Mario Kart DS Member Review for the DS

New Spin on an old favorite, pretty good job with some very minor complaints.

Mario Kart DS has a lot to offer as far as DS games go. Good game play, Fun tracks. Decent charachters. I liked the unlockable charachters and pretty good size of selection of new carts. I also enjoyed a new feature I had not noticed an any other MK racers, Drafting! I only have a few gripes. I don't like that the touch screen is barely used in this, not that I have a clue on how they could have incorporated it any better. I would have liked to have seen some player specific items like in MKDD. I also thought that the Grand Prix mode was pretty easy. I whipped through it in about 4 days time playing it off and on. On the other hand the Mission mode was too hard. Call me an idiot but I don't see the point in busting boxes or destroying other obstacles when I am just going to avoid them during a race. It also would have been nice to be able to change control configuration, I thought the gas and item use button should have been swapped for much easier use.

Mario Kart DS is a great game if you like MK type racing. Its fun, you never really are out of a race if you stick with it. Clever new items like the Bullit Bill and the ink squirting squid thing keep it interesting. Graphics are pretty good, this is the only hand held system I have other than the GBA which is not even in the same league as the DS, but the graphics were impressive to me. But then again I come from the Atari 2600 days. I am easily impressed sometimes.

The Wifi aspect is decent, playing against my buddy while in the same room was alright. I have not had a chance to get "online" as of yet. I am looking forward to going head to head with more than just one other human opponent.

Overall its one of the better games so far for the DS, A must have for any die hard Mario Kart enthusiest.