Mario Kart Tour

Since Mario Kart Tour’s release in 2019, the gacha pipe mechanic has been one of the most despised features in the game. Suppose you haven’t played or don’t remember, the pipe mechanic is essentially a gacha rolling system that requires players to purchase an in-game currency called Rubies and roll for playable characters, karts, and gliders. It was such an irritating feature because it meant that the player with the better gear always had a higher chance of winning the race. It was also pretty hard to score good gear too, so rolling became pretty costly if you weren’t lucky.

I waited to write this review until I was well into the game just to see what changes were initially made. I think the racing itself is awesome; cool karts, characters, gliders, etc... However, I think the limits on how many points and coins you can acquire each day is entirely too low. I can play for 30 minutes and reach this limit. It makes it very hard to achieve high points on items, which makes it hard to advance in the game. If you pay for a gold pass, there should be no limit to your daily points or coins. Additionally, I think that rubies are entirely too expensive (both real money & virtually) and they don’t necessarily guarantee good items from the pipes. I think that you should be able to purchase rubies with coins collected in the game & 48 rubies should not cost $27, especially since they don’t guarantee you’ll receive anything valuable to your game play.

Mario Kart is one of the best party games I’ve ever played. It’s fun and chaotic, in a perfect combination. You could driving past your mates at mach5 in first place and then get blue shelled and drop to the last. This type of gameplay makes it more than just a racing game. And also, Donkey Kong.