware (eh, still more representation than the main series ever gave them). The Pac-Man Cup features Pac-Mountain and Pac-Labyrinth, both based on Pac-Land and regular Pac-Man mazes. The Bowser Cup features Bowser's Castle and Castle Wall, both set, well, I think you can figure it out. Then finally we have the Rainbow Cup, featuring Rainbow Coaster and Rainbow Downhill, where you face Robo Mario.

Well, there we are. Let's see what we've got:

Characters:

Mario Kart: Lock-on (basin or tire, fave), Shoot Forward (tornado), Drop Backward (oil or firecracker), Shoot Backward (pie), Melee (thunder stick), Status (shield), High Beam, Magic Hand

Robo Mario: see all above, total gimmick rep. Might not even need to be echo.

Mario

Luigi

Princess Peach

Toad

Yoshi

Donkey Kong

Wario

Bowser

Stages:

Mario Highway

Mario Beach

DK Jungle

Bananan Ruins

Diamond City

Snow Panic

Pac-Mountain

Pac-Labyrinth

Bowser's Castle

Castle Walls

Rainbow Coaster

Rainbow Downhill

Thanks for reading! Next up, we'll cover Mario Kart Arcade GP 2!