It's no secret that Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit is a risky direction for the series. A regular Mario Kart game is almost guaranteed to drive sales and keep fans interested, and nobody would have been surprised to see Mario Kart 9 announced sometime during 2020. Instead, Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit will attempt to do for its series what the Nintendo Switch did for its company's consoles, and reinvent the way consumers view it by creating a hybridization of two core design elements.
For those a little out of the loop on Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit, the game is an ambitious spin on the kart racing formula that will see players given an actual RC car - complete with either Mario or Luigi as the driver - to maneuver throughout their home while creating their own tracks. The game is being touted as "Mixed Reality," as players will use their Nintendo Switch screen to see the track they have created and the avatar they've chosen to race with while the actual physical car also navigates its terrain. If nothing else, Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit already has Switch owners talking about whether or not they'll be picking it up day one to see exactly how this novel idea plays out over hours of gameplay.
Now, however, we have a better idea of how Nintendo's new racer will captivate its fans. Screen Rant was able to attend a virtual demonstration of Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit, complete with looks at how it's set up, what innovations its bringing to the series, and how multiplayer works. For those interested in what's on the horizon for Mario Kart, read on.
Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit's four gates that come with the game are foldable and easy to store/place, which will make it much easier for those with busy households and limited space. The four gates are also mandatory, and the game can only function with that exact amount - no more, no less, though creativity in course design can allow for gates to be re-used. In an example described to us during the presentation, players could create a loop around a circular piece of furniture that sees them go through the same gate twice.
That's an important function because gates themselves are a core element of Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit gameplay. Gates can be customized and will offer players different elements of both help and hazard, with the latter taking the form of things like Piranha Plants. Physical obstacles, like tiny cardboard boxes, can also be placed on the course, and an RC car crashing into them and then spreading them out across the track will mean a different layout to deal with on the following lap. This dynamic was stressed as something unique to Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit, and it will be interesting to see how much consumers can use this functionality to create track variance.
Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit gameplay will be carried, for better or worse, by its tracks. CPU enemies will take the form of Bowser Jr. and the Koopalings, and players will also have the option of racing up to 3 other friends in multiplayer. Unfortunately, Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit will have absolutely no online connectivity, which means it will be local or CPU for fans. That's especially taxing given the fact that, while fans will all have access to the game itself - the software will be free on the Nintendo eShop - they do need a physical kart to play.
Accessibility, then, feels like one concern Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit will have to circumvent in order to succeed. It's not that the product itself isn't compelling - it definitely is. Requiring everyone to own a kart is actually going to be a decently-sized hurdle, but given that most people interested in the title will likely own a kart, it probably isn't a deal-breaker on its own. The demo did provide some live footage of two karts alongside each other at once, and it's easy to imagine how much more interesting races get with 4 karts in play - space comes at a premium in the real world, and the jostling and navigation of silly obstacles that can shift based on contact with karts will make for some truly interesting gameplay.
Outside of multiplayer, the most interesting Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit game mode will no doubt be Grand Prix, which makes its return in a new form. Grand Prix will have 3 races based on the course players established by setting up their gates and mapping it out. The races will provide players with new obstacles each time, usually in the form of gates and environmental changes, which affect both in-game and real life movement of the car. During the demo, a desert environment caused the car to wobble in handling and get pulled in different directions, while an ice environment populated the track with Freezies that needed to be avoided.
Grand Prix will provide players with coins, which in turn will grant them access to different unlockables. All unlockable Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit items are cosmetic and don't affect gameplay at all, but they look pretty varied and definitely add some much needed flair to lengthy gameplay sessions. Outfits, karts, and horns can all be changed based on unlocks, and some of them - the airship kart, or Mario's construction worker or knight outfits - are really eye-catching. It's important to note that cosmetics will only display for the person who has selected them on their Switch. Opponents will simply see regular Marios or Luigis - or, potentially, newer characters, though Nintendo couldn't comment on whether that was a possibility.
There's a lot to unpack in Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit, both figuratively and literally, as the physical version of the game comes with either a Mario or a Luigi kart and the gates needed to play. It remains to be seen just how much cc levels will matter to players, as the difference between 50cc and 200cc is dramatic when reflected in the physical kart, but also creates issues with space needed. Faster karts need wider turns, and it feels like people with cramped living spaces may not be able to access everything Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit has to offer.
There's also a question of longevity. While creative Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit players will likely be salivating over just how much their course customization is in their hands, less design-focused gamers will likely tire of standard layouts fairly quickly. While environments and gate variations will help, will they do enough to keep the game playable for weeks or months? Especially without online play and a restrictive multiplayer that will require people to get together locally to compete, it may be difficult for Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit to establish a large install base.
With that said, though, the Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit preview demo was impressive overall. When things are functioning as intended, the game looks incredible, and a brilliant mashup of two elements in traditional kart-based video games and RC car racing that has all of the appeal of both. With a bevy of options in environments, customizations, and the track layouts themselves, it seems like the game has enough tools to be captivating for a long time. Whether or not that plays out in practice remains to be seen, but the promise of Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit makes it one to watch as its release date nears.
Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit releases on October 16, 2020 for Nintendo Switch. Screen Rant attended a virtual presentation for this preview.