Mario Kart Wii won’t necessarily be an uncontrollable nightmare

February 20th, 2008, 3:58am by Jeff

I hope I’m not the only one that’s been skeptical about how well motion controls will work with the Mario Kart franchise. Unlike the “looser” feeling of Excitetruck, Mario Kart has always been more about precision steering, whether sliding perfectly around a tough corner, aiming a green shell with lethal accuracy, or lining yourself up properly for a shortcut.  Maybe Nintendo will prove me wrong, but trying to get this level of precision out of what seems to me like miming a steering wheel seems impossible.

However, like Super Smash Bros, Nintendo is apparently not being heavy-handed with forcing a motion-controlled setup on you.  According to 1up, there will be support for various control schemes, including a Nunchuk-Wii Remote setup, GCN controllers, and the classic controller as well.  I’ll be certain to try out each of the styles once the game is finally made available (which, I’m guessing won’t be until at least September despite what Nintendo says now), but I have a feeling that one of these alternative control methods will be my preference.

Now if they can just nail the online play…

Posted in Nintendo, Wii, Jeff |



      

7 Responses to “Mario Kart Wii won’t necessarily be an uncontrollable nightmare”

  1. Rob Says:
    February 20th, 2008 at 8:19 am

    I’m betting friend codes will feature prominently, so no, I doubt that they’ll nail online play.

  2. Jeff Says:
    February 20th, 2008 at 12:39 pm

    Rob-

    Well, given the limitations of friend codes (which are an unfortunate given), I still hope that the online mode is far more customizable than the DS version.

    For instance, how about Halo-like parties, or online Battle Mode, or *gasp* the ability to chat?

  3. Rob Says:
    February 20th, 2008 at 5:04 pm

    You’re funny.

  4. laesperanzapaz Says:
    February 21st, 2008 at 1:47 am

    Or even better, like the much superior PC scene. Like ya know, Steam and stuff.

  5. Jeff Says:
    February 21st, 2008 at 2:26 am

    Laesp-

    Is it actually better?

    Also, how would it function without a keyboard? I think Halo’s system is pretty stellar for an online console game.

  6. Rob Says:
    February 21st, 2008 at 7:40 am

    I agree, the party system is brilliant. More games need to adopt it. I’ve been pleased to see a few more games use it in ‘07.

  7. used cisco Says:
    February 21st, 2008 at 9:21 am

    There is some comment out there about “chat” on Kart, but they don’t specify if its voice or text.

    Also, Excite is actually pretty precise. Once you get a handle on the controls, you can power slide through a corner while scraping next to trees to grab “tree runs”. It just takes more practice, but i was actually amazed at how precise the controls were.

    Also, the thing that I thought was neat, the stats feature in Kart, not only tracks your times, but it also lists which controller you were using to get the time. This leads me to believe that some controls are going to be more favored, likely the more classic controls.

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