-Graham Hill
The tracks in the Mario Kart series have, for me, always been what’s defined the quality of each entry. The racing mechanics and items have their place, but over the years, the adjustments and additions to these elements have changed less and less in the series. Bigger and more noticeable changes like gliding and underwater driving in Mario Kart 7 were great, but when you look more granularly at things like drifting, the changes are more for “quality-of-life” purposes. The same can’t be said for the tracks. With each iteration, Mario Kart’s tracks have continued to impress me and herein lies the creativity and fun of the series. Getting to know the quirks, turns, and shortcuts of each track that give you the edge to propel yourself into 1st is all part of what makes this frantic racer the commercial success it is.
Mario Kart 8 currently has more tracks available than any other Mario Kart game. There’s 4 tracks per cup, and Mario Kart 8 has the standard 4 Nitro Cups (Mushroom, Flower, Star & Special), 4 Retro Cups, and an added 4 DLC Cups, which were included for free in the ‘Deluxe’ Switch release – totalling a whopping 48 tracks to choose from! The DLC tracks are noticeably and consistently high in quality, so if I included those, I’m not sure how many of the original 16 would make the cut!
So with that said, I’ve decided to focus on the original 16 tracks (I’m sure I’ll make a DLC focused Top 10 one day), and what makes them so great. Whether you’re ascending waterfalls or traversing down a snow-covered mountain, the tracks here have enough hazards, tight corners and obstacles to separate the men from the baby Marios.
Did You Know?
- The first Mario Kart entry where the first track isn’t a “circuit”.
- Mario Kart 8 includes 48 tracks – the most in any entry!
- Rainbow Road (N64) is the longest track whilst Baby Park (GCN) is the shortest.
10) Thwomp Ruins
The last track in the Mushroom Cup, Thwomp Ruins is – as you’d expect – a dilapidated course full to the brim with Thwomps trying to crush you at every turn. The track starts with a relatively basic opening before directing racers through a tunnel. Here you can choose to take the normal path busy with gigantic rolling stones (I don’t mean an enormous Mick Jagger), or use the anti-gravity wall to edge around the dangers. Exiting the tunnels, you end up in an area which I think is the pinnacle of the track – an open section with a large variety of routes. There’s more anti-gravity sections, a gliding pad that lets you fly to a central island, or you can dive in and go through the pond in the centre – whatever takes your fancy. The track finishes with some driftable, Thwomp crushing corners and a glide to the finish line. Thwomp Ruins is a track that rewards careful driving, but also those willing to get creative with their route choices – for me, it’s the best in the Mushroom Cup.
9) Mario Circuit
Mario Circuit is without a doubt the best visual representation of Mario Kart 8 – a track literally in the shape of a figure 8. The track itself is a mobius strip – a surface with one side, but twisted to create that said figure 8 shape. The underside of the track kicks in the anti-gravity mechanic, adding mayhem and franticness to what would’ve been a relatively straight-forward track. It’s peppered with Mushroom Kingdom enemies including Piranha Plant at the edge of each turn – preventing racers from hogging the inside line – and towers of stacked Goomba that can be dodged. Despite being relatively straightforward, there’s never a dull, actionless moment on Mario Circuit, which is thanks to the anti-gravity clash boost segments and plethora of enemies on hand to ruin your pole-position.
8) Twisted Mansion
Twisted Mansion is a Luigi’s Mansion inspired track rich with Boos and Fishbones! The start of the race sees a couple of Boos opening the mansion doors before you boost yourself inside and reveal the trickery hiding behind the four walls. There are multiple sections in Twisted Mansion that split the track – one of these being an underwater part that is twinned with anti-gravity. This section culminates in a glide pad where you fly through the mansion’s courtyard before heading through the garden, rife with tombstones trying to crush racers. There’s a nice number of shortcuts in Twisted Mansion that can influence the race’s outcome, including a nifty little mushroom-assisted shortcut through a bookshelf. Twisted Mansion has the third highest number of coins out of every track, meaning you can reach your top speed quickly, and make every visit to this track a high-speed thriller.
7) Shy Guy Falls
I mentioned in my Top 10 Mario Enemies blog my love for Shy Guys – so not only does Mario Kart 8 help this love by allowing you to select any Shy Guy colour as a racer, but it also gives you a wonderful track in Shy Guy Falls. On this track, Shy Guys are everywhere and, although difficult, it’s best not to get distracted as there’s a vast number of jumps, glidable chasms, and sharp corners. However, the pinnacle of Shy Guys Falls is the vertical, anti-gravity ascent up the waterfall. During this section, water and boost pads cascade towards you as you drive to the waterfall’s edge. The top of the waterfall has you immediately turn around and drive down an adjacent chute, but only momentarily, as you’re soon gliding back to some rocky ground. Shy Guy Falls is an insanely fun track, with a nice mixture of driftable corners and boost pads to keep the intensity a satisfyingly high level.
6) Bowser’s Castle
Mario Kart entries are known for some recurring tracks – such as Mario Circuit and Rainbow Road. Another one of these is Bowser’s Castle and oh boy is the version in Mario Kart 8 a treat. Bowser’s Castle is packed full of hazards as you’d expect – and this is no less true in MK 8’s iteration; fireballs, statues shooting lasers, and rolling rocks to name a few. However, the largest hazard is in the central room of the track – in this room, the track splits in two and encompasses an enormous stone Bowser statue. However, this statue is moving and swinging massive punches into the track, alternating between the left and right forks on repeat. Take a punch from this guy, and you’ll be crushed into a pancake, and will no doubt drop a few places as your speed reduces. The track itself is hard to navigate, throw in this onslaught of obstacles, and you’re left with a track that requires all your concentration, from start to finish.
5) Toad Harbour
I’m not sure what it is with Toad and vehicles. First there was N64’s Toad’s Turnpike, a busy motorway packed with lorries and trucks. Then (if you kind of count Mushroom Bridge and Mushroom City in Double Dash), areas of track covered in buses and Wiggler Wagons. Now, in Mario Kart 8, Toad Harbour rocks out with boats and trams. I really love San Francisco as a city and you can see it’s influence within the design of this track – the harbour section with a bustling bazaar and steep, tram-lined slopes to name a few. This is another track, similar to Thwomp Ruins, where there’s multiple paths you can take to mix things up. Whether that’s driving through or on top of the bazaar, leaving the bazaar and taking a shorter road with a really narrow path for a risk vs. reward gamble, or the safe anti-gravity section around busy trams, it’s up to you! Toad Harbour is rife with action, choice and a pleasing oceanside aesthetic resulting in a great and memorable Mario Kart track.
4) Rainbow Road
Mario Kart 8’s Rainbow Road is the ultimate test of skill. Unlike any previous Rainbow Roads, Mario Kart 8’s space station designed track includes metallic, technological sections that break up the difficult and risky rainbow pathways. On 200cc, this track is a menace, and the brake will become your best friend. The thin, railless roads mean you’ll be skidding and drifting around sharp and immediate bends that give no forewarning. Staying away from the edge is tough, but necessary if you don’t want Lakitu fishing you out of the expanding emptiness of space. Chuck in the fact that most of the track is anti-gravity, and you’re therefore trying to avoid touching other racers for an unwanted boost into oblivion, and you’ve got probably the most chaotic and dangerous Rainbow Road in the series.
3) Cloudtop Cruise
There’s very few Mario Kart tracks that use the “above-the-clouds” aesthetic, which is so often seen in the main 2D and 3D Mario games. However, I was pleased to see this style used in MK 8 and I’m of course talking about Cloudtop Cruise. The track is broken up over many different segments – it starts on pleasant and calm cloudtops before taking racers onto an airship. From the airship you’re shot out of a canon into a storm cloud. This intense section is littered with boost pads which attract lightning from the surrounding cloud – so picking a boost pad that’s not being zapped by mother nature becomes the key to getting through unscathed and ahead of the pack. The track ends on a beanstalk, which has a great design touch – it’s coming out of a question mark block, exactly as it does in some of the 2D side scrolling Mario games. The constant changing of environment and the variety in Cloudtop Cruise make it a Mario Kart classic.
2) Electrodome
Electrodome is a disco, wrapped in a party, wrapped in a nightclub – and it’s great. One of the most noticeable features of Electrodome is the music – not only is the soundtrack a constant upbeat melody of electronica inspired notes but there are sections of the track that add to the music as you drive over them. The aesthetic of Electrodome is also refreshingly original. Despite Mario Kart games always releasing with new tracks, there are elements that are always reused from previous games – sometimes the tracks are just outright new iterations with a different design, like Rainbow Road and Bowser’s Castle. But Electrodome is truly new and unique – there’s not been a style like it before and I hope Nintendo continue to experiment with different aesthetics for future releases, because if they’re anything like Electrodome, they’ll pay off.
1) Mount Wario
The summit of Mario Kart 8 tracks – both literally and figuratively – is Mount Wario. A race track with a single lap split into three sections (something introduced in later Mario Kart titles). Mount Wario is a constant, high-octane battle starting on a snow-crested mountain and finishing at the base. The race starts inside a helicopter – so you know it’s going to be good – where the hanger opens and you drop onto the mountain below. As you descend the mountain you’ll drive through ice caverns, anti-gravity over a dam wall as well as enter the dam itself, cut through a frosty forest, and slalom through an Olympic-style ski course. I really like Mario Kart tracks which don’t loop and Mount Wario executes this perfectly with it’s ski-related aesthetic. The track has a progressive fluidity to it which makes you feel like you really are descending a mountain. It also manages to keep the terrain variety, excitement and intensity constant, resulting in what I believe to be the best Mario Kart 8 track from the first four original cups.
Mario Kart 8’s track design is definitely up there as one of the best – the level of creativity, fun and added anti-gravity mechanic has resulted in some of the funnest, and most chaotic, MK tracks to date. Hopefully we’ll see the anti-gravity return in future iterations, which have helped unlock a new level of design – giving Nintendo the option to add multiple routes throughout individual tracks. I hope you look forward to my MK8 DLC tracks list, as the tracks in those cups are on a completely different, gravity defying level!