IS THAT LINK IN A KART????

[Kriven]

Here's my thoughts on the DLC (and I'm just going to warn you guys, some of it is pretty nitpicky).

Tanooki Mario and Cat Peach have grown on me after playing as them and hearing their personalities and watching their tricks. Tanooki Mario in particular at least looks adorable from all angles, like a soft, squishy teddy bear driving along. Link is neat, as expected, although it's a little silly to see him cramming into karts half his size.

I don't like that the past tracks and new tracks are all jumbled together... consistency is key to just about everything. I mean, if they wanted to do five new tracks instead of the four-four split (which is something else I take issue, but keep reading) it would have been nicer to have the one new track or maybe a seemingly remade track at the beginning of the new cup and allow the three past tracks to take a consecutive order. Rainbow Road, while being absolutely fabulous, needs to be the last track of the cup. It feels downright wrong that it's in the middle of the cup like that. This would have been my preferred cup order (while keeping all current tracks):

Triforce Cup:

Ice Ice Outpost - Dragon Driftway - Mute City - Hyrule

Egg Cup:

Excitebike Arena - Yoshi Circuit - Wario's Goldmine - SNES Rainbow Road

I choose Excitebike Arena to put in the past cup, because it can be viewed as a reimagining of Excitebike Mario Battle Stadium. I also reversed the cup positioning on the screen to reflect this.

Honestly when I first went through the tracks, I liked them all except for Ice Ice Outpost. It just seemed really bland on the first go. It's been growing on me, though, and it has a more complex gimmick (or rather, a simple gimmick that leads to more complex racing) than it seems going in. SNES Rainbow Road is fabulous, I wish Yoshi Circuit still had its shortcuts, Excitebike is bliss. Mute City could have done more with the F-Zero influence the way Hyrule did... Instead of Lakitu, they could have used the tractor beams. Instead of the typical countdown, I would give my left foot to hear the F-Zero robot voice. The track itself is great though, and I love the recovery strip serving as coins.

Hyrule as a track is also well-designed, and I like that they went ahead and swapped out the Swoopers for Keese and the Piranha Plants with Deku Babas, and particular the coins for rupees (although with the rupees I would have liked to see more than just green, even if they don't change the denominations. Rupees are just so pretty, and Mario Kart excels at multicolored beauty). The one thing I don't like about the Hyrule track are the audience members. The only Zelda ones are these weird knights that superficially resemble Link... and then the rest are all Mario characters. I would have rather seen Zoras and Gorons and Deku Scrubs cheering me on.

Wario's Goldmine stands out to me now as my least favorite, and not because "Lol MKWii Levels Suck". I actually liked that track in MKW. I remember in the Wii game, Wario's Goldmine was quite cluttered and full of things everywhere. MK8's verison feels kind of... empty. The bats aren't as intrusive, and the minecarts aren't hazards anymore. I mean, I like it, and I like the idea of the minecarts using anti-grav, but the track doesn't have the same kind of energy it did before.

The karts I can take or leave... they're there, that's cool.

Generally I'm fond of this DLC. There's mainly a few nitpicks I have with it, but it's otherwise great.