Here is my summary of the pros and cons of MKWii:
Pros:
- Great, flawless online system with 0 runtime lag (there's some logical lag like red shells not hitting the player when they visually look like they will)
- Awesome online features (ranking/ghost data, competitions, etc.)
- Pretty interesting tracks
- Bikes: very fun
- Items:
- I like the POW block. If you can get into the air at the right time you can avoid it. It's a neat concept.
- The lightning cloud is also neat. I like how the player has to pass it to someone else in a short amount of time.
- I like that terrain actually has a significant impact on your speed. It actually makes players more careful.
Cons:
- 12 players is just too much. The powerful items (like thunder, blue shell, bullet bill) are gotten way too often since there's such a high probability (the number of players). I think 6 players is the perfect number.
- Items:
- Bullet Bill is ridiculous. It should only be obtainable on last rank, and should have a shorter duration.
- The squid ink is ineffective. It could have been designed better to actually have serious effects.
- The blue shell should not stop players in their tracks. It should instead roll them in a direction. Simply put it's way too powerful and can change the rankings way too much.
- Red shells should retain their semi-homing (not fully homing like MKDS/Wii) nature that was seen in MK64. They shouldn't be guaranteed hit if the victim doesn't have protection (banana, shell).
- The lightning cloud is too penalizing. With 12 racers, having just one racer become small is too harsh.
- The yellow mushroom should not last as long as it does. A player can go from 12th place to 1st with just one of those mushrooms easily.
- Where the hell is the ghost!? I loved the idea of being able to steal other player's items.
- It seems like a step back that they didn't include player specific items/weapons like in GC (or was that DS? I forget).
- Tricks could have been thought out better. I believe they could have made this very much a skilled portion of the game that players could master to gain an edge.
- The drifting system is too easy. They should have matched the drifting system entirely to MK64 or MKGC which both didn't have snaking problems but still made drifting something of an "advanced technique" that at least required *some* skill.
- No free for all battle mode really hurts this game.
It feels weird to me that MKWii is almost a step back in many ways. For one, they removed the partner system that was in GC (but maybe that's why MKGC is called Double Dash). They removed some items (like the ghost). They removed in a sense the left-right-left-right drift system and replaced it with something much simpler. If you think about it, the only two aspects that MKWii brings to the series is bikes. It's weird to think it doesn't innovate any more than that. But it really doesn't!
MKGC added the partner system (significant) + multiple carts. MKDS added online (significant). MKWii in this sense feels somewhat rushed.
And it bothers me because I feel like Nintendo is losing some of its quality. This isn't just MKWii I'm talking about... look at their other first party products: Metroid Prime 3 Corruption added wiimote control but other than that it was pretty similar to MP2/MP1. Zelda Twilight Princess was not necessarily a huge step above the Zelda 64 games (it really just added pointing control for aiming weapons and some gimmicky swinging control). Super Mario Galaxy, while very pretty, was hardly innovative as compared to Super Mario 64 (it did implement some neat space physics into the mix, but was very much easier than the previous installments and felt dumbed down in terms of its puzzles and platforming challenges). Super Smash Brawl I feel is very much simplified. It adds, what, the tripping mechanic which is annoying as hell and a slightly different air dodging system, and then I guess the final smashes which are neat but very unbalanced, while removing some more interesting mechanics like power shielding (reflecting projectiles with shield), fast fall, L-canceling, etc. And then we have MKWii which is as I've mentioned above.
Lets face it, Nintendo has taken the "We" aspect of the Wii a little too far. If they simply added options to all their games to add/remove certain gameplay mechanics, and actually even better, if they simply had different games that targeted different markets (rather than casual-izing all their main franchise games as well as everything else), then I think their systems would have the absolute widest appeal. But to me, they've had way too many strikes to give me any hope that they will change their outlook, at least for the Wii. Inevitably, I will end up playing previous iterations in their franchises (SSBM, Mario Kart DS/64, Super Metroid, Super Mario 64/World/etc.) much longer than I will ever play the Wii counterparts. Don't get me wrong, the games are good, but they just aren't great.
Pros:
- Great, flawless online system with 0 runtime lag (there's some logical lag like red shells not hitting the player when they visually look like they will)
- Awesome online features (ranking/ghost data, competitions, etc.)
- Pretty interesting tracks
- Bikes: very fun
- Items:
- I like the POW block. If you can get into the air at the right time you can avoid it. It's a neat concept.
- The lightning cloud is also neat. I like how the player has to pass it to someone else in a short amount of time.
- I like that terrain actually has a significant impact on your speed. It actually makes players more careful.
Cons:
- 12 players is just too much. The powerful items (like thunder, blue shell, bullet bill) are gotten way too often since there's such a high probability (the number of players). I think 6 players is the perfect number.
- Items:
- Bullet Bill is ridiculous. It should only be obtainable on last rank, and should have a shorter duration.
- The squid ink is ineffective. It could have been designed better to actually have serious effects.
- The blue shell should not stop players in their tracks. It should instead roll them in a direction. Simply put it's way too powerful and can change the rankings way too much.
- Red shells should retain their semi-homing (not fully homing like MKDS/Wii) nature that was seen in MK64. They shouldn't be guaranteed hit if the victim doesn't have protection (banana, shell).
- The lightning cloud is too penalizing. With 12 racers, having just one racer become small is too harsh.
- The yellow mushroom should not last as long as it does. A player can go from 12th place to 1st with just one of those mushrooms easily.
- Where the hell is the ghost!? I loved the idea of being able to steal other player's items.
- It seems like a step back that they didn't include player specific items/weapons like in GC (or was that DS? I forget).
- Tricks could have been thought out better. I believe they could have made this very much a skilled portion of the game that players could master to gain an edge.
- The drifting system is too easy. They should have matched the drifting system entirely to MK64 or MKGC which both didn't have snaking problems but still made drifting something of an "advanced technique" that at least required *some* skill.
- No free for all battle mode really hurts this game.
It feels weird to me that MKWii is almost a step back in many ways. For one, they removed the partner system that was in GC (but maybe that's why MKGC is called Double Dash). They removed some items (like the ghost). They removed in a sense the left-right-left-right drift system and replaced it with something much simpler. If you think about it, the only two aspects that MKWii brings to the series is bikes. It's weird to think it doesn't innovate any more than that. But it really doesn't!
MKGC added the partner system (significant) + multiple carts. MKDS added online (significant). MKWii in this sense feels somewhat rushed.
And it bothers me because I feel like Nintendo is losing some of its quality. This isn't just MKWii I'm talking about... look at their other first party products: Metroid Prime 3 Corruption added wiimote control but other than that it was pretty similar to MP2/MP1. Zelda Twilight Princess was not necessarily a huge step above the Zelda 64 games (it really just added pointing control for aiming weapons and some gimmicky swinging control). Super Mario Galaxy, while very pretty, was hardly innovative as compared to Super Mario 64 (it did implement some neat space physics into the mix, but was very much easier than the previous installments and felt dumbed down in terms of its puzzles and platforming challenges). Super Smash Brawl I feel is very much simplified. It adds, what, the tripping mechanic which is annoying as hell and a slightly different air dodging system, and then I guess the final smashes which are neat but very unbalanced, while removing some more interesting mechanics like power shielding (reflecting projectiles with shield), fast fall, L-canceling, etc. And then we have MKWii which is as I've mentioned above.
Lets face it, Nintendo has taken the "We" aspect of the Wii a little too far. If they simply added options to all their games to add/remove certain gameplay mechanics, and actually even better, if they simply had different games that targeted different markets (rather than casual-izing all their main franchise games as well as everything else), then I think their systems would have the absolute widest appeal. But to me, they've had way too many strikes to give me any hope that they will change their outlook, at least for the Wii. Inevitably, I will end up playing previous iterations in their franchises (SSBM, Mario Kart DS/64, Super Metroid, Super Mario 64/World/etc.) much longer than I will ever play the Wii counterparts. Don't get me wrong, the games are good, but they just aren't great.
