Mario Kart 64 is the second game released from the Mario Kart series, which has become one of the most successful games in history. After Super Mario Kart’s successful performance in 1992, Nintendo released Mario kart 64 in 1996 with some new features and maps as well as considerably better graphics. Though not very different conceptually from other Mario Kart games, to gain a better understanding of this version, I played it on a website that has online emulators to play such retro games.
As mentioned previously, the Mario Kart series is one of the most successful games in history, and for this reason Nintendo continues to release new versions of the game, the most recent one being Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit. But, what makes this game so popular? Sure, the game is based around the all-time favorite Super Mario universe, but what makes this game more special in comparison to other racing games like Gran Turismo, Asphalt, etc.?
After some thought, I have come to realize that it is the conceptual elements behind Mario Kart 64 and, in fact, the entire series that make it so popular. Racing games in general all have an element of competition for the goal is to finish first. Yet, the Mario Kart game series implements items into the game that open up possibilities for innate human behavior to take control. I have decided to view the concept behind Mario Kart 64, and the Mario Kart series itself, as a metaphor for a person’s journey towards success. Let me elaborate.
Like most racing games, Mario Kart has multiple laps, which make the game much more interesting for they give players the chance to overtake others. Having a lap system also gives players the chance to make mistakes without having too large of a setback. In this sense, I compared the lap system to a person’s long term journey towards a dream or success in general. Throughout one’s journey towards achievement, there exist natural obstacles and distractions that are uncontrollable. Such aspects are also present in Mario Kart in the form of buses, snowmen, and the possibility to fall off the track in certain maps. In later releases of Mario Kart, they also introduced the black missile Bullet Bills that fly towards you in a specific map. Obviously, your goal is to stay on track as long as you can while avoiding these obstacles. However, even if you fall off the track, for example, you don’t just completely fail. The game just sets you further back on the track, gives you a delay, or has you take a detour to make it back onto the track.
The user input/interactive elements of the game also illustrate this idea. Just like how we, as humans, are born with different qualities and talents, each of the 8 characters and their karts all have qualities with different strengths and weaknesses. Some karts have better acceleration while others have better steering or speed. A player uses these strengths in specific situations and areas around the track to overtake other people or get further ahead.
In this sense, the other racers in the game can be compared to one’s competitors that are working towards the same goal. The implementation of items also adds to the realness of competition. Mario Kart 64 has a total of 9 attacking items, 5 of which were new to the Mario Kart series (triple green shell, triple red shell, spiny/blue shell, bunch of banana peels, and the fake item box). By collecting items throughout the race, you are collecting weapons to your arsenal that you could use for your advantage. The use of the green and red shells somewhat represent evil in the environment of competition. Just as how one strategizes when to use these shells, one could strategize to make other people in competition fail just for yourself to succeed. The spiny or blue shell is always targeted at the racer in first place. Often, players save this blue shell to use at the perfect timing when he or she can overtake first place. From this, I immediately thought of comparing this to scandals in the entertainment industry. Paparazzi’s or old acquaintances may hold onto scandals to eventually release them at the “perfect” timing. The power-ups (mushroom, triple mushroom, super/golden mushroom, starman, boo) are like the sources of help you receive when pursuing your goal. For example, just as how an internship acts as a stepping stone in your journey towards your dream job, a super/golden mushroom or starman acts as a stepping stone in your journey towards first place.
Like so, Mario Kart 64 and all the other games in the series seem to represent a person’s journey towards success. As a small note, thinking back to when someone mentioned the Super Mario theory during one of the discussion sections, Nintendo seems to find importance in the theory of human behavior and add elements into their game to test such behaviors.
