Mario Kart 8

Mario Kart 8 is a kart-racing game developed and published by Nintendo for the Wii U. It is the eleventh installment in Nintendo's Mario Kart franchise, the eighth in the main series, and was released on May 30th, 2014.

Gameplay
Mario Kart 8 takes the glider and underwater mechanics as well as the coins mechanic of its predecessor Mario Kart 7. The bikes from Mario Kart Wii make a return though they have been changed to act similarly to Karts; real wheelies cannot be performed. 12 player races also make a return. In addition, the main new mechanic is an anti-gravity transformation which will allow racers to drive along the ceiling and walls of courses allowing more different path as one races.

Roster
These are in order they appear on the character select screen
 * Mario
 * Luigi
 * Peach
 * Daisy
 * Rosalina
 * Metal Mario
 * Yoshi
 * Toad
 * Koopa
 * Shy Guy
 * Lakitu
 * Toadette
 * Baby Mario
 * Baby Luigi
 * Baby Peach
 * Baby Daisy
 * Baby Rosalina (New)
 * Pink Gold Peach (New)
 * Bowser
 * DK
 * Wario
 * Waluigi
 * Iggy Koopa (New)
 * Roy Koopa (New)
 * Lemmy Koopa (New)
 * Larry Koopa (New)
 * Wendy O. Koopa (New)
 * Ludwig von Koopa (New)
 * Morton Koopa Jr (New)
 * Mii

DLC
In each DLC pack, 3 characters are added. In the 1st DLC pack, there are: In the 2nd DLC pack, there are:
 * Tanuki Mario
 * Cat Peach
 * Legend of Zelda Link
 * Animal Crossing Villager
 * Animal Crossing Isabelle
 * Dry Bowser

DLC
Each DLC pack will bring 2 cups with 4 courses each, for a total of 16 additional courses

Here is what is confirmed

DLC Pack 1
 * Mute City
 * Excitebike
 * WII Wario's Gold Mine

DLC Pack 2
 * Animal Crossing
 * Tree Trunk

Items

 * Golden Mushrooms
 * Stars
 * Fire Flowers
 * Bob-Ombs
 * Mushroooms
 * Triple Mushrooms
 * Red Shells
 * Triple Red Shells
 * Green Shells
 * Triple Green Shells
 * Bananas
 * Triple Bananas
 * Lightning
 * Bloopers
 * Blue Shell
 * Boomerang (New)
 * Piranha Plant (New)
 * Super Horn (New)
 * Crazy Eight (New)

Customization
Customzation returns from Mario Kart 7, now with alternative Bikes and ATVs in addition to Karts as the main body. Except for the golden parts, they are randomly unlocked through getting multiples of 50 coins.

Karts

 * Standard Kart
 * Landship
 * Cat Cruiser
 * Badwagon
 * Mach 8
 * BiddyBuggy
 * Pipe Frame
 * Prancer
 * Sneeker
 * Steel Driver
 * Sports Coupe
 * Tri-Speeder
 * Circuit Special
 * Gold Standard

Bikes

 * Standard Bike
 * Broad Bean
 * Burning Bowl
 * Jet Rider
 * Mach GP
 * Maximum
 * Motor Dozer
 * Super Comet
 * Yoshi Bike

ATV

 * Standard ATV
 * Bean Rider
 * Wild Wiggler

Tires

 * Standard Tires
 * Normal Blue
 * Ring Tires
 * Spicy Rings
 * Roller
 * Sky Rollers
 * Monster
 * Wild Hot
 * Sponge
 * Slick
 * Cyber Slick
 * Block Tires
 * Cream Blocks
 * Metal Tires
 * Wood Rings
 * Button Tires
 * Cushion Tires
 * Golden Tires

Gliders

 * Super Glider
 * Cloud Balloons
 * Flower Glider
 * Koopa Kite
 * MKTV Parafoil
 * Parachute
 * Para-glider
 * Peach Parasol
 * Sail Plane
 * Waddlewing Kite
 * Wario Glider
 * Golden Glider

DLC
Mercedes-Benz GLA-Class

Battle Mode
The battle mode seems akin to earlier Mario Karts except the battle courses are based on the race tracks albeit modified for a Battle purpose.There are 8 courses used for Battle including
 * Mario Circuit
 * Toad Harbor
 * Moo Moo Meadows
 * Toad Turnpike
 * Sherbet Land
 * Donut Plains 3
 * Dry Dry Desert
 * Yoshi Valley

Mario Kart TV
This is a robust replay editting system that even supports both Miiverse posting and direct-to-Youtube upload. The system can take 15 second, 30 second, 60 second highlights or full race and pot them on Miiverse. Unfortunately, the Youtube upload function has disabled full race for it.

Development
Development for Mario Kart 8 started in 2012. Some ideas that were scrapped in Mario Kart 8 included a drill that made drivers drive into subterranean depths. The idea was scrapped because the developers thought it was not as interesting as the anti-gravity idea. The anti-gravity concept stemmed from the Wii U being a powerful console, and with the upgraded hardware, the developers wanted to make courses with a 3D plane in mind rather than the 2D plane as the other tracks in the Mario Kart series.

The title, Mario Kart 8, is chosen to represent the anti-gravity mechanic as the "8" used in the official logo resembles the Möbius strip from Mario Circuit. Mario circuit was in fact the first course for the game

Select tracks will be orchestrated, making this game the first Mario Kart game to feature orchestrated tracks. According to the devs, this game pushes some limits of the Wii U, but there is still potential.

Marketing and Promotion
The game had a Nintendo Direct dedicated to describing all the new features. In this Nintendo Direct, they also reveal a special Wii U Bundle for America and Europe, which included a Deluxe Black Wii U Console, a physical copy of the game, a Wii Remote Plus, a Wii Wheel and Mario & Luigi hats. Europe had a special limited edition with a T-shirt and a Blue Shell Figure. There was a special promotion in that if the consumer registered the game on Club Nintendo, the consumer could a free game. In North America, there were 4 games, each with a $40 value; Wii Party U, The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker HD, New Super Mario Bros. U, and Pikmin 3. In Europe, in addition to the games listed for America, they also got; Sonic Lost World, Mario and Sonic at the Sochi 2014 Olympic Winter Games, The Wonderful 101, Game & Wario, Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate and  Nintendo Land. Japan got a slightly difference deal where they could select 2 game and there would be free for a month and then get the games for 1/2 off after the trial.

Nintendo also did a series of commericials demonstrating the new items and the anti gravity in a quality testing format with the tag line "Flippin' Fun". They started airing on TV 2 week prior to release and was shown before movies in theaters.

Reception
The game was received very well. On Metacritic, the game received an 88 and on GameRankings, it got a 88.22% with the lowest score it received being a 7/10 from the Toronto Sun. Famitsu gave the game a 36(8,9,9,10) out of 40.

While it is currently unknown how exactly well the game has done so far, the game seems to have caused numerous stores to run out of Wii Us and selling most of their stock of the game. Amazon confimred that Mario Kart 8 has passed PS4 sales on the website. . According to Nintendo, the game sold 1.2 million over its release weekend becoming the fastest selling Wii U game to date. Most of the Wii U's sold around the time of the release were the special edition Mario Kart 8 Wii U. In Japan, the game sold 325,892 units according to Media Create and is the third best Mario Kart launch, behind Mario Kart Wii and Mario Kart 7. In the UK, the game was the best Wii U game launch and the 3rd best selling SKU behind Watch_Dogs PS4 and Xbox One. In America, the game sold over 400,000 in its opening weekend, also not far behind Watch_Dogs in the May NPD. In France, the game sold 74755 in its opening week. It was confirmed at the June Investor meeting that the game has sold over 2 million worldwide in just under a month.

Gallery
See: Mario Kart 8/gallery