Super Mario Kart

Template:Redirectshere Template:Infobox Super Mario Kart is a racing game for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System released in 1992 and re-released in 1996 as a Player's Choice title. It was also released in Japan on June 9, 2009; in United States on November 23, 2009; and on April 2, 2010 in Europe and Australia as a Virtual Console title. It is the first installment in the Mario Kart series and the game that set precedents to the kart racing style of video games.

Characters

Character select screen.

As well as the eight playable drivers, various other Mario series characters appear in Super Mario Kart. Thwomps, Piranha Plants, Monty Moles, and Cheep-Cheeps are enemies that serve as obstacles in certain tracks and Boos appear in the background of other tracks, as well as serving as a usable item.

As stated in the Super Mario Kart manual, Lakitu is the owner of the Super Mario Kart Race Track, and as such, he oversees all races. He holds up the starting signal and various other signs and for the price of two Coins, he also uses his fishing rod to lift any fallen drivers back onto the racetrack.

Button controls

SNES

• - Accelerate, Rocket Start
• - Use items, stop Item Roulette
• - Pause/Select
• - Switch view
• - Change option during the Menus/Steer
• - Switch view
• - Brake
• / - Drift

Modes of play

Mario GP

File:SMK 1-1 Yoshistart.png

The first race of the Mario Kart GP is about to start.

The Mario GP is the main mode for Super Mario Kart. Here, players can race against seven other opponents in a five-course cup. The four best drivers will receive Driver Points for placing in the top four. First place gives the player nine points, second gets six, three points for third and only one for fourth. If players get fifth or below, they can try again using one of three limited lives. If they get it four times, the mode is over. A single extra life was earned by placing the same position three times. The maximum score in a GP cup is forty-five. The three best drivers will move on to the award ceremony where they can receive their trophies. Third place gives the player a bronze trophy, second gives them silver and gold for the winner. Each race is five laps long. If the player wants more of a challenge, he or she could highlight his or her character and press the and buttons at the same time. Their character will be permanently small until the player presses these buttons again.

Vs. Mode

In this two-player mode, players can race against each other. The player who crosses the finish line after five laps wins the race. Hazards will also be placed on the track to add to the challenge.

Time Trial

In this single-player mode, players can get the fastest time within the required number of laps. The best lap time and race time is recorded after all of the laps are played.

Battle

Battle Mode

In this mode for two people, players can battle against each other with balloons. To pop them, the player must hit their opponent with an item. The Item Panels will automatically restock after all of them have been used. Each player gets three balloons to begin the battle with and the first person to pop all the other players' three balloons wins the battle.

Drivers

Super Mario Kart has eight available drivers, divided into statistically identical pairs of two. These four categories have no official name, but are referred in the manual as different classes. Later Mario Kart titles categorize characters into weight classes to organize their stats.

The Bros. SMKMario.png Mario CPU Item: Invincibility Star SMKluigi.png Luigi CPU Item: Invincibility Star Acceleration Top Speed Weight Handling Medium Medium Medium Medium

The Dino and the Princess MKToadstool.PNG Princess CPU Item: Poison Mushrooms MKYoshi.PNG Yoshi CPU Item: Eggs Acceleration Top Speed Weight Handling High Medium Medium Low

The Showdown MKBowser.PNG Bowser CPU Item: Lava Balls DKJRMK.PNG Donkey Kong Jr. CPU Item: Bananas Acceleration Top Speed Weight Handling Low High High Medium

The Small Guys MKTroopa.PNG Koopa Troopa CPU Item: Green Shells MKToad.PNG Toad CPU Item: Poison Mushrooms Acceleration Top Speed Weight Handling Medium Low Low High

Courses

Racing courses

• Mushroom Cup
• 

  Mario Circuit 1

• SNES Donut Plains 1.png

  Donut Plains 1

• SNES Ghost Valley 1.png

  Ghost Valley 1

• SNES Bowser Castle 1.png

  Bowser Castle 1

• 

  Mario Circuit 2

• Flower Cup
• SNES Choco Island 1.png

  Choco Island 1

• SNES Ghost Valley 2.png

  Ghost Valley 2

• SNES Donut Plains 2.png

  Donut Plains 2

• SNES Bowser Castle 2 map.png

  Bowser Castle 2

• SNES Mario Circuit 3 map.png

  Mario Circuit 3

• Star Cup
• SNES Koopa Beach 1.png

  Koopa Beach 1

• SNES Choco Island 2.png

  Choco Island 2

• SNES Vanilla Lake 1.png

  Vanilla Lake 1

• SNES Bowser Castle 3 map.png

  Bowser Castle 3

• SNES Mario Circuit 4.png

  Mario Circuit 4

• Special Cup
• SNES Donut Plains 3.png

  Donut Plains 3

• SNES Koopa Beach 2.png

  Koopa Beach 2

• SNES Ghost Valley 3.png

  Ghost Valley 3

• SNES Vanilla Lake 2.png

  Vanilla Lake 2

• SNES Rainbow Road.png

  Rainbow Road

Battle courses

• BC1SNES.png

  Battle Course 1

• BC2SNES.png

  Battle Course 2

• BC3SNES.png

  Battle Course 3

• BC4SNES.png

  Battle Course 4

Items

• SMKItem-GreenShell.jpg

  Green Shell

• SMKItem-RedShell.jpg

  Red Shell

• SMKItem-BananaPeel.jpg

  Banana Peel

• 

  Feather

• SMKItem-Mushroom.jpg

  Mushroom

• SMKItem-Star.jpg

  Star

• SMKItem-LightningBolt.jpg

  Lightning Bolt^*

• SMKItem-Coin.jpg

  Coin^*

• SMKItem-Ghost.jpg

  Ghost^**

* - Do not appear in the Battle Mode.
** - Do not appear in the Mario Kart GP Mode.

Rivals

The rivals always finish in a particular order. In this case, though, Princess got a lower spot than normal.

Super Mario Kart has a different rival system from the rest of the series; the rivals contain one very fast driver, one fast driver, one medium driver, one slow driver and three very slow drivers. It is notable that when one of the three slower drivers gets hit, that kart will keep its place, while when one of the faster cars gets shot, it will usually resume its previous place very quickly unless unable to catch up fast enough before the race ends. For this reason, the drivers (except the human racer) will (if unaffected) always finish in the exact same order. Also if the player tries to hit an opponent a majority of the time, they jump over the item.

The rivals for each driver are always the same, the list will be in the order the line up for the first race. It is possible to change the order if the rivals can't recover their place at the end, (Eg. If someone is playing as Luigi and Yoshi finishes last, Yoshi will then become one of the three slower drivers while everybody takes the next position up).

The rivals are determined by the current points standing, meaning that if Yoshi was still only second to the player, he will boost back to first position from the start.

Character	Rival Order
	Very Fast	Fast	Medium	Slow	Very Slow
Mario	Donkey Kong Jr.	Princess	Yoshi	Luigi	Toad	Bowser	Koopa Troopa
Luigi	Yoshi	Mario	Bowser	Koopa Troopa	Princess	Donkey Kong Jr.	Toad
Princess	Bowser	Toad	Mario	Donkey Kong Jr.	Luigi	Yoshi	Koopa Troopa
Yoshi	Koopa Troopa	Donkey Kong Jr.	Princess	Bowser	Mario	Toad	Luigi
Bowser	Mario	Luigi	Princess	Yoshi	Donkey Kong Jr.	Toad	Koopa Troopa
Donkey Kong Jr.	Toad	Bowser	Koopa Troopa	Luigi	Princess	Mario	Yoshi
Koopa Troopa	Luigi	Yoshi	Princess	Mario	Bowser	Donkey Kong Jr.	Toad
Toad	Princess	Donkey Kong Jr.	Mario	Yoshi	Luigi	Koopa Troopa	Bowser

Development

Super Mario Kart was born out of the idea of making a two-player racing game following F-Zero, which was exclusively single-player . The prototype initially only featured a generic "guy in overalls". The decision to include Mario characters and concepts was made three to four months in development, when the developers added Mario driving one of the karts because they were curious about how the game would look, and decided that it looked better . The battle mode was implemented because the developers thought it would be a good idea to include a form of one-on-one battles that didn't involving competing for ranks during the races .

Beta Elements

Main article: List of Super Mario Kart beta elements

In addition to the above, a prototype cartridge of the game features several differences, such as the presence of animations on the podium screen when the player ranks 2nd or 3rd place, a music track for Vanilla Lake 1 that does not appear in the final build and a different Battle Course 3 set in Choco Island.

Reception

Super Mario Kart met with very favorable reviews. The game was placed 32nd in the 100th issue of Nintendo Power's "100 best Nintendo games of all time" in 1997.. In the book, Guinness World Records: Gamer's Edition for 2009, Super Mario Kart was placed as the #1 best console game. The game was placed 33rd in the 200th issue of GameInformer's "Top 200 Games of all Time" in December 2009. The game was awarded the Most Critically Acclaimed Mario Kart Game by Guinness Book of World Records Gamer's Edition 2009 - 2014.

Super Mario Kart is the 3rd best selling game for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System, selling 8.76 copies worldwide as of December 31, 2009.

Staff

Main article: List of Super Mario Kart staff

References to other games

• Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels: The computer-controlled Toad and Peach are able to throw Poison Mushrooms, which are not usable by the player.
• Super Mario World: Several sound effects from this game are reused, for example, the music in the Bowser's Castle levels is very similar from the final boss in this game. Most of the races take place on Dinosaur Land. Also, sprites such as the Lakitu bear a resemblance to their Super Mario World sprite.

References in later games

• Mario Kart: Super Circuit: All twenty of the courses appeared in this game, but all of their track hazards have been removed, Item Boxes are at different places than where ? Panels laid and some tracks changed a little. The music for all tracks is redone for the Game Boy Advance.
• Mario Kart DS: Mario Circuit 1, Donut Plains 1, Koopa Beach 2, and Choco Island 2 all return to this game
• Mario Kart Wii: Ghost Valley 2 and Mario Circuit 3 return as retro tracks and Battle Course 4 returns as a retro battle stage.
• Mario Kart 7: Mario Circuit 2 and Rainbow Road return as retro tracks. Also, the rival system returned in this game.
• Super Mario 3D World: Mount Must Dash is based on Mario Circuit from this game.
• Mario Kart 8: Donut Plains 3 returns as a retro track. Also the Coin item returns with the same function as it did in this game. The Pipe Frame is similar to the karts in this game. Part of the main theme is an orchestrated version of the main theme of Super Mario Kart. The design of Rainbow Road is very similar to N64 Rainbow Road and Rainbow Road for that game.

Media

Main article: List of media from Super Mario Kart

Glitches

Main article: List of glitches in Super Mario Kart

Trivia

• In the Japanese version of Super Mario Kart, every character has a winning animation that involves a bottle of champagne. Bowser and Peach/Toadstool drink champagne in their said animations, which goes against Nintendo of America's policy on the depiction of alcohol, as it was considered inappropriate for younger children. Instead, they just toss and catch the bottles in the Western versions.
• This is the only game in the Mario Kart series to have 5 courses per cup, as opposed to 4 in later games (not counting All Cup Tour in Mario Kart: Double Dash!!).
• This is also the only game in the Mario Kart series where Wario and Donkey Kong do not appear and the only game in the Mario Kart series where the Spiny Shell does not appear.
• There is a prototype cartridge that belongs to a collector with some differences from the final.