“Mario Kart 8 Deluxe,” the version that runs on the Nintendo Switch system, has finally finished releasing new courses for players to race on. As of this past week, there are now 96 different tracks, with 48 from the base game, and another 48 that have been released in the form of DLC (Downloadable Content) over the past two years. Since we have now officially hit the end of an era, I’d like to take some time to go over the different tracks that were added as DLC, since I’ve had many opinions on their release in the past (see “The Confusing Release of Mario Kart’s DLC” from Weather Vane volume 69). 

I think overall, all of the maps that they’ve added have been very good, especially those added in this most recent installment of courses. Just last week, they added popular tracks from previous Mario Kart titles such as DK Mountain, Rosalina’s Ice World, Wii Rainbow Road, and a few others. Wii Rainbow Road has got to be my favorite of this bunch, and I think it may find a place among my favorite tracks overall. It’s got some really interesting turns, some paths that split off into different directions (which is always a good sign for a Mario Kart course), and some fast-paced areas that are very entertaining to navigate. 

Of course, they have also included some maps from the mobile game, “Mario Kart Tour.” A lot of these maps are based around real-world cities, and while some of them are very good, such as Sydney Sprint and New York Minute, a lot of them are rather sub-par. One Tour map that was added, Madrid Drive, fits this trend. This map is simply boring. There are very few interesting routes to take, the course doesn’t really display many notable landmarks from the city, and it’s really just a drive down cobblestone-paved streets, for the most part. The only part of this map that is mildly interesting is the football field. Near the end of the course, you are diverted onto the football field, which I believe to be a recreation of the Santiago Bernabeu Stadium. This part is pretty cool since there’s a bunch of footballs flying around, and a bunch of speed boosts around the field to dodge out of the way of aforementioned footballs. It’s the only thing that makes this track worthwhile (although putting cars on a football field is an odd choice, I don’t think any other video game has done that before). This is not the case with one of the courses that they added most recently, that being Rome Avanti. This Italy-inspired track is quite fun and may be one of my favorites of the “Mario Kart Tour” courses. Throughout the race, you take multiple paths through the Roman Coliseum, you get to go up what appears to be a rough recreation of the Spanish Steps, and it also shows a number of other landmarks throughout the city of Rome. 

Overall, the Mario Kart DLC is very good, and I highly recommend it  to anyone who is looking to bring some new variety in courses to their game. The price point of $25 is very reasonable, especially for almost double the content of the base game. There is some room for improvement in areas of the DLC, but overall it has been very entertaining for me.