By: Ryan Ramakrishnan
Five years ago today, Nintendo shipped one of its greatest exclusives yet in the form of “Mario Kart 8.” And while the platform exclusivity didn’t help the Wii U as much as they certainly would have liked, it nevertheless went down in the console’s short history as one of its best games around.
Fast forward a few years and we see a bigger, better and ultimately much more successful Nintendo. They may have not provided their fans with the next proper sequel to the long-running kart racing series; however, the already great “Mario Kart 8” quickly found its way over to the Switch and somehow became even better.
Today, the niche of driving games that “Mario Kart” falls into isn’t overly populated; however, even when in comparison to other games with the “Mario” namesake and Nintendo's other big titles as well, “Mario Kart 8” remains to be one of the finest first party hits they have delivered in recent years.
In celebration of “Mario Kart 8’s” five year anniversary, I was originally planning on a bit of a retrospective for the kart racer, one that I’d use to look at all of the aspects that Nintendo incorporated into it that make it the definitive experience. I then however decided what would be more interesting would be to analyze what the series could do moving forward. With “Mario Kart 8 Deluxe” on the Switch being arguably the best in the franchise and easily the most content-heavy and enjoyable game of its kind in today’s market, what could Nintendo possibly do in the future? It’s hard to imagine they haven’t already begun planning the inevitable “Mario Kart 9” but what exactly does that look like? I’d like to dive into what I think about the subject with you.
