Talk:Mario Kart Tour/Archive 1

True Relase Window?
I may have realized something. This game is said to release "during the next fiscal year". Unless I'm misunderstanding something, wouldn't that mean anytime in between March 2018 and March 2019, and not right in March 2019? This is a bit confusing. -- 22:56, 31 January 2018 (EST)
 * It says "fiscal year ending March 2019", meaning the launch window frame is between now and March 2019. Is there a different way you have in mind to word it? 23:00, 31 January 2018 (EST)
 * I would simplify it to 2018, considering that the "fiscal year ending March 2019" is more or less the fiscal year for 2018. MarioComix (talk) 23:10, 31 January 2018 (EST)
 * I think it should be put to in between April 2018 and March 2019. The slides linked on the wiki page (The 4th reference), on the 15th page, it says "To be released during the next fiscal year (April 2018-March 2019). https://imgur.com/a/AaJyp -- 10:28, 1 February 2018 (EST)
 * I just realized the wiki page pretty much already says what I suggested. Nevermind, then. -- 11:54, 1 February 2018 (EST)

Nothing changed since April
Why is there no changes since April? Benjaminkirsc (talk) 08:08, 22 November 2018 (EST)
 * Because we haven't had any new information since. DK Fan
 * Holy monly. We need to fix this artcle. Benjaminkirsc (talk) 11:56, 23 November 2018 (EST)
 * The article will be fixed once there is more information available about the game. As far as I am aware, the article currently completely covers the very little information that has been released. -- 12:02, 23 November 2018 (EST)
 * Or Nintendo is Fouceing on other projects. I think so to. Benjaminkirsc (talk) 18:11, 4 December 2018 (EST)

Release date and new artwork
[https://twitter.com/NintendoAmerica/status/1166144294115323904 A release date has been unveiled for MK Tour. September 25.] There's also an official Twitter account. --GarfLarf (talk) 20:42, August 26, 2019 (EDT)

New Trailer
With the newest trailer here, we see tons of new elements including tracks based on real-world locations, returning karts such as the Flame Flyer from Mario Kart Wii, and even Diddy Kong as a playable racer. How shall we approach covering this information? MarioComix (talk) 02:43, August 27, 2019 (EDT)


 * On second watch, I've noticed the inclusion of Lakitu (in the first shot of SNES Rainbow Road), Bowser Jr. (during the Bowser Shell segment), the Bill Blaster (used by Junior), the Daytripper (during DS Waluigi Pinball segment), the Prancer (when Koopa Troopa goes underwater), and the Royale (used by Peachette). MarioComix (talk) 03:19, August 27, 2019 (EDT)


 * I've added new sections if you want to add those. 03:32, August 27, 2019 (EDT)

Redirects
Should I add redirects for Mario Kart 9 for this? JoeRunner (talk and stuff) 16:33, August 27, 2019 (EDT)
 * I wouldn't do that. It's conjectural, not a mainline game, and I wouldn't be surprised if we did get an actual Mario Kart 9 somewhere down the road. -- 16:35, August 27, 2019 (EDT)
 * I'd say only do it if the developers acknowledge this in-game or otherwise. 17:38, August 27, 2019 (EDT)

Do Bowser Jr. and Lakitu actually appear in the new trailer?
I cannot seem to see them in the new trailer and if they are not there I think if they are not there in the trailer they should be removed from this page.


 * Bowser Jr. is at 1:10, appearing right at the very end of the clip where Wario uses a Mega Mushroom. --PeabodySam (talk) 21:56, August 27, 2019 (EDT)


 * Read the post two sections above. 22:00, August 27, 2019 (EDT)

Tire customization
Are we 100 percent sure that there's no tire customization in the game? Because there are two instances where Diddy Kong's Barrel Train has both the Standard SFC tires and the Slim tires equipped. SonicSpeed48 (talk) 16:24, September 15, 2019 (EDT)


 * Could be just changes made mid-development, or perhaps it is tire customisation. However, from what I've seen, no sources have mentioned any kind of tire customisation so far, including official sources. They have mentioned picking between karts and gliders, but that's all. MarioComix (talk) 17:17, September 15, 2019 (EDT)

Pink Gold Peach?
Say, if there's a pink gold Pipe Frame body and Super Glider, doesn't that make you wonder if Pink Gold Peach will return? SonicSpeed48 (talk) 09:20, September 24, 2019 (EDT)
 * I sure hope not... We'll see when the game is released or when she gets announced. We shouldn't add PGP in the article if she was not officially confirmed yet. 09:23, September 24, 2019 (EDT)

Big Update Incoming
I have obtained a decrypted version of the 1.0.1 update, so I am about to upload a bunch of images onto this page. SwampyGator (talk) 11:54, September 28, 2019 (EDT)
 * Don't. If it hasn't been released yet, it shouldn't be mentioned. 21:16, September 28, 2019 (EDT)
 * 1.0.1 is the current version of the game. They just mean they've ripped some images to add to the page. 21:21, September 28, 2019 (EDT)
 * I see. Just reasoned that since he said it was "decrypted", it wasn't released yet. Just because, you know, really everyone has a decrypted version of the current version. 11:47, September 29, 2019 (EDT)

Extracting files from MKT
I've tried and tried to extract files from this game, but the data folder seems to be completely empty. How did you guys extract the files from the game and put them onto here? --Kaidigem (talk) 16:46, October 21, 2019 (EDT)
 * in dr. mario world's case, i used asset studio gui. mario kart tour is a major pain in the ass to sort through though as i've heard it's an unorganized mess. where did you download mario kart tour's contents off of? it should be contained in an apk file, which is pretty much just a .zip in a different name. 16:50, October 21, 2019 (EDT)
 * I downloaded the APK from off my phone and tried to sort through it. It really is an unorganized mess, too; the data file is nearly empty, all that's in the DEX file are a bunch of class files I don't understand, there's a dummy text file that is completely empty, among other things. If anyone knows where the pictures in this article came from, please message me. --Kaidigem (talk) 16:57, October 21, 2019 (EDT)

Editing
Why can't I edit this page? There are a few typos I'd like to fix for myself, since I don't know if anyone else will fix it.

I can barely edit any other pages, anyhow. As in, I don't have the permissions to do so. --Kaidigem (talk) 08:28, November 1, 2019 (EDT)
 * The page is protected because it is receiving constant updates, so we're avoiding any false information. You'll be able to edit it yourself when you are autoconfirmed. For the time being, you can say what you noticed here and someone will fix it. 14:16, November 1, 2019 (EDT)

I checked the drivers page, and on the High-End Tour Exclusive list, some of the kart size lists are mixed up. Could someone fix them? Pasteloku (talk) 06:58, June 4, 2020 (EDT)
 * Hi, just fixed it. MarioComix (talk) 17:45, June 4, 2020 (EDT)

Meaning behind "tour-exclusive"
As a person without this game, this article isn't doing a good job of telling me, are the "tour-exclusive" entities from previous "tours" now forever unavailable? If so, that should be spelled out specifically, as that sort of....setup is unusual IMO Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 03:01, November 4, 2019 (EST)
 * The game states that they may become available in future tours. But as of now, they haven't been available outside of their designated tour. MarioComix (talk) 17:33, November 4, 2019 (EST)
 * It's quite typical for a gacha game. 208.95.51.52 18:01, November 5, 2019 (EST)
 * To explain a little more: some karts that are recolor of the normal karts can only be obtained by having the Gold Pass during a Tour, similarly in each Tour there are spotlight characters, karts and gliders that can only be obtained through the launch pipe. Each week there is a new launch pipe with a new spotlight character, kart and glider added. After the Tour is over, all of these can’t be obtained in the following Tour, making them exclusive to the Tour.—Mister Wu (talk) 17:39, November 6, 2019 (EST)

Maximum number of coins during a race confirmed
You can get up to 99 coins per race, as shown in this recent video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AC6W7Agifj4

I don't know where to add this, so I'll just put it here for anyone to put it in the proper place (if it needs to be added). Gold Luigi (talk) 13:46, November 11, 2019 (EST)
 * I added the info in the relevant section, thanks for the link to the video and the information!—Mister Wu (talk) 11:10, November 19, 2019 (EST)

Bullet Blaster with Monster tires
content://media/external/file/119442 Copy and paste this link Look at Bowser Jr., and the Bullet Blaster. Bullet Blaster has monster tires. Is this an error? Eythrius (talk) 21:55, November 18, 2019 (EST)


 * I can't see that file, however this had been covered before that the Bullet Blaster was seen with Monster tires in pre-release materials. We can only assume that it is just that, pre-release material, and was changed for the final product. MarioComix (talk) 23:02, November 18, 2019 (EST)


 * If you want us to actually see the image, don't use a "local to your computer" link. Just upload to an image hosting site or something similar. -- 23:17, November 18, 2019 (EST)

Christmas Tour datamine
It looks like there's been a recent datamine of the characters coming to Mario Kart Tour next. Found proof on Twitter, but only in photo form. SonicSpeed48 (talk) 06:29, December 12, 2019 (EST)
 * Tomorrow is the day of the announcement of the new tour, so we can just wait for that - unused datamined content is far from being uncommon in the whole Mario Kart series.—Mister Wu (talk) 13:59, December 12, 2019 (EST)

beta
multiplayer beta ended. update I am RedoStone (talk) 09:08, December 27, 2019 (EST)
 * Got it, thanks! 10:39, December 27, 2019 (EST)

Engine sounds
For each individual kart page, can you tell us what the engine sounds like? --174.225.15.10 11:39, January 4, 2020 (EST)

Unlike the other games, the karts do not have an engine sound.- CherryBomb314
 * They do have an engine sound, but it isn’t straightforward to extract and add that sound to each kart page, which is why they haven’t been added.—Mister Wu (talk) 18:42, February 24, 2020 (EST)

MKT Driver pic
Okay, I know the next tour is next week, but the driver's pic still needs to be updated. Whoever is able to update it, please do. SonicSpeed48 (talk) 15:56, January 10, 2020 (EST)

Tires?
Why do we need to list these when they're just aesthetics? 208.95.49.167 13:31, January 12, 2020 (EST)
 * Because they've existed in prior games as distinct entities. If we can name and classify them, then we can report that information. MarioComix (talk) 19:20, January 12, 2020 (EST)

So Much No Cover Arts...
Get Artworks For Em Please....


 * Which will be done once the resident dataminers extract those image files from the game's internal files. Please be patient, the Ice Tour has been out for less than a day, while this page has a good track record of keeping up with its updates. MarioComix (talk) 18:07, January 15, 2020 (EST)

Pauline
Should Pauline be moved to the regular high-ends section? At this point she's appeared in three in a row, it's safe to assume she's staying. Also, images will be up soon. Had a busy day. 20:14, January 15, 2020 (EST)
 * Maybe we can put a thing next to her name stating that she was tour exclusive until Holiday? 20:42, January 15, 2020 (EST)
 * If that's the case, sounds right to me. MarioComix (talk) 22:22, January 15, 2020 (EST)

If she's not going to be moved, the Ice Tour at least needs to be added to her list of appearances. But she should really be moved. 208.95.49.53 17:17, January 20, 2020 (EST)

Hi hello please fix this :) 208.95.49.53 16:30, January 23, 2020 (EST)

Original tracks have dropped the "1" again
As of update 1.6.0, looks like the first track in each original series has re-removed the "1" from its name (e.g. "New York Minute 1" is now once again "New York Minute"). Should the wiki be updated to reflect this? --Eth3792 (talk) 02:01, January 28, 2020 (EST)
 * What about the "2" tracks (New York Minute 2, Tokyo Blur 2)? MarioComix (talk) 02:05, January 28, 2020 (EST)
 * Those are still shown as before and should be kept the way they are. Only New York Minute 1, Tokyo Blur 1, and Paris Promenade 1 would need to be changed --Eth3792 (talk) 02:12, January 28, 2020 (EST)
 * Let's sit on it for now, in case they change back again. MarioComix (talk) 03:03, January 28, 2020 (EST)

They are formerly known as that, they are now just "New York Minute" and "Tokyo Blur" and "Paris Promenade". - CherryBomb314 (talk) 09:44, February 8, 2020 (EST)
 * That's my point lol. We should probably wait a couple weeks though to make sure the next update doesn't change them back. --Eth3792 (talk) 12:01, February 8, 2020 (EST)
 * If the Vancouver Tour update keeps their names without the "1", then that might be a good enough indicator to change the names. MarioComix (talk) 16:27, February 8, 2020 (EST)
 * Looks like they have, wanna make the changes? --Eth3792 (talk) 12:26, February 15, 2020 (EST)
 * Yeah we should. 21:25, February 15, 2020 (EST)

I'll work on moving the New York Minute pages to take care of this. If all goes well, I'll do the others tonight. --Eth3792 (talk) 12:20, March 9, 2020 (EDT)

Character Audio
Honestly, I think there should be audio samples for each of the characters, by that I mean when they are selected, I'd especially want that from the high-end spotlights.- CherryBomb314 09:40, February 8, 2020 (EST)

Mario Bros. Tour
The new Mario Bros Tour announcement shows us a new Mario Circuit which does not resemble any of the SNES MCs in layout, but still uses most of the same textures and assets. I find that I don't have any edit permissions on the article (since I'm new) so would it be OK if someone could add the track to the Nitro Tracks section?


 * Let's wait until the tour launches before we categorise it. 06:09, February 21, 2020 (EST)

New characters in the Mario Bros. Tour
There's a silhouette of Mario and Luigi in Twitter's announcement for the Mario Bros. Tour that is different from their in-game artworks. Should we add them as a Mario and Luigi alt characters? We might get a classic outfit alt for both of them. --MatiasNTRM (talk) 13:22, February 21, 2020 (EST)
 * To reply also to the points above (and future similar points dealing with what is hinted by the official Twitter account as well): with these reveals I think it is better to just list what was revealed in the respective Other sections, which is what was done for the new Mario Circuit-like course. When the Tour is released, the appropriate information is then added.—Mister Wu (talk) 13:58, February 21, 2020 (EST)

London Loop 2 and 3DS Rainbow Road R/T images
Can someone add the images for London Loop 2 (etc) and 3DS Rainbow Road R/T in the Courses section? I uploaded them, but I can't edit the article, apparently:


 * File:MKT Icon LondonLoop2C.png
 * File:MKT Icon LondonLoop2CR.png
 * File:MKT Icon LondonLoop2CT.png
 * File:MKT Icon LondonLoop2CRT.png
 * File:MKT Icon RainbowRoad3DSCRT.png

Thanks in advance! — Afelix (talk) 14:34, March 13, 2020 (EDT)


 * It has been done. Just so you know, if you can't edit the article, it's because you likely aren't autoconfirmed.  BMfan08 (talk) 14:51, March 13, 2020 (EDT)


 * Thanks. That was the reason. I am new to the wiki after all. — Afelix (talk) 15:14, March 13, 2020 (EDT)

Driver list picture
Could somebody please update the picture of the full driver list? Doyle06 (talk) 16:51, March 15, 2020 (EDT)

Glider challenge
There was no Glider Challenge on the Vancouver Tour. Please check it as soon as possible to avoid creating confusion. Héctor GDL19 (talk) 15:35, March 16, 2020 (EDT)


 * Fixed, thanks for pointing it out. 21:43, March 16, 2020 (EDT)

Kart, Glider, and certain Character Recolors/Re-skins
I had an idea for labeling new recolors or designs (such as the Red Turbo Yoshi or the Shell Parachute). Instead of calling them new, does it sound like a good idea to label them as a new redesign? Since truely, they aren't new parts, just re-skins of other parts. If so and someone else does this, I would label the Gold Free-running Koopa in the same way, since unlike most other character variants which change the outfit or something, it is just a simple recolor in the way that Shy Guys, Yoshis, and (strangely enough) Birdos are normally done. It is even in the same pose as the Red Free-running Koopa in the way the three previously mentioned characters are. Even if this doesn't seem like a good idea to others, I at least wanted to mention the possibility. March 19, 2020, 15:22 (EST)

This most likely wouldn’t work, because the different color variants of characters such as Yoshi and shy guy have different special items and favored courses. Doyle06 (talk) 09:29, March 24, 2020 (EDT)
 * That was about tagging the characters rather than grouping them, I'd be fine with a symbol pointing then that the character/part is a new variant of an existing character like we do with games such as Mario Kart 8 Deluxe with the DX label, but I'm not sure if it would be as clear as the new label. Maybe a NV or NR label?--Mister Wu (talk) 12:57, March 24, 2020 (EDT)

Hey, whatever works for the community at large. I do think it'd need to be clear enough to everyone, but I do think the differentiation would be useful to include somehow. March 25, 2020, 10:38 (EST)
 * P.S. This would mostly only apply to Gliders and Karts. The only two characters this would apply to would be Gold Koopa (Free-running) and Light Blue Birdo, as they are the only new recolors thus far. We'll likely see more of them in the future, since there are actual color-alts of Birdo in Super Mario Bros 2 and Super Mario Advance, and there are six different shell colors of Free-Running Koopas in Super Mario Odyssey. 3/25/20- 15:15 (EST)
 * There's no need to be that specific, distinguishing actually new characters and variants of existing characters is useful.--Mister Wu (talk) 20:26, March 25, 2020 (EDT)
 * I now marked the variants as new variant, try to see if that looks good.--Mister Wu (talk) 20:53, March 25, 2020 (EDT)

I fell like this might be confusing to some people, as the different variants have different special items and favored courses. But I might be overthinking. Doyle06 (talk) 23:24, March 25, 2020 (EDT)
 * We aren’t removing said information, which is still quite visible as far as the ability is concerned, just changing the label near the name.—Mister Wu (talk) 00:09, March 26, 2020 (EDT)

I am so glad that my idea got used. 4/06/20- 17:14 (EST)

RE: Kart, Glider, and certain Character Recolors/Re-skins
I have an issue with this idea: it feels disingenous to mark certain new characters as "variants" when the Mario Kart series has been introducing a different version of the same character as far back as Mario Kart: Double Dash!! (with Baby Mario and Baby Luigi, that is).

Let's think to Mario Kart 8 and the entire list of playable characters that have ever appeared in a Mario Kart game: When Tanooki Mario and Cat Peach were first introduced, they were added to that list of characters; this makes sense, as outside of Metal Mario, who is sometimes portrayed as his own being, there were never any playable versions of powerup forms in a Mario Kart game. And while multiple colored variants of Yoshi and Shy Guy were introduced, they weren't counted as new playable characters as they were only recolors of pre-existing characters that each didn't take a slot of their own. Flash forward to Mario Kart Tour, and you'll see King Boo's appearance from the Luigi's Mansion series, the Penguin Luigi and Ice Mario powerup forms, the golden freerunning Koopa Troopa from Super Mario Odyssey, and a Shy Guy in a chef's outfit, all as playable characters. Huh? Which should get added to the list?

Now, Mario Kart Tour has these "tours" featuring cups all named and designed around characters found in the game, such as the Mario Cup and the Daisy Cup. Most notably, these cups don't star costume or recolored variants of characters, meaning there's no Mario (Happi) Cup nor is there a Pink Shy Guy cup, even when they would otherwise be counted as new characters in the game. There are also cups for different forms of pre-existing characters that were thought to be new characters to the Mario Kart series at the time of their debuts, such as the Baby Mario Cup, the Dry Bowser Cup, and the Metal Mario Cup.

Ultimately, what I'm suggesting is that we take the cups that appear in each Tour as a criteria for what counts as a brand new character to the Mario Kart series and what counts as a new variant; if we were to take this approach, we would be left with Peachette, Pauline, Ice Mario, and Hammer Bro as the only new characters introduced to the Mario Kart series in Mario Kart Tour. It should be no coincidence either that the first three characters are all counted as High-End characters not exclusive to any tour, alongside Metal Mario and Dry Bowser. -- Superstarxalien169  18:41, April 15, 2020 (EDT)


 * I think I would agree with that definition of having a cup = a separate character. Out of the ones listed, only Ice Mario shares animations and voices with another character (Metal Mario), but even then, his voice clips are not as filtered as Metal Mario's. About listing characters as "variants", to me, it boils down to how Mario Kart 8 (which is this game's basis for character animations) made an effort to have every character use different animations. As a result, those characters count as separate characters. In this game, the tour-exclusive variants, for example, share animations and voices with their base character. MarioComix (talk) 19:26, April 15, 2020 (EDT)
 * Well, not really. Yoshi (Egg Hunt) has a few exclusive animations not shared with Yoshi. The system that the game uses for tagging the new driver variants introduced in this game is name of character (name of variant). Ice Mario is not presented as Mario (Ice) and effectively he had his own cup, I wouldn't be surprised if Penguin Luigi will end up with his own cup since he's not presented as a variant either - although cups so far are restricted to drivers available in all the pipes so he'll have to become generally available before that. Funnily, the recolors of Yoshis and Shy Guys (but not Birdos) follow the old naming from Mario Kart 8 and thus aren't presented as variants, although this doesn't affect us since they aren't new either. With all that being said, I'm not sure if tagging just the official variants as new variant is what it's best for us. Pauline and Hammer Bro are way more notable than Ice Mario because those are completely new characters, similarly Red Koopa (Free-running) is likely one of the Roving Racers, even though the game uses the variant nomenclature for it (and effectively it never had its own cup). Ultimately, the variants weren't a true issue until Mario Kart Tour, now we need to find a system that will be useful for us to properly separate variants from completely new characters. We might use the "they're featured in a cup" criterion or the naming convention criterion, but we need to see if this leads us to miss certain characters (possibly, the Roving Racers) or gives us too many "false positives" (characters who are simply power-up forms rather than completely new characters, like Ice Mario).--Mister Wu (talk) 21:49, April 15, 2020 (EDT)

Honestly, what ended up happening was far beyond my original definition of a reskin/recolor. I was referring to characters, karts, and gliders that are literally the original, but with a new color scheme (new tire set could also be featured for karts). I was never imagining all of the costumes would fall into the list, but in most cases I agree with the furthering of my idea. In my mind, there are four main rules for determining if the characters are variants or new characters (karts and gliders should be very obvious); the Base Model Rule, the Cup Name Rule, the Emblem Sharing Rule, and the Canonically-Different Rule. For the Base Model Rule, if the character looks different, but has the same base model as another, it is a variant. For example, Yoshi (Egg Hunt) uses Yoshi's model with two halves of an eggshell added on. All basic recolors also follow this rule. In addition, all basic recolors will also use the same render, just with its corresponding colors. As such, Yoshi's image in the character list is recolored for Red Yoshi and Black Yoshi. The same applies to Shy Guys, Birdos, and Free-running Koopas. This rule is sometimes not as easy to see visually, besides basic recolors, and will require some research, though it usually takes lowest priority of all of my rules. For the Emblem Sharing Rule, if they use the same emblem (the basic recolors of previously mentioned characters have recolored versions of the same emblem), they are the same character. The only exceptions to the emblem rule seems to be Builder Mario, Builder Toad, who use slightly different emblems, and Red Koopa Free-running. Builder Mario's emblem is just the Mario M on a yellow background instead of white, so its not a significant change and clearly is still a Mario alt. Builder Toad's however uses a Blue Toad cap rather than a red one, indicating that he is an alternate costume of Blue Toad rather than an alternate costume of Red Toad. Even though Blue Toad is not currently playable in-game, we know it is possible to get a variation of a part before the original from the examples of the Gilded Prancer and Dasher II (recolors of the Prancer and Cucumber respectively). Additionally, Toad (Pit Crew) uses the Red Toad cap his the emblem despite wearing a blue outfit, indicating that it is a Red-capped Toad. For the Cup Name Rule, if a character has their own cup that is directly named after them, (at least as of now) they would classify as separate characters. The closest a cup comes to disproving this is the Ice Mario Cup. However, Ice Mario would just be a character in the way that Metal Mario is, where he's technically a version of Mario, but different enough for Nintendo to classify him separately from the other Mario variations by giving him a cup and not give any others a cup. For the Canonically-Different Rule, if two characters are the same character (like Mario and Mario (Happi)), the alternate costume is a variant. First of all, Yoshis, Shy Guys, Birdos, and Koopas are entire species in addition to individual characters, so their basic recolors should count as variations despite them being separate characters. For example, if more Toads colors and costumes are added, it mostly depends on the color of the cap. Captain Toad and Blue and Yellow Toads would be separate characters from Toad due to having their own significant roles, but Blue and Yellow Toads would be classified the same due to their similar roles. Though technically, if a Red-capped Toad with a red vest gets added, than it would be separate from Toad and would be named Red Toad since the Red Toad we usually play (simply named Toad) is distinguishable from other Red Toads by his Blue vest (Toads usually wear vests that match their cap color). Toad (Part Time) and Toad (Pit Crew) are variants of Toad, while Builder Toad would be a variant of Blue Toad, even though Blue Toad has yet to be playable in Mario Kart Tour. Red Free-running Koopa is a separate character from Koopa Troopa in my mind, since in-universe the Roving Racers are separate from the Koopa Troop in the sense that they are always friendly towards Mario while standard Koopa Troopas are almost always aggressive in the main games (spin-offs don't really matter in this case). Also, the Fire Bro, Ice Bro, and Boomerang Bro are not variants of Hammer Bros, despite breaking the Emblem Sharing Rule and Base Model Rule. This is mostly because of the Canonically-Different Rule, as the four are separate sub-species of the Hammer Bro in game, which in itself is a sub-species of Koopas. Despite how closely related they are, they serve different-enough roles to be classified as separate by my rules. One last thing, I saw something about the people thinking that the baby versions of characters should be variants based on the ruling. While it is true that they are the same characters, they are a special case since it significantly changes the characters from their original appearance while being the same in a technical sense. Plus, if you want think about it like than, then Peachette is a variant of Toadette, Dry Bowser in a variant of Bowser, Ice Mario and Metal Mario are variants of Mario in addition to his costumes, Koopa (Free-running) is a variant of Koopa Troopa, and the Accursed One is a variant of Peach. See, those just don't make much sense, despite being versions of the original characters. Ice Mario is the only one I can go either way on. To me, the Canonically-Different Rule and Cup Name Rule are the most full proof, with the only characters currently without their own cup that could receive one being Fire Bro, Ice Bro, and Boomerang Bro, and Red Koopa (Free-running). However, since there are exceptions, you definitely need a combination of the four. I hope I have cleared everything up for how to classify characters in the future, at least based on my way of doing it (since it was my idea originally). ) 4/22/2020 ~ 13:01 (EST)

Considering how Gold Koopa (Freerunning) is effectively a separate character in Super Mario Odyssey, I’d go for the emblem sharing rule. It’s very easy to tell if the emblem is the same or not and I think it’s the best compromise between false positives and false negatives. The recolored Yoshis and Shy Guys aren’t new anyway, and in our wiki Blue Toad is not Toad and the situation of the Birdos is yet to be clarified, basically leaving only Builder Mario and Yellow Birdo as possible false positives (since the light blue Birdo is still considered different from Birdo here). Considering how Ice Mario is treated as if he was a separate character, the issue of Builder Mario is really minor, on the other hand we can keep the Roving Racers and the various Koopa Bros. as new characters.—Mister Wu (talk) 14:53, April 29, 2020 (EDT)
 * I believe that there is no longer an easy "one size fits all" criterion for whether a character constitutes a variant or not, but instead, we have to approach the topic from multiple lines of evidence (sharing emblems, sharing animations and voices, having a cup, parenthesis naming) and use those to decide. For example, sharing an emblem, animations, or voices would be the prime indicator that a character is a variant. But just because they don't share those, doesn't mean they aren't a variant. MarioComix (talk) 15:43, April 29, 2020 (EDT)
 * I know Gold Koopa Free-running is seperate, but since he uses the same image (except recolored), he is a variation of Red Koopa Free-running for a similar reason to the Yoshis, Shy Guys, and Birdos. Also, I said that while some are a bit more reliable, you will always need a combination of the rules. Most of the alternate costumes of characters (like the several Mario and Peach variants) are quite obviously the same character just by looking at them, but then we have Metal Mario, Pink Gold Peach, and Ice Mario who are seemingly exceptions. ) 5/7/2020 ~ 12:59 (EST) (Sorry, I forgot to put this originally)
 * We can’t use the same criterion used for confirmed species, as so far we have no evidence that the Roving Racers are a wider group of similar-looking freerunning Koopa Troopas, we only know of these five. Either we interpret them as just differently-dressed Koopa Troopas, and at that point the Red Koopa is a variant as well, or we interpret them as new characters, and at that point both are confirmed to be separate characters. Regarding the implementation in the game (literally just a new set of textures, including the emblem texture), we can’t really go that technical, as otherwise many variants actually have different meshes, textures, animations and sound clip when chosen, despite them clearly being labeled as variants in both the name and emblem.—Mister Wu (talk) 17:03, May 7, 2020 (EDT)

Regarding Gold Koopa, it's a variant of Red Koopa regardless of whether Red Koopa is a variant or not. We can see the example in the karts - Green Kiddie Kart is a new kart, and then they added Red Kiddie Kart later, which we count as a new variant of Green Kiddie Kart. The "Kiddie Kart" has not existed in any previous Mario Kart game. In the case of the Hammer Bros., they were all added at the same time, so it's not evident enough as to which Bro is a variant of whom. No matter how you look at it, Gold Koopa is a variant of Red Koopa, I'm sure these two share animations and voice clips, plus the only difference in their naming is the colour (like Red Yoshi to Black Yoshi), and their emblems differ by colour alone too. And if they're treated as "separate characters in-universe so they need to be separate characters", that's moot because 1. the other Birdos aren't the same as pink Birdo (and have never been seen changing colours in any other game) but are counted as variants and 2. we have many instances of the same character in-universe being treated as separate characters (ex. Bowser and Dry Bowser, Toadette and Peachette, Mario and Metal Mario). Plus there's the case of Builder Toad being a variant of Toad, but not necessarily because he's the Toad in Builder Form. So variants do not have to be the same individual as the base character (this is by far the shoddiest reasoning anyhow, because it would mean the likes of Dry Bowser and Peachette are variants, despite failing in all other criteria). MarioComix (talk) 21:23, May 7, 2020 (EDT)
 * Using the how many technical differences there are criterion would label many characters, who are explicitly labeled as variants by the game, as new characters, since as I stated before files-wise they are different in most aspects from the characters they are based on, so that criterion too alone can have its fair share of shoddiness. Until we find and agree on an objectively-evaluable combination of criteria, there will always be a degree of subjectivity in the decisions regarding what is variant and what is not, so I’d say it’s better to focus on the issue at hand. Now the Japanese names of the freerunning Koopas are 「あかノコノコ（レース）」 and 「ゴールデンノコノコ（レース）」, apart from reconfirming that they are indeed the runners from Super Mario Odyssey, their names also shows that Koopa is just a shorthand for Koopa Troopa, in order to have a shorter name. Their emblem too is just a recolored Koopa Troopa emblem, much like what was done with the Yoshis and Birdos. They are therefore presented by the game as color- and outfit-based variants of Koopa Troopa, which also explains why not even the red one received a cup so far despite being introduced long ago. I’m fine with labeling both as variants of Koopa Troopa just like the game does, but if we don’t do so because they're the Roving Racers from Super Mario Odyssey, then at this point in my opinion we need to acknowledge the Gold one as a new one as well, because it’s actually a distinguished member of the Roving Racers, appearing only in the postgame and using special tricks and routes.—Mister Wu (talk) 08:50, May 8, 2020 (EDT)
 * Then I think we're actually in agreement about the Roving Racers here, because the fact that they are "unique" characters is one of, if not the most, shoddiest lines for labelling variants. For example, the Birdos are clearly named in variant format "Name (Variant)", but Birdos have never been seen changing colours, so they can't be the same individual. Then taking the reverse logic, we have several separate characters who are the same individual but are not variants, i.e. Dry Bowser and Peachette. So I think the "individual characters" criterion is moot. MarioComix (talk) 17:49, May 8, 2020 (EDT)
 * Basically, the freerunning Koopas are like Builder Toad, but one step further:
 * both clearly are not the base character (Koopa Troopa and Toad respectively)
 * both have a different color pattern compared to that of the base character
 * and this is reflected in the emblem having the same logo of the base character but with different colors
 * both wear a different outfit compared to that of the base character
 * In the case of the freerunning Koopa Troopas, the naming is even that used for variants (although in English this is not as obvious due to the shorthand name Koopa they used in place of Koopa Troopa), so at this point, either we consider Builder Toad a new character or we consider the freerunning Koopas and Builder Toads variants. Considering how in the current state of the page the approach used to determine what are new drivers and new variants isn’t character-based, (and admittedly the cups themselves treat Dry Bowser, Peachette and Ice Mario as separate drivers) the latter choice is in my opinion the most consistent and the one we should take.—Mister Wu (talk) 18:32, May 8, 2020 (EDT)
 * Then in that case, the Roving Racers ought to be counted as variants. MarioComix (talk) 01:57, May 9, 2020 (EDT)
 * That's the change I plan to make, if nobody is against that.--Mister Wu (talk) 20:20, May 9, 2020 (EDT)

Minor Issue with Transparency
I happened to notice that the image of Morton used doesn't have a transparent background, while every other character's image does. It's hardly noticeable, but it seems strangely inconsistent and should be adjusted. March 25, 2020, 10:56 (EST)
 * This stems from us not using the artwork ripped from the game, but rather the artwork we already have. It makes sense since a lot of artwork in this game is reused, but this results in Morton not having a transparent background.--Mister Wu (talk) 20:55, March 25, 2020 (EDT)
 * I've obtained the raw image of Morton from a dataminer and uploaded it under File:MKT Artwork Morton.png. It's not great quality, but it has a transparent background and looks fine at 120x120. --Eth3792 (talk) 14:51, May 8, 2020 (EDT)

Point-boost ticket rewards in ranked cups
I noticed that you no longer receive more than 1/2/3 point-boost tickets for becoming 3rd/2nd/1st in the ranked cup, for the tier I am in now. I do not know if this holds for all tiers, but if someone knows, please update the table.Tomoto17 (talk) 06:14, March 29, 2020 (EDT)
 * The amount of point-boost tickets won has been reduced indeed: at rank 35 you get 3 of each type at first place, 2 of each type at second place and just one of each type at 3rd place. At the moment I'm just going to assume that all tiers receive the same rewards in terms of tickets, in case we'll update the table if some tiers still have different rewards.--Mister Wu (talk) 10:04, March 31, 2020 (EDT)

Character Variants
Initially, variants were decided by basically having the name of the base character, and then their "variant"-ness described in the parentheses, such as Mario (Musician), Peach (Kimono), and Mario (Hakama). Upon playing the game more, I realised that variants share animations and voices with the base character, and this became the new basis for variants - they also shared emblems. However, upon Red Yoshi's release, the emblem matter wouldn't stick since he's clearly a variant of Yoshi. Next, Ice Mario fell into a unique situation since he shares Metal Mario's animations but his voice clips do not have the same "metal" filter - this was further compounded by Ice Mario having his own cup, which no other clearly variant character has.

Gold Koopa (Freerunning) counts as a variant of Red Koopa (Freerunning) because they definitely share animations, and Gold Koopa was added after Red Koopa. Whether they should be a variant of Koopa Troopa, I'm not sure, since I don't know if they all share animations. For Hammer Bro and co., I'm not sure if all four of them share animations, but Boomerang Bro appears to be a variant of Hammer Bro. And to reiterate, variants are not decided on the basis of being the same character but with a different appearance - Peachette was never considered a variant (upon the game's release) because she doesn't share voices, animations, or emblem with another character. MarioComix (talk) 21:53, April 15, 2020 (EDT)
 * As I said above, we can't use animations or sound effects as criterion for variant-ness, since Yoshi (Egg Hunt) has different animations from Yoshi and even a different character select voice clip, but it's pretty clearly a variant of Yoshi, as the naming also suggests.--Mister Wu (talk) 22:09, April 15, 2020 (EDT)
 * Well, that's a shock. At least Yoshi (Egg Hunt) has the same emblem as regular Yoshi to point him as a variant of Yoshi. MarioComix (talk) 22:23, April 15, 2020 (EDT)

Updated Driver List (as of Trick Tour)
I assumed this would take care of itself by the start of the Yoshi Tour, but clearly I need to say something about it. It is missing 10 drivers now, so I think its a bit overdue. 4/22/2020 ~ 13:06 (EST)

Is Mario Kart Tour REALLY mainline?
lets be real, is it actually mainline? To me, it isn't. It's as mainline as Super Mario Run is. I think we can all agree that Mario Run is NOT mainline, so why do we think that Tour is? Tour, to me, is Namco's answer to Arcade GP, but let me guess, thats mainline too all of a sudden?
 * It’s listed as the ninth main game in the Japanese Mario Portal, the official portal of Mario from Nintendo. Until the next console Mario Kart game we can’t have strong proof that the official site is wrong or not in this aspect.—Mister Wu (talk) 12:50, May 3, 2020 (EDT)
 * Well, we do consider Mario Run part of the main series, so... -- 12:54, May 3, 2020 (EDT)
 * ummm... no where, i repeat, NO WHERE, does it bring up anything about what is mainline or not, this is just a list of all the games by Nintendo. Also, if ur gonna use this, then that means there are two mario kart 8s in the main series, which is completely wrong. Alas, its either Mario Kart Tour is NOT mainline or its actually the TENTH, either way - you're dead wrong. --RSM (talk) 15:50, May 3, 2020 (EDT)
 * The Mario Kart Arcade GP games are not listed, but are officially licensed (and likely developed in collaboration with Nintendo as well). There is therefore a distinction between games deserving to be in that list or not. The name used for this group of games put in that list (e.g. main) is merely a problem of lexicon. We can choose a different term if it would be more appropriate. We obviously don't count enhanced ports - namely, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe - as new entry, hence our ninth despite being the tenth element in that list.--Mister Wu (talk) 16:22, May 3, 2020 (EDT)
 * I believe ninth official is a better term, but it 100% is not part of the mainline mario kart series. If not, then use the terms the other way round. --RSM (talk) 16:28, May 3, 2020 (EDT)
 * I believe that Mario Kart Tour shall be considered the ninth "main", however when Mario Kart 9 comes around, it shall be refered to as the ninth "official" mario kart game. --RSM (talk) 16:31, May 3, 2020 (EDT)
 * What would an "unofficial" Mario Kart game be? They are all official. 16:38, May 3, 2020 (EDT)
 * I think the user is arguing that Mario Kart Tour is a Mario Kart spin-off. 16:41, May 3, 2020 (EDT)
 * I do think this is the point as well; in any case nothing from Nintendo suggests that, ultimately Super Mario Run and Super Mario Maker were incorporated in the main series in the Super Mario article, I think that for now we'll do the same here. If a Mario Kart 9 came out, we'd change this as spin-off of course.--Mister Wu (talk) 16:51, May 3, 2020 (EDT)
 * If a Mario Kart 9 is not numbered, then I don't know unless Nintendo says that "MKT" is a ninth instalment. The fact that New Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe is included in the Super Mario list, despite the previous enhanced ports/remakes not listed, it shows that they are just advertising the most recent games. - 23:09, May 3, 2020 (EDT)
 * They are advertising recent games, which is why we are not including the enhanced ports by default. At the same time, though, the Switch version of Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker is not included in the list depsite being recently remade, it being developed internally by Nintendo and it being a prequel for main Super Mario games, meaning that there is nonetheless a bit of selection on what goes in there. Similarly, Mario Kart Arcade GP VR is not in the list of Mario Kart games despite it being released in 2018, so after the list was first made for Mario kart 8 Deluxe.--Mister Wu (talk) 07:42, May 4, 2020 (EDT)

PSA: Recurring bonus challenges
Hi! If anyone other than SonicSpeed48 (who already knows) happens to add cups to tour pages from now on, please check Gallery:Mario Kart Tour screenshots and course icons first, as the developers have started reusing bonus challenge icons. If the icon you're looking for is not there, just use the expected filename (or File:Nocoverart.png, if you prefer that) until the icon is uploaded. Thanks. — Afelix (talk) 05:17, May 7, 2020 (EDT)
 * Same for tours in cup pages, of course. I intend to upload the icons as soon as I can for the foreseeable future, as with the last four tours. — Afelix (talk) 05:22, May 7, 2020 (EDT)

Simplifying the tour-exclusive sections
Since it's becoming clear that Nintendo is willing to bring tour-exclusive items back in many different ways (e.g. Pink Gold Peach, Queen Bee, Apple Kart, ...), I've been thinking the current "Tour-exclusive" sections for drivers, karts, and gliders could use some reorganization. What if, for each of the 9 categories, we put all tour-exclusive items in a single table, listing how each item was available in each applicable tour? For example, Pink Gold Peach was available first in the Winter Tour as the week 2 spotlight, then in the Yoshi Tour as a non-spotlight in the Special Pipe, and now in the Flower Tour as a special offer. Here's a rough mockup of how we might encapsulate this information for each item. The expanded "Exclusive tour(s)" sections need some work, but if we can get that figured out, this would end any confusion or debate over the sub-tables we have at the moment.

A possible next step would be combining regular High-Ends into the same table with all the others (same with Supers and Normals). While I'm not yet sure how this would work, it would allow us to cover things such as the Heart Balloons being a spotlight this tour despite being a regular High-End in previous tours, and possibly the opposite happening with Pauline (though her "demotion" appears to be a one-time event at the moment).

--Eth3792 (talk) 03:48, May 8, 2020 (EDT)
 * The mock-up table looks good to me. MarioComix (talk) 04:07, May 8, 2020 (EDT)
 * I also think it's a nice organizational change to the article. 05:58, May 8, 2020 (EDT)
 * I also support this. — Afelix (talk) 06:20, May 8, 2020 (EDT)
 * I like the change as well, maybe I’d change Exclusive Tour with something like Special availability in, with a General availability in showing the tour in which the character first became regularly available in all the regular pipes appeared since then.—Mister Wu (talk) 09:00, May 8, 2020 (EDT)
 * I really like this idea. This could be applied to every driver/kart/glider, with the majority of Normals and Supers having "None" in Special availability in, but those that have been available in spotlights or packs would now be covered in the same table. Let me see if I can draft what this would look like. --Eth3792 (talk) 13:44, May 8, 2020 (EDT)
 * I've added these suggestions to the regular High-End drivers table. Thoughts/critiques? --Eth3792 (talk) 14:04, May 8, 2020 (EDT)
 * BTW, I think it'd be best for now not to combine the Regular tables with the Tour-exclusives; in the current format one can tell at a glance which drivers/karts/gliders are available in every pipe, and that info would be buried if the tables were combined. Pauline is currently the only item that may be better off in such a combined format. --Eth3792 (talk) 14:10, May 8, 2020 (EDT)

Thanks for all the feedback. I've gone ahead and converted the tour-exclusive drivers section to this new combined format. I'll create a mockup of Mister Wu's suggestion, and we can decide where to go from there. --Eth3792 (talk) 13:46, May 8, 2020 (EDT)

Bonus Challenges
First, I'd like to mention that the table of Bonus Challenges is starting to bleed off the page, even on desktop mode. I think it would make sense to make a new "Bonus Challenge" or "List of bonus challenges in Mario Kart Tour" page and move that chart data over. Speaking of that chart data, what does it even mean? The challenges have either 1, 2, or 3 in the table cells but there's no indication as to what the numbers even mean? MarioComix (talk) 00:28, June 18, 2020 (EDT)
 * I guess that would mean how many times these challenges appear for each tour. My suggestion would be changing to a table with a description of each challenge, and a separate table with the tally count. The new "Bonus Challenge" page would work as well, while the table with descriptions can be put in the Bonus Challenge section. - 03:21, June 18, 2020 (EDT)

Driver/Kart/Glider Tables
While the ease of organising the data in the table is nice, my main issue is that it removes all the historical data such as exclusive availability and special availability of characters/karts/gliders (like as a special pack, Gold Pass gift, etc.). I think we need to come to some kind of consensus on how we can get the best of both worlds. MarioComix (talk) 17:27, June 21, 2020 (EDT)
 * I created the original template with the very few information we had at the start, thinking that Tours would cycle and were only city and holiday related. The clasification was entirely fan made and now it's been proven time and time again that a old characters and parts can reappear in Tours going forward. Since that information becomes obsolete as every new tour starts those are only relevant as historic reference and are already present or should be in each Tour page for when it becomes available through a none Pipe method of purchase. That way on this the main page of the game only accounts for that element being in the game and the first time it was available. GamblerMario (talk) 18:52, June 21, 2020 (EDT)
 * Then if someone wants to know how they can unlock Monty Mole in the game, they should check Monty Mole's page, and ideally the information of his limited availability (i.e. tour-exclusive to Flower Tour) would be there. And if this information hasn't been moved to each character's page, then they'd have to search every Tour page to find out that Monty Mole was exclusively available in Flower Tour. Would you say this is the course of action someone would now have to take? MarioComix (talk) 20:08, June 21, 2020 (EDT)
 * Hmm, you're right, that information is not clear in the new simplified table BUT I would argue that under the old template the same questions happened since that was not clear then either. Then again, only in mobile games you have the problem of temporal availability that changes everytime a new Tour starts. In that case if I want to know right now if Monty Mole is available in Tour "X" it's not very useful to me to know it was available in Tour "T", "N" and "C" because those are already over. The important fact is that it was first available in "C" and unless someone updates that it's available in "X" (might be easy for spotlights, packs and gifts but not for EVERYTHING in the pipe) the information in the main page would get clustered again. GamblerMario (talk) 21:23, June 21, 2020 (EDT)
 * Well, the reason for separating "tour-exclusive" characters out was because they wouldn't be obtainable except in the exclusive tours listed. So let's say for Shy Guy (Pastry Chef), the table used to say he was available in Paris, Valentine's, and Cooking Tours, so we can deduce that he's not available otherwise. I'm not sure if the Pipe inventories have begun to include these tour-exclusive characters, but for High-End drivers I can confirm that the "regular" High-End characters were available in every Pipe. (I know the Daily Selects have changed, so maybe the Pipe too?) A not-too-hard fix would be to just move all the "special availability" information to each character's page - the only issue is whether someone will step up to do that, and be willing to traverse to so many characters' pages just to update it for each new tour. MarioComix (talk) 23:14, June 21, 2020 (EDT)
 * A simple and not too intrusive addition that would still give the essential information would be adding an “Availability” column, with the text being either “Shop” with gold background for items available as Daily Selects, “Pipe” with green background for the items available in all the pipes and “Limited” with gray background for the rest.—Mister Wu (talk) 09:03, June 22, 2020 (EDT)
 * Speaking to this: could detailed availability info possibly be added to the MKTProfile template on each driver/kart/glider's page? Would that even be worth it? Another option is to just add a paragraph to each page stating "[d/k/g X] was available as a Gold Pass gift in [tour Y], and as a spotlight in [tour Z]," but that might not fit within the drivers' respective "Profiles and Statistics" sections. --Scepthan (talk) 23:23, June 24, 2020 (EDT)
 * If someone is willing to view history of this page and move all that special availability information to each driver/kart/glider's individual page, then that would be the easiest fix. There's also the point that for each new tour, the people keeping track of these special availabilities will have to go around on a wiki tour and visit whichever pages need updating. If someone is willing to do that, go for it. MarioComix (talk) 00:17, June 25, 2020 (EDT)

Driver/Kart/Glider Tables Order
Before an edit war starts for this topic, I have to ask, is there an specific policy in the wiki that states that all character list should be in Character Select Screen (CSS) order? That's because for this game in particular that order is messy and not very intuitive. That and the fact that the player very seldomly goes to the Kart and/or Glider lists is the reason I suggest we should order them all by variants. GamblerMario (talk) 13:47, June 22, 2020 (EDT)
 * To be blunt, I would go with the order I edited, which would be starting with in-game order: Mario, Peach, Yoshi, Daisy, etc. but for each character, we place all variants (based on sharing the same emblem, or having a recolour for their emblem, such as Peach, Peach (Kimono) and others, then Pink Gold Peach) next to the base character. The reason we go with in-game orders is to avoid arbitrary ordering decisions. For example, you initially ordered karts and gliders based on when they were introduced to the Mario Kart series, however, that order is irrelevant to the order of karts and gliders in Mario Kart Tour, especially when we come to the conflict of "how do we order the karts introduced in Mario Kart 7"? It seems you went back to MK7 and looked at that game's in-game order to order the karts for this game. So why not use the in-game order for the actual Mario Kart Tour game? So again I suggest the compromise between in-game order of characters, karts, and gliders, but placing the variants after each of their bases. MarioComix (talk) 14:46, June 22, 2020 (EDT)
 * I had to re-add the footnote lines back to each section, and move Gold Mario out of the Other section with the other Mario variants, because it felt like something was off when I saw Gold Mario in one section and the small footnotes not shown for each item. --Bri (talk)

Inaccuracies in the debuts column
It should be noted that Black Shy Guy and Pink Shy Guy debuted earlier in Mario Kart DS (exclusive to DS Download Play), and Red Yoshi debuted in Mario Kart: Super Circuit (exclusive to GBA Single-Pak Multiplayer). - 10:17, June 23, 2020 (EDT)
 * I didn't include them going by the same rules for karts like Blue Biddybuggy and Black Circuit - they weren't explicitly named as such before. (Shy Guys were just "Shy Guy" in MKDS, Red Yoshi was just "Yoshi" in MK:SC, I assume since they're not selectable characters. Similarly, "Blue Biddybuggy" and "Black Circuit" haven't appeared in a prior Mario Kart game.) MarioComix (talk) 15:07, June 23, 2020 (EDT)
 * Both the "Blue Biddybuggy" and "Black Circuit" have previously appeared in Mario Kart 8 as a respective colour schemes for the Biddybuggy and Circuit Special, exclusive to certain characters. Same goes for "Birthday Girl Rosalina" and "Birthday Girl Daisy", which both appeared in Mario Kart 7 as Rosalina's and Daisy's colour schemes respectively. - 03:43, June 24, 2020 (EDT)
 * But that's the thing, we decided to count them as new karts because there has technically been no kart named "Birthday Girl Rosalina" or "Black Circuit" in any prior game. Hence, I was following that technicality for "Red Yoshi" and the Shy Guys, just putting it out there. MarioComix (talk) 15:58, June 24, 2020 (EDT)
 * I think the Daisy Glider should have the "new variant" removed because I am 100% sure that this glider is simply the Mario Kart 7 Flower Glider with various modifications.--24.44.76.88 14:23, July 13, 2020 (EDT)

"new" vs "new variant"
This article lists Ice Mario as simply (new) but characters like Penguin Luigi and Builder Mario as (new variant). now I'm wondering what makes this distinction. it seems completely arbitrary to me and I can't figure out why it is listed like this. if Ice Mario isn't a variant, then why are other powerups? we didn't call Metal Mario or Tanooki Mario new variants when they were added. very curious. also, this also mainly relates to the character table on Mario Kart (series) because the "variants" aren't listed there except for.. Gold Mario? idk. I didn't wanna go and change it since I feel like this is done with a reason and it's so minor but also it doesn't make a lot of sense to me. - Qyzxf (talk) 08:22, July 23, 2020 (EDT)
 * The game gives various clues to signal minor variants that we list as new variants, such as the name being Name (variant name), the emblem being identical with at best a recoloring and the minor variants so far not getting their own cups (this include Red Koopa (Freerunning), who is technically a new character but is treated by the game as minor variants of Koopa Troopa). So far we are relying on those clues as far as drivers are concerned, whereas for karts and gliders the reuse of the base design is more obvious (and often even outright stated in the internal data).—Mister Wu (talk) 13:09, July 23, 2020 (EDT)
 * Not to mention this whole "variant" categorisation doesn't apply at all to previous games - in those cases, all characters introduced are new characters. Hence, Tanooki Mario and Gold Mario are listed because they were introduced in older games. Also, Gold Mario is only playable in Gold Rush so his footnote is still relevant in the series page's table. In short, the main criteria for variants are: "Name (variant name)", sharing an emblem or particular animations with the base character (in particular, the rocket start animation), or if their emblem is a simple recolour of the base character's emblem and they don't have a personal cup. MarioComix (talk) 18:42, July 23, 2020 (EDT)
 * Fair point! I was going to also bring up Builder Mario having a different emblem, but I'm guessing that counts as the latter part? Qyzxf (talk) 09:57, July 24, 2020 (EDT)
 * Yes, Builder Mario has yet to have a personal cup. In fact, no confirmed variants or recoloured characters (like Red Yoshi) have their own cup. MarioComix (talk) 18:01, July 24, 2020 (EDT)

Pack Special Availability
If the Pack lasts both weeks of a Tour, then I think we should either remove the association with a particular week, or specify that it lasts both weeks. Since "Week 1 pack" implies that the pack was available for the 1st week, and then no longer available for the 2nd week. Likewise, "Week 2 pack" means the pack was available for the 2nd week, and gone after that Tour ended. "[Tour] (Pack)" would imply that the pack was available for the entire duration of that Tour. MarioComix (talk) 22:37, July 23, 2020 (EDT)

Metal Mario and Dry Bowser as possible starting drivers
I'm trying to put down that Metal Mario and Dry Bowser are given to players after the tutorial on the table; however, I don't know if that was confirmed or not, so I think it was already possible during the first release. --Bri (talk)
 * Hopefully we can find video footage of it somewhere online... MarioComix (talk) 22:51, July 26, 2020 (EDT)
 * I overheard someone on the Mario Kart Tour Community Discord that someone else got Dry Bowser (still unconfirmed), but here is proof Metal Mario appears: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xClWB7aU1TM
 * Okay, good find. I think I'll add in references just to compile them on the main page. MarioComix (talk) 19:07, July 27, 2020 (EDT)

Are Remix Courses considered Nitro or Retro?
So I've noticed that Kalimari Desert 2 (based on N64 Kalimari Desert), which is considered a new course, is under a nitro course on the page. However, RMX Mario Circuit 1 and RMX Choco Island 1, which are also new courses, are considered retro courses on the page. If Kalimari Desert 2 is a Nitro Course, shouldn't the Remix Courses also be considered nitro courses?
 * I do agree that Kalimari Desert 2 is like RMX tracks, actually it’s more like the latter R/T track variants as the base layout is clearly the one of N64 Kalimari Desert in this game. At best we can name the section “remakes” so the distinction with RMX track sets (that feature a new layout while reusing the SNES tracks assets) remains, but Kalimari Desert 2 clearly isn’t a Nitro track like the city tracks.—Mister Wu (talk) 10:55, August 1, 2020 (EDT)
 * Perhaps we could make a section under N64 courses called "Alternate layout" and put Kalimari Desert 2 in there, since it's basically Kalimari Desert but with an alternate layout. MarioComix (talk) 13:52, August 1, 2020 (EDT)
 * Yes, but what I'm explaining is: wouldn't the RMX Courses be Nitro courses instead of Retro?
 * The RMX courses were originally listed in the Nitro section, but were moved because they are internally labeled "rsfc" (Super Famicom remix). However, this seems incorrect, since the layout of these courses are completely new - unlike Kalimari Desert 2. Even the MKT template lists them as new courses. So I moved them back to the Nitro section. The Italian wiki lists these courses under a Remix section, separate from the Retro section. --PhGuy12 (talk) 16:26, August 1, 2020 (EDT)
 * I’m not really liking this reversion and like more what was starting to do. Putting RMX tracks alongside city tracks when even internal data confirms that they are using SNES tracks assets is using old criteria that fit Mario Kart Tour badly. We have different degrees of novelty now:
 * Nitro tracks (in this game, the city tracks)
 * RMX tracks (reused assets, completely new layout)
 * new 2 tracks (like New York Minute 2, London Loop 2 and Kalimari Desert 2, same base layout of the original tracks, different placement of certain elements to create a new track)
 * Retro tracks
 * We can discuss how to properly classify the new 2 tracks, but ultimately they are using a rather consistent naming since the 1 city tracks had their original name without the 1 restored and I think sooner or later we’ll have to acknowledge how in Mario Kart Tour there aren’t simply Nitro and Retro tracks.—Mister Wu (talk) 21:40, August 1, 2020 (EDT)

Nabbit's kart size
Nabbit definitely has a medium kart, not a small one. I took screenshots of both him and Mario in the pipe frame on Choco Island 1 and their karts are clearly the same size. I can upload the screenshots to Imgur or something if necessary. 76.111.186.236 22:01, August 13, 2020 (EDT)
 * Link them, please. 22:54, August 13, 2020 (EDT)
 * https://imgur.com/a/GLR8nTm 76.111.186.236 23:39, August 13, 2020 (EDT)
 * Looks so. We might need a further discussion on this. (Sorry, I've never played MKT) 23:45, August 13, 2020 (EDT)
 * Sorry to ask, but could you also upload the original screenshots to imgur? (I'm assuming you composited them together to make that image.) MarioComix (talk) 23:55, August 13, 2020 (EDT)
 * https://imgur.com/a/rAcA7Hi 76.111.186.236 02:04, August 14, 2020 (EDT)
 * Yeah, Nabbit looks medium enough to me. I'll make the change to the article. MarioComix (talk) 04:43, August 14, 2020 (EDT)

Merging the “new” 2,3 etc. tracks?
With Tokyo Blur now getting its third iteration (with the screenshot again showing the very same base track 3D mesh, just with different elements), I feel like we should consider merging the various iterations together in the same page. This isn’t like in Super Mario Kart or Mario Kart: Super Circuit where the track layout was different but the theme was the same - the equivalent of those in Mario Kart Tour are the RMX tracks -, those tracks share the very same 3D mesh and just move a few added elements to allow exploring different parts of said mesh. The same can be said about Kalimari Desert 2, which is actually less original than the RMX tracks. What do you think?—Mister Wu (talk) 19:47, August 21, 2020 (EDT)
 * I haven't played the game so I'm just going off what you said here, but it sounds like the layouts are still different even if the rest of the track technically still exists. Trying to explain up to three different layouts (and possibly more as the game continues) on the same article sounds like it'll get a bit messy. -- 19:58, August 21, 2020 (EDT)
 * Because the track layouts are different, I say we should keep them separate. It'd be a different case if they all shared the exact same name but had different layouts. MarioComix (talk) 01:22, August 22, 2020 (EDT)

Question
There’s a typo near the bottom of the page where a few hyphens would need removed. Is that there for a reason?
 * What precisely are you talking about? Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 15:52, September 4, 2020 (EDT)

Do Mario (SNES) and Donkey Kong Jr. (SNES) Count as Variants?
Since these two are in quite a novel situation, let's look at the evidence for and against them.
 * For being a variant:
 * They use the variant naming style consistent with all variants, i.e. Character Name (Variant).
 * They are recognisably the same character as their base character (Mario is Mario, DK Jr. is DK Jr.). Contrast this with Dry Bowser, who has been an entity distinct from Bowser, and is therefore not a variant.
 * They do not have their own cup, and it might be cumbersome to have, say, a Mario (SNES) Cup. However, Captain Toad, the High-End Kongs, Nabbit, and King Bob-omb don't have their own cup yet, either.


 * For being a new character:
 * They do not share their emblem with the base character, and neither is it a simple recolour, which would be inconsistent with other variants. If we disregard this criterion, then Captain Toad would fit to be a variant rather than a new character, since he doesn't share his emblem with Toads, but he does share his animations, in particular his winning animation as seen here.
 * They do not share assets (a base icon, model, or animations) with the base character, namely for Mario (SNES). This one kind of speaks for itself... There are variants who have their own unique trick animations, for example, but I believe they still share the same "rocket start" animation. As well, their head and map icons are all a modified version of the base character's, so their face (and angle of their head icon) looks identical, just with different hats/clothes. The same cannot be said for these SNES characters' icons.
 * This criterion is more arbitrary, but imagine the base characters were to have alternate costumes. Would their variants fit neatly as simple costume swaps? Clearly, the SNES characters would not fit, but pretty much all existing variants would (and even separate characters, like Ice Mario and Captain Toad, but they fit other criteria to not be variants).

I personally believe the two SNES characters don't fit as variants, despite the naming convention. Still, does anyone have anything else to add or to consider? MarioComix (talk) 23:15, September 9, 2020 (EDT)
 * Thing is, these aren’t new at all, the concept of creating characters based on Super Mario Kart sprites is new, but the base characters and the vast majority of their sprites all appeared in Super Mario Kart. So in my opinion we either use new variants to reflect the new approach or we don’t say anything since there really is nothing new in these characters to begin with.—Mister Wu (talk) 08:03, September 10, 2020 (EDT)
 * Well, if we go by the karts conundrum (e.g. Birthday Girl vs. Birthday Girl Rosalina vs. Birthday Girl Daisy), the design existed before (Mario and DK Jr.'s sprite, the orange or light-blue Birthday Girl), even though technically there has never been a kart named "Birthday Girl Daisy" or "Mario (SNES)" before. So, for consistency, I guess we're better off not saying anything? One could also argue that since they're 2D sprites playable in a 3D game, they're "new characters" since there's intention to use the old graphics (like 8-Bit Dr. Mario in Dr. Mario World), as opposed to just being "the character Mario, but due to technical limitations he's in 2D". MarioComix (talk) 15:35, September 10, 2020 (EDT)
 * The concept is indeed new, but character-wise they surely aren’t new since they’re supposed to be the drivers from Super Mario Kart, they couldn’t be retro drivers if they really were new. We could invoke how some variants were indeed treated by the game as another Metal Mario case and thus given general availability and even their own cup, namely Ice Mario as far as Mario is concerned, but the naming and non-general availability point out how these aren’t supposed to be major variants that we’d consider “new”. They probably deserve quite a few words in the main pages to describe the very interesting approach, but as far as novelty is concerned, retro drivers by definition can’t be really new and the game currently doesn’t really want to present them as major variants. In any case, it will be an easy fix if Nintendo changes how these drivers are presented by the game.—Mister Wu (talk) 17:10, September 10, 2020 (EDT)

I would say they are variants on the basis that Mario is Mario and Donkey Kong Jr. is Donkey Kong Jr.. They aren't separate character with their own pages. -- It's Meester Tweester! 01:40, October 13, 2020 (EDT)

Possible 3rd New York Track
So on the game's main site, there's that moving image that showcases a variety of tracks in the game. It's been there since launch obviously, but there's one screenshot that showcases a New York track, but it's a different area than the 2 currently in the game. My question: is that enough to have an Unreleased section in the tracks and put it there? I know we've only had an unreleased or upcoming section for tracks we've seen much more of (such as Luigi's Mansion and DK Pass prior to their respective tours or tracks from the tour previews days before). 21:20, September 26, 2020 (EDT)
 * There's still the possibility that the course has been scrapped and wouldn't be coming to the game at all, in which case, it should only be on the MKT pre-release and unused content page. MarioComix (talk) 02:50, September 27, 2020 (EDT)
 * Alright then, good to know. Thanks. 16:10, September 30, 2020 (EDT)

Decide on the terminology to define tiers
'Notice: with the 2.6.0 update of Mario Kart Tour, released while the voting on this proposal was ongoing, the developers started widely using their own terms within the game, favored course and favorite course''. Subsequently, the 2.6.1 update added the normal course term. While there are still corner cases in which this proposal can be applied, editors are encouraged to rather rewrite the parts of the wiki to use the in-game terms. If this can’t be done, the outcome of this proposal should be followed.'''

Each course in Mario Kart Tour has a three-shelved tier-based system where the higher a driver, kart, or glider is situated, the more useful it is on that course. As far as I'm aware, Nintendo has not defined the shelves in a tier in general terms, instead giving each shelf a descriptor for what it offers depending on the driver, kart or glider used; e.g., the topmost shelf for drivers is referred to as "Three items per Item Box", while the one for gliders is "Combo bonus ×3 and big combo-time boost". This lets us use our own descriptors for the shelves in the overarching tier system when we don't want to focus on a particular unit type. The issue here is that our terminology, as a result, has been rather inconsistent and confusing, and this proposal aims to settle on one particular set of descriptors to use for these tiers.

Here are the options I either came up with or saw on other pages, along with my opinion on each. If you have other options to add, please mention them in the comments.
 * Top / Middle / Bottom tier: Perhaps the most widely used and intuitive way of defining the position at which something is situated in a tier. Although there are many synonyms for "middle", this option restricts usage to only one variant for added consistency.
 * Top / [synonym for "middle"] / Bottom tier: Slightly different from the previous, but depending on the word used, it can refer to the quantity of items, point combo etc. offered in a tier rather than just the tier's position. For this one, we can use words such as "medium", "intermediate" and even "middle".
 * Primary / Secondary / Tertiary tier: I came up with this one for the pages we have on the game's cups, but I now find it to be too complicated and vague. When you say Pauline is a primary character, it could mean she's of the lowest rarity or something.
 * Level 3 / Level 2 / Level 1 tier: Seen on most course pages. This conflates with the game's own level system, which is a different thing.

You can also vote for It doesn't matter.

Proposer: Deadline: October 19, 2020, 23:59 GMT

Top / Middle / Bottom

 * 1) my preferred choice.
 * 2) I've heard "top shelf" among the MKT community more often than "Level 3 shelf".  Also, in my opinion, it is the clearest indicator that a character gets three Item Boxes on the course, for instance.
 * 3) This one sounds to be the most consistent for terminology, and avoids using the same terms as other mechanics in the game.
 * 4) Per MarioComix.
 * 5) Per MarioComix.
 * 6) I wanted to give them a more general name than "Three/Two Star" (not sure where those came from) but didn't realise "Level 3/2" would lead to potential confusion with the level-up system, so that's my bad. Per proposal.
 * 7) As a Mario Kart Tour player (meaning it is one of the games I play), I say per all.
 * 8) Been working with Mario Kart Tour data since January, and this is by far the most common and consistent terminology I've seen used in the community.
 * 9) Per all.
 * 10) Per MarioComix. And as a Mario Kart Tour player and article editor since the New Year's Tour, in my opinion, this will be the best simply because the community adopted these terminologies.
 * 11) This is the option I've seen most frequently in the Mario Kart Tour community. I've heard "top/middle/bottom shelf" the most, although I do hear "tier 3/2/1" sometimes.
 * 12) Per MarioComix and Meester Tweester.
 * 13) Per all. Top/Middle/Bottom is certainly most sensible as it not only represents how much someone/something favours a course in obvious terms, but is also helpful for readers as it is the most widely used option throughout the MKT community and is how it appears in game.
 * 14) Per all.

Comments
Not necessarily relevant to the vote, but when talking about items that are in the top shelf, Nintendo uses a track-oriented approach in the in-game text:
 * From the Frequently Asked Questions: “When a driver, kart or glider is used to race on a favoured course, you will receive bonus-points boosts based on the driver, kart or glider’s level and base points.”
 * From the results screen: ”A bonus-points boost will be added when racing at level 2 or above on a favorite course.”

Since the in-game guide doesn’t distinguish between middle shelf and top shelf, I don’t think this should affect the voting options, it’s just something to keep in mind in case we want to rewrite parts of pages.—Mister Wu (talk) 12:04, October 6, 2020 (EDT)
 * Well, thanks to a comparison with the Italian translation, in which I had spotted terms to refer to middle and top shelf courses, I finally found an in-game sentence that has terms for both middle and top shelf courses:
 * From the tour’s main pipe description:”Tap on a driver, kart or glider to learn more about their special skill, and favored and favorite courses”.
 * As usual, the approach is different from ours, we’d say the kart, driver or glider is in the middle shelf or top shelf of these courses, whereas the game says the kart, driver and glider has the following favored or favorite courses, as such it might not necessarily affect this proposal. I wonder if we should consider using the in-game terminology and approach, though.—Mister Wu (talk) 07:19, October 9, 2020 (EDT)
 * P.S.: like in the case of Frenzy, the FAQ uses a different terminology from the rest of the game, using favoured as a rather generic term, often used to refer to top shelf, but considering the results screen text a correspondence can nonetheless be made:
 * middle shelf = favored course
 * top shelf = favorite course
 * if we had to consider using the in-game terms, I’d suggest using the more specific and consistent terminology used in the results screen and the pipe description.—Mister Wu (talk) 08:18, October 9, 2020 (EDT)


 * The only issues I have with the favored/favorite terminology are what the bottom shelf would be called (when we need to refer to it, which wouldn't be often, but still), and also what to do with the tables for the drivers/karts/gliders, since currently it lists all top and middle courses as "favored courses" and then goes into specifics with "3 items per box/2 items per box". Perhaps we'd just get rid of the "favored courses" column and say "Favorite courses (3 items per box)" and "Favored courses (2 items per box)"? MarioComix (talk) 17:24, October 9, 2020 (EDT)
 * Effectively, the Japanese text uses 「得意コース」(specialty course, but also course one is good at racing in, from which they likely derived that GOOD internal name) both in the text of the pipe and the driver/kart/glider summary screen, the translators legitimately translated both as favored course. Since the same term is used in both contexts, this might be a source of ambiguity for us, although we can just keep the tables as they are, they match the summary screens and shouldn’t be affected by this proposal, that rather deals with the other use cases.—Mister Wu (talk) 18:17, October 9, 2020 (EDT)
 * This was solved in the 2.6.0 update. Now middle shelf courses are listed as favored and top shelf courses are listed as favorite, meaning that this is now the official terminology used by the game.—Mister Wu (talk) 05:06, October 14, 2020 (EDT)

By the way, the names of the three tiers in the internal data are Normal, Good and MoreGood. Needless to say, I'm not suggesting them as names we could use (well, at least it's better than nothing, I guess...).--Mister Wu (talk) 20:10, October 6, 2020 (EDT)
 * If we want to be grammatically correct, we'll end up with Normal, Good, and Better. My main gripe is that Normal ends up overlapping with the Normal/Super/High-End terminology. MarioComix (talk) 22:38, October 6, 2020 (EDT)

Hold on, with the update promoting favored tracks to favorite (explicitly meaning top shelf, as per the new wording I pointed out in the comments above), the official terminology got even more spotlight and now is consistent with the rules I stated above even in the driver/kart/glider summary screen. While of course there are still cases in which we might need to use top/middle/bottom shelf, it’s even more important to rather use the official terms instead as they’re seeing increased usage in-game.—Mister Wu (talk) 05:00, October 14, 2020 (EDT)
 * Funny how the latest update addressed our concerns. Okay, so which one of us is on the localization team? I think we can use top/middle/bottom shelf to explain where the favored/favorite courses appear in UI (and potentially for the bottom shelf as a whole). Also, I suppose our tables need updating to account for which favored courses get upgraded, as well as potentially which level they get upgraded, if that's a thing. MarioComix (talk) 05:37, October 14, 2020 (EDT)

So from what I understand, the official "favored / favorite" terminology is only used to describe courses in relation to drivers, karts and gliders, not vice-versa: e.g. Yoshi Circuit is a favored course for Mario, but Mario is not a favored driver for Yoshi Circuit; we'll instead call him a middle shelf driver on that course based on this proposal's favored (heh) option. 16:37, October 14, 2020 (EDT)
 * We should rather reword and try to use the in-game terms first and foremost, especially now that they are quite visible and widely used; when this is not really feasible, we’ll resort to the outcome of this proposal.—Mister Wu (talk) 18:25, October 14, 2020 (EDT)
 * Would you see it acceptable to change instances of "Level 3 / Level 2" in the tables on this page with the proposal's chosen terminology, or must we use the "favored / favorite" indicators? I want to see whether we have the same perception of the latter two, as I think they refer strictly to courses. 19:53, October 14, 2020 (EDT)
 * I’m discussing with the other members of the wiki’s staff about adding a notice regarding the update immediately below the title of the proposal with the guidelines about this very unusual situation in which the subject discussed changed during the voting, in any case since it’s not specific, I think we could do the following:
 * drivers'/karts'/gliders' pages: using the official terms, mirroring the current summary screen
 * main page of Mario Kart Tour: trying to reword the sentences in order to use the in-game terms, if this is not really possible or practical following the outcome of this proposal
 * courses’ pages: here we should try to change the wording in the text to use the official terminology, realistically I think that in a few cases we’ll resort to the outcome of this proposal, as an example the header of tables must be quickly readable, so it’s likely we’ll use what comes put of this proposal
 * other pages: like in the main page, giving priority to the official terms, where this is impossible or impractical using the outcome of the proposal
 * To answer your question: yes, there the alternative would be using “drivers/karts/gliders that have this course as favored/favorite”, way too long. Unless we find a different approach allowing us to come out with short headers, I think using the wording being discussed here will help us more.—Mister Wu (talk) 21:14, October 14, 2020 (EDT)


 * Personally I don't see using "Favorite / favored" on the course pages' tables being a major issue. While I understand it's used to refer to the courses, simply labelling "Favorite" and "Favored" next to the drivers/karts/gliders in the tables wouldn't necessarily mean "favorite/favored drivers/karts/gliders"; it can be interpreted as "drivers/karts/gliders with this course as a favorite/favored course". 22:10, October 14, 2020 (EDT)


 * If not, what about "Favorite of" and "Favored by"? 06:43, October 17, 2020 (EDT)


 * These terms seem very reasonable, as they use the in-game terminology while being attributed to drivers, karts and gliders. I think once the proposal ends, I'm using them on course and cup pages, e.g.: "The courses in this cup are favored by..." Thank you! How did I not think of these? 10:05, October 17, 2020 (EDT)

I added the notice, which stems from the naming policy. This is a new ground for us as I think it's one of the first times that Nintendo actively changed the content while a proposal was ongoing, passing from using the official terms in a section that could be easily missed to a rather consistent approach used in the drivers', karts' and gliders' summary screens. As a wiki we are of course invited to follow the in-game approach first and foremost, but this change was made when the proposal was ongoing and the proposal rules clearly aren't designed to face such changing conditions. Still, since the approach here is track-oriented, I thought that there might still be corner cases in which the wording can't be easily changed and the outcome might be useful, especially considering how there is an apparent consensus in the voting. It also goes without saying that, if needed, a further proposal now dealing with the changed conditions will be possible after the usual period.--Mister Wu (talk) 11:43, October 16, 2020 (EDT)


 * suggested some terms above that could further cover those corner cases you mention. If these are taken into consideration, I believe the only cases where we should use the proposal's winning option would be those where we have to define bottom shelves, for which there's no official indicator. Though I suppose it's acceptable to call these "not favored". 10:05, October 17, 2020 (EDT)
 * Or it could be called "unfavored". 10:36, October 17, 2020 (EDT)e

While this proposal is finished, I think it still makes sense to add the information here: with the new 2.6.1 update the FAQ was updated to use favored and favorite course, and it also added the term for bottom shelf, normal course.--Mister Wu (talk) 23:22, October 31, 2020 (EDT)

Clarification
Gold Mario was never playable in Mario Kart Tour outside of Coin Rush. Johnjohn2001 (talk) 19:30, October 20, 2020 (PST)
 * Good thing it literally specifies that in the table. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 22:49, October 20, 2020 (EDT)


 * Please check the article's history page before repeatedly re-adding the same edit. That's why "Coin Rush mode" is labelled next to his availability, and he's still considered a driver like everyone else. 22:51, October 20, 2020 (EDT)


 * The article also claims that Gold Mario had the coin box special item during the Valentine's Day Tour. This is nothing further from the truth. Please remove this untruthful piece of information pronto. Next time before editing get clarification from the Discord community like I did. User:Johnjohn2001 22:19, October 22, 2020 (PST)


 * No worries, I found video evidence that Gold Mario used the Coin Box during the Valentine's Tour Coin Rush. MarioComix (talk) 03:11, October 23, 2020 (EDT)


 * Ok let's compromise. I will stop removing Gold Mario from the list of drivers as long as there is a non playable section of the list and Gold Mario is in that section. Ps, I am out of state right now. User:Johnjohn2001 17:37, November 22, 2020 (CST)


 * He's literally playable when you play Gold Rush. MarioComix (talk) 20:53, November 22, 2020 (EST)

The internal grouping of the courses
Internally, this game uses a surprisingly straightforward and clear grouping of the courses into folders, all of which have a clear name. Here are the tracks as of the 2020 Halloween Tour (I'm omitting here the r, rx and x variants):
 * new
 * gmob_london1
 * gmob_london2
 * gmob_losangeles1
 * gmob_newyork1
 * gmob_newyork2
 * gmob_newyork3
 * gmob_paris1
 * gmob_paris2
 * gmob_tokyo1
 * gmob_tokyo2
 * gmob_tokyo3
 * gmob_vancouver1
 * remix
 * grsfc_chocoisland1
 * grsfc_mariocircuit1
 * grsfc_rainbowroad1
 * classic
 * g3ds_cheepcheeplagoon
 * g3ds_daisyhills
 * g3ds_mariocircuit
 * g3ds_neobowsercity
 * g3ds_rainbowroad
 * g3ds_rockrockmountain
 * g3ds_shyguybazaar
 * g3ds_toadcircuit
 * gagb_bowsercastle1
 * gagb_bowsercastle2
 * gds_dkpass
 * gds_killership
 * gds_luigimansion
 * gds_waluigipinball
 * ggc_dinodinojungle
 * ggc_yoshicircuit
 * gn64_chocomountain
 * gn64_frappesnowland
 * gn64_kalimaridesert
 * gn64_kalimaridesert2
 * gn64_koopatroopabeach
 * gn64_peachcircuit
 * gsfc_chocoisland1
 * gsfc_chocoisland2
 * gsfc_donutsplain1
 * gsfc_ghostvalley1
 * gsfc_koopatroopabeach2
 * gsfc_mariocircuit1
 * gsfc_mariocircuit2
 * gsfc_mariocircuit3
 * gsfc_rainbowroad
 * gsfc_vanillalake1
 * gwii_mapletreeway
 * gsfc_mariocircuit2
 * gsfc_mariocircuit3
 * gsfc_rainbowroad
 * gsfc_vanillalake1
 * gwii_mapletreeway

There are few interesting things to note here - as an example, the internal naming convention of Mario Kart 8 is being used, suggesting the involvement of Nintendo in this aspect of the game, plus the city tracks have their own platform code, mob, pointing out how internally this game is treated as a main Mario Kart game whose release platform was mobile devices -, what I find more interesting however is the way courses are organized.

I personally think that such an organization would come in handy for us as well, as it's pretty clear and straightforward. This would imply creating a separate subsection for remix courses and putting Kalimari Desert 2 among the retro tracks, even though probably using the classic term there would help us more in distinguishing the old retro concept of Mario Kart DS from the new classic concept - Kaliamri Desert 2 might not strictly be a retro track according to the old convention, but it surely is a classic track in the sense that it reuses the layout and assets of Kalimari Desert. What do you think?--Mister Wu (talk) 11:13, November 5, 2020 (EST)
 * Normally I'm the first one to prefer alternative ordering methods when the in game order is either too complicated or nonexistant like the courses in this case, however I see two problems with the order you're proposing:

1) Not many people or at least we who edit normally have access to the ingame data, thus we'd have to count on you or someone who can to update this every time there is a new course. 2) The internal order per game is not clear. I can see that it's neither by date added nor original game appearnce, thus it takes me back to point 1. GamblerMario (talk) 12:08, November 5, 2020 (EST)
 * Scratch point 2, I can now see it's alphabetically. Point 1 still stands. GamblerMario (talk) 12:11, November 5, 2020 (EST)
 * There really isn't a need to check the in-game data every time, what is being affected is just the placement of a single track and the creation of a subsection. The current placement of Kalimari Desert 2 is awkward as the main track mesh and the assets aren't new, and the internal data confirmed it.--Mister Wu (talk) 12:20, November 5, 2020 (EST)


 * I think the current ordering of retro courses (by original game's course order) and of nitro/remix courses (by introduction) still holds water. The issue is Kalimari Desert 2. We could create a new "category" instead of retro courses, using "classic courses" as the name, but my main issue with this is whether that's just the Japanese name for retro courses. Another possibility is creating a new category under "nitro courses" called "Classic", and just stick Kalimari Desert 2 in there, by saying that it uses the original course's layout in its own layout. MarioComix (talk) 22:13, November 5, 2020 (EST)
 * Mario Kart 8 actually had all the non-DLC courses in the same folder, while Mario Kart DS and Mario Kart Wii did the same and used old as prefix to identify retro tracks. I have no access to the filesystem of Mario Kart 7, but considering how Mario Kart 8 is the game that came before Mario Kart Tour I'd say that this grouping into new, remix and classic is something that was introduced in Mario Kart Tour, likely because the game itself has a different approach to the courses. In any case, what we define as Nitro courses, i.e. the tracks that when featured in an hypothetical sequel would be named Mobile Name of the Course, are the city courses, as they are referred to internally as gmob_Name of the course. Kalimari Desert is a real puzzle for us, but the platform identifier is n64 and it is located in the classic folder, questioning its status as Nitro track.--Mister Wu (talk) 23:55, November 5, 2020 (EST)


 * Well, I think that Kalimari Desert 2 should be grouped with the MK64 tracks. There are tour challenges like doing something on a (prefix) course, and Kalimari Desert 2 is identified as an N64 course. The solution to this puzzle would be to add a note about this track being a new version / variation of the original. By the way, some of the challenges in the 1st Anniversary Tour used the city courses term, which we could use to group these tracks. About the classic term; it was used in a MK7 trailer, so it's not a different concept than retro. --PhGuy12 (talk) 18:13, November 6, 2020 (EST)
 * They also say "classic and new items", so "classic" is really being used as a stand-in for "returning" (which Kalimari Desert 2 is technically not returning) in the context of MK7. I think we could use either Classic or Retro for the MKT page, and since Kalimari Desert 2 is the anomaly we can add it to the MK64 section with a note. MarioComix (talk) 01:15, November 7, 2020 (EST)
 * Yes, that's what I suggested. --PhGuy12 (talk) 06:02, November 7, 2020 (EST)
 * Thanks for pointing out the challenges, at this point it's even more important to classify Kalimari Desert 2 as N64 course since the challenges of the game themselves classify it as such. i now even wonder when was the last time the retro term had been used, anyway before changing the name of the section we might have a look at more in-game text to see if we can find the equivalent term and for the monent just put Kalimari Desert 2 as a N64 course with, for example, a grey background to signal how it's a variation of a retro track.--Mister Wu (talk) 18:13, November 7, 2020 (EST)
 * Seems that Mario Kart DS is the only game in the series to use the terms "nitro" and "retro" in-game and in manuals. Later games don't use those terms, and refer "retro" as "classic"/"returning". Also in Mario Kart DS, calling the DS courses a "nitro" was very fitting that the codename for the DS was "Project Nitro". We should use the "new" and "classic"/"returning" term in the later games (but also keep "nitro" and "retro" term for MKDS page only).--- 01:01, November 8, 2020 (EST)


 * Interesting. This is similar to the Japanese version of MKSC referring to its original tracks as "GBA courses" (Super Circuit tracks in English localization). In this case, the "Nitro course" page should be moved to "Race course", after all this page covers all tracks in the series (at least for console games). --PhGuy12 (talk) 12:59, November 8, 2020 (EST)
 * We'd rather use New, Classic and Remix as internal names take priority over purely conjectural names, but still can we gather sources on the terms that were used over time? I think that this should be the starting point before making any decision regarding the naming that we should use.--Mister Wu (talk) 15:53, November 8, 2020 (EST)
 * Well, quick update: the Prima Mario Kart Wii guide has the Wii CUPS and RETRO CUPS sections, the Prima Mario Kart 7 guide doesn't seem to use any corresponding term but the official UK site uses the new and retro courses terms, the Prima Mario Kart 8 guide has the section about the new tracks named as The New Tracks, while the section about the old tracks is named Returning Classics, with the official NA site of Mario Kart 8 Deluxe only mentioning new and returning battle courses, not mentioning the racecourses. At the moment, the use of New and Classic would be supported by the Mario Kart 8 guide, I'll also add for the sake of completeness that the official Nintendo of America site of Mario Kart Tour talks about courses inspired by real-world cities in addition to classic Mario Kart courses.--Mister Wu (talk) 16:31, November 8, 2020 (EST)


 * About MKW, it also uses the Wii and Retro terms in-game for the battle stages. --PhGuy12 (talk) 17:30, November 8, 2020 (EST)

I made two needed changes: N64 Kalimari Desert 2 is actively considered by the game as a N64 track so it had to be moved - with a note explaining its status -, I also replaced the Nitro term - that doesn't make sense in the context of Mario Kart Tour since it was used exclusively in Mario Kart DS - with the New term, that is used both internally and on Twitter with regards to Merry Mountain. The issue of the naming of the new tracks should still be discussed for the other Mario Kart games, as Nitro is effectively the wrong term outside of Mario Kart DS.--Mister Wu (talk) 10:12, December 10, 2020 (EST)