DS Shroom Ridge

Shroom Ridge is the the fourth and final race course of the Flower Cup in Mario Kart DS. The course takes place on a public road with traffic and runs on a mountain ridge, hence the name. For about half of the course, the right hand side has no railing and is a sheer drop. Shroom Ridge is the first traffic course to have cars moving in opposite directions, as opposed to the same direction as in all previous road tracks. It returns as the second course of the Lucky Cat Cup in Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, in the Booster Course Pass DLC.

Notably, the cars not involved in the race drive on the left side of the road (which means, from the player's perspective, the cars that come against them are at the right side), as done in real life in various countries including Japan, India, the United Kingdom, and Australia. In Mirror Mode, however, they take the right side of the road, as done in the Continental Americas or Mainland Europe.

Due to the DS's limited 3D graphics capability, vehicles cannot be seen from a far distance. Unlike the previous game, Mario Kart: Double Dash!!, they will disappear from a player's sight if far enough.

Some of the trucks contain advertisements for Fruits or for "Fresh Cheep Cheep", though in pre-release versions, the "Fresh Cheep Cheep" advertisements read "Flesh" instead of "Fresh", likely a translation error.

Course layout
The race starts on a part of the road near to the cliff. Players go straight to encounter the first corner that turns to the left. The road becomes slightly wider and the racers leave the ridge going in between two hills. The road makes another abrupt turn to the right crossing the hills and then turns to the left. The road passes through an expansive meadow with trees in the background behind one of the hills of the road that leads the racers uphill in a S turn that ends inside a tunnel traversing a hill bordering on the road. Racers go through the tunnel to make a slight turn to the left. The tunnel ends leading the racers again to the ridge. During the turn, the road tilts slightly downhill and then makes an S turn to the right. Racers must take now another turn to the left and lastly another to the right. The road ends in a straight line towards the finish line to complete the lap.

When the player crosses the finish line, starting another lap, Lakitu is shown on the right side of the player, holding the lap count signs.

Missions
There are two missions that take place on Shroom Ridge:


 * Mission 3-7: The player controls Donkey Kong, who must perform 10 power-slide mini-turbos.
 * Mission 4-3: The player controls Mario, who must reach the finish before the red car speeding around the course. This car is much faster than normal and drives erratically.

Both missions involve the player driving in a single-lap race.

Mario Kart 8 Deluxe
In Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, Shroom Ridge returns as the second course of the Lucky Cat Cup in the Booster Course Pass. It is the only course in the first wave of the DLC that is not currently in Mario Kart Tour, as well one of two classic courses so far (excluding courses originally from Mario Kart Tour) that has not reappeared as a retro course in a previous installment, the other being.

The graphics have been updated, there is now fog over the woodland below, a lake is added in the background, and the vehicles have been replaced by the ones found in (with the exception of the dash panel ramp truck). The vehicles also now all move in the same direction. The signpost over the finish line now has the modern Mario Kart logo. Guardrails have been added in spots along the final stretch of the track, though they do not cover the entire length of the cliffside. Yoshis and Toads also appear as spectators on this course. Additionally, two shortcuts were added. For the first, a glide ramp was added in the large patch of grass before the tunnel, accessible via a Mushroom. In addition, a fan that blows out wind was added over the edge of the S-turn, allowing racers to skip it with a Mushroom. The minimap was turned around 60 degrees counterclockwise compared to the equivalent in Mario Kart DS. Shroom Ridge is one of two tracks in the game to not have Double Item Boxes, the other being.

Unlike in Mario Kart DS, when the player crosses the finish line to begin the next lap, Lakitu is shown on the left side of the player holding the lap count signs, instead of the right side (when holding the start signal, he’s also shown on the left side of the player).

As with all other courses from Wave 1, this course's icon and lighting were adjusted slightly in the 2.1.0 update.

Other appearances
In a found in Mario Kart 8 Deluxe's files for the Booster Course Pass, there is an image of a reverse and trick variant of DS Shroom Ridge, featuring different trees and some Mushroom Trampolines, suggesting a R/T variant of the course in Mario Kart Tour. The image of Shroom Ridge in the of the Booster Course Pass also shows several floating coins near a tunnel along with a blue car, neither of which appear in the course. Additionally, all other images on this banner are from Mario Kart Tour.

Mario Kart DS

 * European website bio: "In the great tradition of Toad's Turnpike and Mushroom Bridge, this race takes place on real roads packed with traffic. Shroom Ridge is downhill all the way, so make sure your breaks are in tip-top shape. There are no crash barriers either, so you'd better have perfected those power-slides..."

Mario Kart DS

 * Fresh (Cargo trucks)
 * Mario Racing (Billboards)
 * Super Mario (Trackside banners)
 * Super Mario GP (Billboards)
 * Wario Racing (Trackside banners, billboards)

Mario Kart 8 Deluxe

 * Boomerang Bros. International Airlines (Signs)
 * Bullet Bill Speed Trial (Signs)
 * Coconut Cafe (Signs)
 * Fun Flower (Signs)
 * Galaxy Air (Buses, signs)
 * Green Shell Taxi (Taxis)
 * Mario Work Gear (Signs)
 * Moo Moo Meadows Milk (Signs)
 * Propeller Toad Transport (Trucks)
 * Red Shell Strike Equipment (Stickers)
 * Shy Guy Metals (Signs)
 * Sunshine Parts (Signs)
 * Super Marine World (Car decal)
 * Tropical Grocery (Signs)

Trivia

 * On the American official webpage for the Mario Kart 8 Deluxe – Booster Course Pass, Shroom Ridge was erroneously listed as a 3DS course rather than a DS course. This was later corrected.
 * The car in the course icon in Mario Kart 8 Deluxe is driving backwards, making this the second course icon with this oddity, after . It is also driving in the middle of the road.