We face Nintendo's response to its karting saga on iOS and Android; a huge playable potential with an aggressive monetization system.
Who was going to tell us just a few years ago that we were going to be able to play Mario Kart, officially, with his own delivery for mobile devices. Nintendo refused to reach out to smartphones with their large IPs just five years ago, but times have changed, as well as the way of consumption and the interpretation of the game as a service. Mario Kart Tour is a reflection of all those practices; of the good, of the bad and of the debatable. It is, above all, a valid translation of the traditional experience for iOS and Android terminals. With its lights and shadows.
The two sides of the coin free to play
It has been several weeks of study and daily play that we have needed to perform this Reviews, circumstances that do not usually occur for a seemingly modest application and without too much depth. When we learned that the title was going to base its playable experience on an approach for seasons, rotations and periodic content, we understood that it could have been precipitated to reach some conclusions before knowing what Nintendo had to tell us, its objectives: where they want Arrive with this proposal.
There have been criticisms of all kinds, especially hard those of the users who valued the game after their first available days. For our part, we are not going to deceive you: the least of Mario Kart Tour's problems is its control. The adaptation of the control scheme to a touch interface is much more precise than we initially thought, especially when we realize that the races base part of their success on the number of combos and, therefore, the requirement behind the wheel requires a millimeter accuracy.
Playing with a pair of fingers – one for the turn / skid and another to activate the objects – has been executed correctly, the classic gameplay is not renounced. For this, the acceleration is automatic; The player should worry about spinning, skidding, and chaining combos with which to accumulate turbos, jumps, hits when throwing objects … It is a fast game, if we choose the 150cc or 200cc, with an artistic section that greatly improves the title of the one that inherits more elements, Mario Kart 7 (3DS, 2011) and that does not get so far from that brilliant Mario Kart 8 (2014, Wii U; 2017, Nintendo Switch) in the angles of rotation, camera position or animations .
However, as a video game Mario Kart Tour could have been the great title of Nintendo on mobiles thanks to its control – which requires some adaptability but rewards you for maintaining many more elements than it may seem at first glance – and its design for seasons. The problem, not in vain, comes in its insufficient amount of content, challenges and, especially, a business model where the one who pays the most earns the most.
The danger of the Pipeline: studying its business model
It is very close to the risky pay to win system, because without investing money you can complete absolutely everything and compete with guarantees, but it is exaggeratedly aggressive with the price of micropayments and the tiny percentage of obtaining some characters. As in any porridge, its language is clear: character typology according to its rarity (Common, Singular, Megasingular), with better skills and bonus depending on the degree of difficulty of achievement, based on randomness. A green pipe awaits us in the main menu, the place to recruit all the contents available in the current season, which are temporary. With five Rubies we can try our luck, but it will be very difficult to get one of those karts, pilots or delta wings of greater value. And it's a shame. It is a pity that such a small percentage has been chosen because it reduces any possibility of having a good assortment of materials in the garage for each test; although we play every day without leaving any challenge without completing.
Content selection process before contesting a race; Each circuit has its preferential order of parts.
The design of Mario Kart Tour is constantly giving a pulse to the player, to his patience, somehow perverting a precise gameplay, as happened in his day with Super Mario Run (iOS / Android, 2016), Nintendo's solution to move the classic platform platform experience in mobile devices. The result came into view, but failed commercially because it opted for a traditional model: free demo and, if you wanted all the content, you had to pay 9.99 euros.
Perhaps it is the fault of the type of user of these contents, who prefers to pay twenty times 1 euro than once only 10 euros and forget about all these headaches, randomness and uncertainty. The free to play business model triumphs when its installed base of players loses control over what it spends or, failing that, if the balance between what is invested and what is received manages to satisfy both parties. This does not happen in the title we are analyzing today. We explain ourselves.
Mario Kart Tour has a Golden Pass, a season pass with a duration of one month in exchange for 4.99 euros. It can be a viable solution that is in between between the complete game and the traditional free to play. The nuance is that it is not a flat rate or a subscription that gives access to everything, but a kind of policy with which to receive a (very small) part of the new contents of the banner (the event and the contents of that season ) active.
In his debut we had the two weeks of the New York Season; In these next two weeks we have had the Tokyo Season; while from October 24 we will have the Halloween Season. The industry has shown that it works, that this system is valid because it sends a direct message to the player: "Come back tomorrow." The user internalizes that every day new challenges await him, new cups in which to participate and challenges with which to test his abilities. What we do not understand is that you limit yourself by eliminating any possibility of playing on circuits not available in the season in question.
Getting the Megasingular (purple color) is really difficult … unless you pay.
For example, the Kalimari Desert was available, but now it is not; as well as Koopa Beach. We do not understand why. Although not always part of the competitive section of the active season, there is no opportunity to continue taking advantage of these contents. That is why the Golden Pass cannot be interpreted in any way as a subscription model with content on demand, but a batch of content, a DLC, which is also the only way to play 200cc, the so-called “dizzying speed”, which We have to say it is the most fun and challenging way to play: everything is going very fast, requires attention and facilitates replayability.
Luckily, Mario Kart Tour has no lives, temporary countdowns to play again or anything like that: the battery of your mobile is the limit.
From yesterday to today with Mario Kart Tour: the day to day with the game
In order to get a mental idea of the distribution of game contents, unlike any other Mario Kart, different contents await us every two weeks. The seasons have a duration of fourteen days, also divided into two competitive seven-day Cups. From among all the available Cups, Nintendo always chooses one with which the records are computed for the general classification and that of friends. Depending on the final position we have in the first one, at the end of each weekly classification we will receive more or less awards. To be first is succulent: 20 Rubies, 1000 coins and a few other elements with which to invest in improvements or in new karts, pilots or chassis.
Weekly classification (we are currently in League 9, starting in League 1) and Classification of friends.
If you don't want to be forced to pay, this is the best way to guarantee Rubies, which is the premium currency (the one we can get in exchange for real money). At the same time, the Rubies are the key to participating in the Gold Rush mode, where we dispute a race that will guarantee 800 to 4000 coins, depending on the jewels invested. But what are coins for then? To buy pilots, go-karts and hang gliders in the game's internal store, whose nine contents vary every day. This has not yet convinced us, because it would be much nicer with the player to release that catalog so that it was the user who chose what and when, since the how it is imposed as standard. But it is not like that, a barrier or more obstacle to deal with.
If you want Wendy, for example, the character necessary to complete one of the challenges of the week in force on the date of publication of this Reviews, or are you lucky to be touched in the pipeline (1%) or you are also fortunate to that is available for purchase in the store.
Problems with the challenge “Get 6000 points or more with a Bowser minion? We explain how to do it. #MarioKartTour Choose a Koopaling and try chaining combos in this circuit of the Larry Cup! pic.twitter.com/piJeRP0TQn
– FreeGameTips.com (@FreeGameTips) October 14, 2019
Speaking of challenges, let's go on to detail how this system works, that there are different types: seasonal, golden (only if you have the Golden Pass active) and standard; whose achievement is more complex, thought long term.
The idea is ideal, should be moved to the main saga to serve as an incentive or hook to continue playing, but the amount is ridiculous to have only nine for a full week. Last Wednesday the new challenges were activated, where we found challenges such as hitting a horn, breaking three pipes, making 20 jumps with acceleration … and we completed them all that same afternoon. From there, what can we do the rest of the week? What other incentive is beyond improving our records in the Cup? Standard challenges propose challenges such as winning 200 races or hitting 500 times with a green shell; that is, challenges that are completed over time, but that do not expire do not require the speed of others, of a temporary nature. Every week there should be half a hundred challenges, without exaggeration, to really keep the player not only with reasons to return but also with the desire to continue playing.
Luigi and his "Death Stare" will debut at the end of October.
For the rest, as we said, the weekly Cup is the only remaining gap if we have completed the rest of the challenges. In these four weeks we have played approximately 60 hours, we are level 21 and we have repeated challenges countless times because of how addictive the system is, but more options are missing, quantity of content – not variety in them -, time trial mode or the long-awaited multiplayer mode, which is still in process.
The eventual arrival of the online multiplayer mode with up to eight runners at the same time can be decisive for the validity of the game in the long term. Meanwhile, Mario Kart Tour is being smart in integrating new circuits, (many) new characters and Cups every two weeks … but eliminates some of the above in each rotation. A couple of steps forward in exchange for taking another step back at the same time.
The hook, while we wait for the next rotation, is to improve our registration in the Cup. This time we have the Mario Cup, with its three computable circuits for qualifying. The sum of the scores of this trio gives a total figure which is what, at the end of each season, will determine our position and our reward.
The playable key of Mario Kart Tour, the intelligent combos system
And here is the explanation to those scores: the combos. It is not enough to win; In fact, there may be cases where we make more points with seconds or third, the important thing is to chain combos. Every time we do an action (jump, coin, hit with an object, make a mini-turbo …) we add an x1 in the chain of combos. It is extremely rewarding to reach figures of x50 or even x70 combos, but it is also extremely difficult … and addictive. Nintendo has been cunning in allowing only a specific type of character to be able to activate Furor mode on each circuit; usually the Megasingular (those with percentages of obtaining less than 1%). The Furor is a mixture of the Star and the Roulette of 7 because it makes us enter that state of invulnerability and maximum speed with the addition of having a specific object for a few seconds unlimitedly. In addition, the characters with Furor's option in a circuit also have three objects per box, which is a positive handicap in that scenario. The kart also influences to activate a base point multiplier, while the delta wing determines the duration of the interval between combos (if it is longer, more time can pass between one combo and the next without the chain being canceled).
This system is not only easy to understand in a mobile game – since, we remember, you don't have to accelerate, just worry about the direction and skidding, but for the main saga: it requires a lot of skill and can be a frenzy of action in the online mode in the future.
A solid foundation on which to build
For those who are very close to the saga for years, the playable Mario Kart Tour scheme is based on Mario Kart 7 – for its skidding system plus three-dimensional assets – and Mario Kart DS (NDS, 2005) – for the angle of turn in control, somewhat more closed than in the latest installments of 3DS, Wii and Wii U—. The reminiscences to Mario Kart 8 are also valid, but precisely because the latter is a refinement of previous deliveries. In any case, Tour does not feel like the eighth numbered delivery because we do not have a physical control input but touch, but the approach is more than remarkable for these devices. Approve with note in the playable section.
Nintendo would be wrong if it misses the huge potential of the title with this aggressive policy of obtaining content or the price of micropayments. Companies like DeNA with Pokémon Masters, ambitious at the root, have had to recline because it was not sustainable to demand so much from the player in exchange for so little. Nintendo is on time to not have to apologize over the months if they start offering more rewards and do not eliminate content that nourishes the whole.
Technically it is brilliant, it is surprising that it looks like this on mobile devices. Both the soundtrack and the design of scenarios are an example of how to squeeze the current hardware of smartphones. In addition, paths have been reused in a thousand ways as there are challenges in R (the inverted circuit) or X (full of projections and changes designed to make dozens of combos), so that the same circuit can be lived in several different ways.
Time will be the one to decide if the update policy leaves Mario Kart Tour nurtured or, on the contrary, this approach ends with the patience of those who see only weekly challenges some challenges that can be completed in one afternoon.
CONCLUSION
Mario Kart Tour has enormous potential. Its control, which you end up getting used to, or the gameplay, based on chaining combos, is effective and addictive. Nintendo has raised new content every two weeks, which makes it clear that we will have new content very regularly. The problem, not in vain, comes with an aggressive monetization system based on pay to win where the more you pay the more you get. If there was the option to pay a specific amount in exchange for forgetting randomness, surely many would sign ipso facto, but we are facing a gacha; with all that that entails. Good design and approach of Cups, but with few challenges and content that appear and disappear. This approach to the most successful sub-series in Nintendo's history has everything to destroy, but that its philosophy is a double-edged sword that not many are willing to tolerate in the long term.
THE BEST
- Gameplay based on stringing combos, very addictive
- Technically bright
- Cups and Seasons System: constant flow of news
WORST
- Your micropayments, aggressive and pay to win
- Few weekly challenges
- Remove content with rotations
- Absence (for now) of time trial and online
Right
It is not the latest or the most original, nor does it have the best execution, but it can be fun if you like the genre. Good, but improvable.
