Mario Kart Tour released on September 25. While many long time Mario Kart fans were pleased to have it, the game feels incomplete and difficult to control. 

Visually the game is just like the rest of the recent Mario Kart games: bright, colorful, sharp edges and great design when it comes to characters and tracks. The soundtrack also feels like themes straight from the old games. 

The issue with the visuals is the game runs in portrait mode not landscape. In portrait mode, it is difficult to see if someone is right beside your avatar and even more difficult to see the obstacles ahead.

More problems emerge with the controls when racing. Players steer in normal mode by swiping left or right, but the movements are inaccurate and sometimes inputs don’t register. Other times, the game doesn’t put as much input as users want. One way to fix this issue could be to use an on screen joystick to control the game, but this would be inconvenient for most users. 

While Mario Kart has always been an arcade style game, Mario Kart Tour feels too easy. On 50cc and 100cc, the game is slow and seems almost impossible to lose. The smart steering the game offers is a way for new players to be good at the game, but makes the game lose some appeal for experienced gamers. 

Mario Kart Tour is great fun especially, when playing with friends, but the needs to develop improved controls and a harder, more competitive mode for more serious players to truly be interested in sticking with it. 

Want to learn more about Mario Kart? Check out Gabriella Ringo’s story on the impact of Mario Kart in schools.