![]() It should be noted that my kart has taken a fair beating over the last week and a half, and there is nary a scratch on it. Utilizing drift, however, Mario handles the curves and then does a little virtual wheelie (the kart is represented digitally on the Switch screen, giving Mario a number of cartoon-like reactions, including sleeping if I set the Switch down). I create a figure eight around an air purifier and a cat fountain (I’m sorry, a waterfall!), and without pressing the drift button my kart always heads straight into the closet. Making tight turns will require the use of drift. But “Mario Kart” games aren’t designed to be simulations, so the fact that a windy prairie course has my cart constantly veering left and right adds just the right amount of chaos. ![]() The little kart handles better than I expected, albeit not perfectly. But even as a solo player I’ve had fun challenging myself with winding tracks through tight corridors, underneath shelving and custom-adding my own series of challenges and power-ups. My kart had no problem racing from family room to kitchen to bedroom to bathroom and back, maintaining a connection throughout a concrete-walled downtown Los Angeles apartment. It’s up to you, for instance, to design the course, which should avoid carpeted spaces. Families with two or more young children may feel the crunch more than someone who lives alone with a cat (hand raised), but out of the box I believe one set offers opportunities for creativity beyond timed racing competitions. You can race up to four players, but you’ll need four sets - and four Nintendo Switch consoles - to do so. All of them digitally transform when races begin (nondescript black-and-white cardboard arrows become colorful digital directional cues). Nintendo celebrates 35 years of Mario with the rerelease of the first ‘Mario’ games to feature 3-D worlds, including the transformational “Super Mario 64,” the criminally underappreciated “Super Mario Sunshine” and the starry-eyed wonder of “Super Mario Galaxy.”Īt $100 per set, you get one car, four gates and two racing signboards. Nintendo’s ‘Super Mario 3D All-Stars’ proves why Mario at 35 is more relevant than ever If the pandemic hadn’t intervened this year, we would have had the opportunity to travel to Universal Studios Japan for an actual “Mario Kart"-inspired ride, one that many suspect will involve some use of AR. ![]() No wonder attention, at least when it comes to non-educational uses of AR, has turned recently to theme parks. My theory: We know nothing is actually there, and the novelty of seeing something appear when it has no environmental interactions wears off pretty quickly, especially when there isn’t a story - or a brand as powerful as “Pokémon” - to match. In the game space, however, nothing has matched the success of “Pokémon Go.” Since 2016’s release of the mobile smash “Pokémon Go,” however, we’ve been well attuned to the appeal of AR - through our phones we were able to see a universe full of creatures materialize. But I’m smitten with “Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit” because it has the exact opposite ambition, and one I would argue is even more powerful: to re-imagine our current one.Īugmented reality, along with virtual reality, has been teased as “the next big thing” for a number of years now, with the two trading hype cycles depending on the tech conference and the year. They will continue, no doubt, to enhance the way we interact with digital worlds. In coming weeks we’ll have new consoles from Sony and Microsoft, each topping off at $500 and each looking to be impossible to find for quite some time. ![]() This is a big holiday season for video game players. A close-up view of a box spring reveals catacomb-worthy etchings seen above Mario, his perspective of my previously ordinary apartment now captured via a camera on a toy car and relayed to my Switch. Where there was once a storage area under the bed, now there are dark caverns with dead-end turns. My wooden kitchen cabinets have become a quaint neighborhood filled with cozy chalets and nooks for parking. Where there were metal-legged barstools now there are commanding, chrome skyscrapers, hinting at a towering, imposing cityscape. Simply booting up the game, even before its augmented reality capabilities are utilized, will result in a sense of wonder. ![]() As a mini remote-controlled Mario may say as he comes careening around a bend in my kitchen, “Ya-hoo!” My 500-square-foot apartment long ago started to feel paralyzingly claustrophobic, but at long last it’s been re-imagined. At least that’s its stated purpose.īut, really, after half a year of largely staying inside 24-7, the Nintendo Switch accessory “Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit” has a power that I don’t think can be overstated. Supposedly, “Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit” is a toy that transforms your home into augmented reality-enhanced race tracks. ![]()
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