Mario Kart: Bowser's Challenge - General Discussion

[mccgavin]

The issue that comes up is that Mario Kart does not live up to the expectations of what a Mario Kart ride should be, not that it isn't a rollercoaster.

The claim that Mario Kart should've been a coaster or high-thrill ride comes up rather frequently. Although that argument hasn't shown up on this forum specifically, I tend to see it more than actual criticisms of the ride itself.

But what's done is done... the ride will age poorly and need major updates in the future.

This is very doubtful. An upgrade to the fidelity of the headsets a couple years from now would be nice, but the ride does not need major reworking.

 

[Evan]

This is very doubtful. An upgrade to the fidelity of the headsets a couple years from now would be nice, but the ride does not need major reworking.

I don't agree - but I guess we will have to wait and see what the future may bring.

 

[MrRoamer]

Although that argument hasn't shown up on this forum specifically, I tend to see it more than actual criticisms of the ride itself.

I mean we kinda accepted the fact that Fast and the Furious is a slow bus simulator. Sometimes we aren't the best proof point of what people are really talking about.

 

[mccgavin]

Sometimes we aren't the best proof point of what people are really talking about.

That's... what I said (?)

 

[Evan]

I found it interesting given this conversation, just two days ago an interview came out with Joe Rhode from attractions magazine, talking just about this, the gamification of rides:

You really do have to step back sometimes. Just calm down for a second and look at this thing and ask yourselves, is it emotionally effective? Does it convey the idea it intends?

The work is complicated, it takes a long time, and it involves a lot of people. It’s very impressive to do the physical parts that need to get done, but you can drift off a little bit from the reason that it’s all being done, which is to create a psychological perception in the mind of a viewer. And sometimes that perception can be achieved with a fantastically simple illusion. And then it should be, in my opinion. The other thing is, this is not movie making. There’s no plot twist, no sudden reveal, no character exposition. None of that works.

In a way, by the time you engage an attraction, you have to know why you’re there. You need to be able to enjoy what it does, the illusions of it, the beauty of it, the magic of the reveals and the tricks and everything. You’re not there to figure it out; you’re there to enjoy it. And usually for most people, they have a very rare opportunity to do this — it could be once a year, it could be once every three years. So it cannot be making requirements of people; it cannot be hard.

I don’t believe it is productive for these sorts of attractions to be derived very much from game strategy. Because most of the conundrum you face is if you love games and gaming, you like really sophisticated, difficult and challenging games, right? That’s why you enjoy them. They take hours and hours to build up proficiency to where you can play them well. Then they become rewarding and really complicated. All the rubrics that you figured out how to do.

So imagine, like my family when I was young, we got to go to Disneyland, maybe every two years. We would do as many things as we possibly could in the day that we’re there. What if one of those things couldn’t really be enjoyed until you have proficiency, efficiency? Think about that.

So with games, there’s all that investment of time at the beginning, that’s hours of time, right? You don’t have that time in a park, which is why the park is so much more of a gift. Like, you’re already here, and here’s an experience. It’s really nice. It’s very cool. It’s for you and you don’t have to do anything.

 

[Pacific]

No, this actually does come up quite a lot to be fair.

I think its a knee jerk reaction due to the ride being a complete whiplash for a lot of people.

Also replying to the post above, the best parts of Mario Kart are all of the non-interactive scenes, lol (I freaking love the star transition sequence going into Rainbow Road, it feels so climatic and it gives me goosebumps).

I’m going to sound like a broken record but for like the 10000th or whatever, they were so busy trying to get Mario Kart to work in this context, that they never stopped to think if they should. Mario Kart ride only resembles Mario Kart in the most surface level way. It barely resembles the game at all…just to be basically a lesser game than Mario Kart at home.


But ofc, if they went a different route, people would’ve been like, “Why isn’t there a Mario Kart ride!?”

And ofc, we were always getting an interactive E-ticket (lol) because that’s what Nintendo wanted (back in the mid 2010s at least, I wonder if they’d change their minds now since this is a very different Nintendo from 2015).