Mario Kart 8: Wii U versus Switch

[gf78]

When discussing games we would like to see ported from the Wii U to Switch, a few people brought up they didn't want any and felt that the ones that have been released were just repackaged. I feel that porting these games is a good thing as many people didnt give the Wii U the time of day. So Nintendo is sitting on some truly fantastic games that deserve to be played by a larger audience.

With that in mind, I decided to do comparisons between the original Wii U versions and the Switch versions, starting with Mario Kart 8 Deluxe. Here are the changes/additions to the Switch version.

New characters:  King Boo, Dry Bones, Bowser Jr., Inkling Boy & Inkling Girl and Gold Mario.

Character Variations:  Link from Breath of the Wild, 8 colors for Yoshi and 8 colors for Shy Guy.

New Karts:  Splat Buggy, Ink Striker, Koopa Clown, Super Glider

New Features:  Dual Items, Super Drift Boost, Quick Turn, Smart Steering, Auto Acceleration, Boo & Fearher Items, 8-player Local Multiplayer, LAN Mode, All tracks & characters unlocked from the start.

Performance Enhancements:  Faster load times, boost to 1080p resolution

DLC:  Includes all previous DLC cups:  Egg Cup, Triforce Cup, Bell Cup and Crossing Cup (16 tracks)

Includes all previous DLC characters:  Link, Tanooki Mario, Cat Peach, Villager Boy & Girl, Isabelle and Dry Bowser.

Includes all previous DLC karts:  Streetle, City Tripper, P-Wing, Bone Rattler, Blu Falcon, B-Dasher, Master Cycle and Tanooki Kart.

New Battle Modes:  Bob-Omb Blast, Renegade Roundup, Coin Runners and Shine Thief.

So comparing the retail packaged Wii U and Switch versions they have added:

13 new characters + variations for Link, Yoshi and Shy Guy
12 new karts
4 cups with 4 tracks each for a total of 16 new tracks
4 new battle modes

Those are pretty significant changes & additions. Nintendo did more work on this game than most other develops put in between sequels of their titles.

[aliensstudios]

Those are pretty significant changes & additions. Nintendo did more work on this game than most other develops put in between sequels of their titles.

[gf78]

Those are pretty significant changes & additions. Nintendo did more work on this game than most other develops put in between sequels of their titles.

You dont agree that it's a pretty good amount of added content? Or that Nintendo put more effort into a port than other developers do in their sequels? 

Activision reskins Call of Doody every year and charges an extra $50 after the base $60 for maps. They even did away with the campaign entirely this round.

Capcom just adds more words and numbers to Street Fighter. $60, a couple new characters & a turbo mode with a ridiculously long game title. Or making you pay for characters already programmed in and locked on the disc.

Sony, porting a huge batch of their games to the PS3 and now PS4 with a slightly higher framerates and upscale to 1080p. 

Fallout 76. Take all the interesting NPC's out. Undoubtedly lower quality with less effort put in than Fallout 4 with multiplayer tacked on that nobody wanted.

Dynasty Warriors 4000. Same game, different name.

Just Dance games that just reused the last ten iterations graphics with different songs.

Those are just a few examples. Tony Hawk?  Guitar Hero?  I could go on and on. Or how about Destiny, actually REGRESSING from the 1st game to the 2nd?

[aliensstudios]

Those are pretty significant changes & additions. Nintendo did more work on this game than most other develops put in between sequels of their titles.

You dont agree that it's a pretty good amount of added content? Or that Nintendo put more effort into a port than other developers do in their sequels? 

Activision reskins Call of Doody every year and charges an extra $50 after the base $60 for maps. They even did away with the campaign entirely this round.

Capcom just adds more words and numbers to Street Fighter. $60, a couple new characters & a turbo mode with a ridiculously long game title. Or making you pay for characters already programmed in and locked on the disc.

Sony, porting a huge batch of their games to the PS3 and now PS4 with a slightly higher framerates and upscale to 1080p. 

Fallout 76. Take all the interesting NPC's out. Undoubtedly lower quality with less effort put in than Fallout 4 with multiplayer tacked on that nobody wanted.

Dynasty Warriors 4000. Same game, different name.

Just Dance games that just reused the last ten iterations graphics with different songs.

Those are just a few examples. Tony Hawk?  Guitar Hero?  I could go on and on. Or how about Destiny, actually REGRESSING from the 1st game to the 2nd?

Personally, as someone who supported the Wii U from day one, each port to Switch sort of makes me roll my eyes. I'll admit, I liked Mario Kart 8 Deluxe enough to purchase, but in hindsight, as someone who bought the Wii U title + the DLC, the new content in Mario Kart 8 Deluxe was not satiable for me and that's why I've steered clear of buying ports for the Switch since then.

Those examples you gave are excellent for the most part, but with each port Nintendo creates, it feels more and more like they are becoming Activision or EA. Their new Switch exclusives are great, but like I said, I already have a lot of their remakes for Wii U.  I guess if you compare the retail packages for the two, you're right, but as someone who bought Mario Kart 8 Deluxe after having all of the Wii U's dlc, I've put like ten hours into Deluxe in almost two years, and I regret the purchase. To me, it wasn't much of an advancement.

[kamikazekeeg]

Personally, as someone who supported the Wii U from day one, each port to Switch sort of makes me roll my eyes. I'll admit, I liked Mario Kart 8 Deluxe enough to purchase, but in hindsight, as someone who bought the Wii U title + the DLC, the new content in Mario Kart 8 Deluxe was not satiable for me and that's why I've steered clear of buying ports for the Switch since then.

Those examples you gave are excellent for the most part, but with each port Nintendo creates, it feels more and more like they are becoming Activision or EA. Their new Switch exclusives are great, but like I said, I already have a lot of their remakes for Wii U.  I guess if you compare the retail packages for the two, you're right, but as someone who bought Mario Kart 8 Deluxe after having all of the Wii U's dlc, I've put like ten hours into Deluxe in almost two years, and I regret the purchase. To me, it wasn't much of an advancement.

The Wii U ports were necessary as Nintendo clearly hasn't had the games ready yet for the Switch.  That first year of release was good, but it dropped off hard in the second year outside of Smash and Pokemon Lets Go at the end of the year.  It also gave those Wii U games a second chance to go big.  I'm in the same place in that I played most of it on the Wii U, so I've only picked up Hyrule Warriors and Mario Kart 8 ports, but I don't fault them for releasing them again on Switch.  Not that I don't feel slightly disappointed when another port shows up over getting something new lol

That said, I hope this year brings more games as I'm worried it'll be just like last year where it wasn't a whole lot till the end of the year.  Not much confirmation for this year beyond Pokemon and Animal Crossing, which aren't big ones for me, I just don't want my Switch to go unused most of the year like in 2018.

As for the Deluxe edition of Mario Kart 8, it's a nice port with some good additions, but it's not on a "sequel" level at all.  Comparing "retail packages" is kinda unfair and sorta overstates what Deluxe brought to to the Switch.  It's mostly just a few new characters, karts, some nice features and tweaks, and Battle Mode.  Really, it's only above the level of one of the DLC packs they had for the Wii U version.  Definitely the best version of the game, no doubt about that though.

[telly]

I think if Mario Kart 8 hadn't gotten DLC then the re-release would be a much, much weaker product. And most of these games that are being turned into Switch ports don't have DLC.

The "New Super Mario Bros U" port is a great example of that 

[gf78]

Personally, as someone who supported the Wii U from day one, each port to Switch sort of makes me roll my eyes. I'll admit, I liked Mario Kart 8 Deluxe enough to purchase, but in hindsight, as someone who bought the Wii U title + the DLC, the new content in Mario Kart 8 Deluxe was not satiable for me and that's why I've steered clear of buying ports for the Switch since then.

Those examples you gave are excellent for the most part, but with each port Nintendo creates, it feels more and more like they are becoming Activision or EA. Their new Switch exclusives are great, but like I said, I already have a lot of their remakes for Wii U.  I guess if you compare the retail packages for the two, you're right, but as someone who bought Mario Kart 8 Deluxe after having all of the Wii U's dlc, I've put like ten hours into Deluxe in almost two years, and I regret the purchase. To me, it wasn't much of an advancement.

I see your side, especially coming from somebody that supported Wii U and bought & played all those games. I think it makes good business sense for Nintendo, and it gives people who didnt play the Wii U a chance to enjoy these games.

In a perfect world, we would have gotten sequels to Mario Kart 8, New Super Mario Bros. U, Donkey Kong Tropical Freeze, Hyrule Warriors, etc.  But regardless of your outlook on the matter, Nintendo doesnt release their games until they are ready. Me, I prefer that rather than the new industry standard:  Ship it now & patch it later.

We have gotten some really great Switch exclusives like Zelda Breath of the Wild (I'm counting it since it was a simultaneous release), Super Mario Odyssey, 1-2 Switch (should a been a pack-in), Fire Emblem Warriors, Splatoon 2, Xenoblade Chronicles 2, Kirby Star Allies, Mario Tennis Aces, the Labo stuff, Octopath Traveller, Pokemon Let's Go Pikachu & Let's Go Evee, Super Mario Party, Super Smash Bros Ultimate and  Xenoblade Chronicles 2 - Zorna the Golden Country.  That's fifteen new, original games - not ports - released in the first 21 months on market. That's a record for Nintendo probably!  To me, that's more than enough 1st party software in that time frame.

There were also about ten Nintendo-made Switch eShop titles so far, and  eight or so ports for those that want them. So about 33 Nintendo games in less than two years.

I'm really looking forward to 2019. So far, we know we are getting Yoshi's Crafted World, a new Pokemon game, Luigi's Mansion 3, Metroid Prime 4 (date has been leaked apparently) and Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3.

Nintendo combined their handheld and console divisions which should start yielding a steady stream of exclusive games. With the supposedly unearthed code pointing to a SNES online app like the current NES one,  the upcoming exclusives and a ton of indies for those who like them, N
The Switch may become my favorite Nintendo system ever.

Now Nintendo just needs to release N64 and Gamecube classic consoles and for Bloodstained to come out and it will be offical:  I'm not leaving the house!  LOL.

[emporerdragon]

Dynasty Warriors 4000. Same game, different name.

I disagree heavily here. While the Warriors games do have the same core gameplay, each one does handle differently from the rest and have their own unique touches to the formula.

[tpugmire]

Just curious since I don’t own the switch version, but does it include the Mercedes Benz DLC too?

[gf78]

Just curious since I don’t own the switch version, but does it include the Mercedes Benz DLC too?

According to this, yes
https://nintendoeverything.com/how-to-unlock-the-mercedes-benz-dlc-in-mario-kart-8-deluxe-plus-footage/

[seberhusky]

The Wii-U was a great system, but the admission price was too high and games were technologically neutered. I don't mind re-ports so long as there is effort put into them other than "hey look here's the same game again but in better quality".  Example being Lego City Undercover on the Wii-U - great game, and its implementation of the gamepad was cool, but the game looked like an Xbox 360 game.  When it was re-released to the PS4, they gave it a total overhaul and changed a lot of the names of the cars, added more cars, removed the draw distance haze, upscaled all the graphics, changed all the missions to adapt to a PS4 controller without the gamepad.  It had a huge amount of work done, but it's what I like to call a "secret remaster". Only fans who played through the original alot would notice the changes, and the changes were not publicly announced or made news like for example when updates to Minecraft are made and there's entire huge list of changes made public.

[sworddude]

The wii u was a failed console it's only logical to create ports from the wii u on the switch. They invested allot of time into the wii u game while allot of people just ignored the console

At least on the switch even if it's a port many people have not played the game yet.

I mean seriously mario kart 8 deluxe sold more copies in a year than the wii u game not to mention that mario kart 8 was the best sold game on the wii u It's kinda pathetic

It's not a good argument that wii u owners should be mad since many people did not give the game a shot in the first place.

even if the port was exactly the same but with better visuals it would still be good enough since the wii u just failed as a console.

As far as sales goes I mean smash bros on switch sold 5 million copies in a single week. smash 4 on wii u sold 5 million copies in the entire life time of the wii u.

Deluxe was a nice improvement but they still messed up the battle mode a bit unfortunately since the god damm wii era

Still no last man standing baloon battles like in them golden days, that's 50% of the fun just gone as far as battle mode goes.

[marvelvscapcom2]

Porting games so the previous gen entires can shine on new software, and so fans and new comers alike can enjoy games they may not have played is a brilliant idea if it's kept with that intent at heart.   


But charging 60 dollars for a 6 year old port that isn't even really a remaster 90 percent of the time soley because it includes the DLC that should have came for free anyway is a diverse and ellaborate scam and the consumer shouldn't stand of it.  I don't buy a 2014 Camry for 2019 Camry price.  Real devs are making real new games like rockstar and they deserve that money.  Not copy and pastes.  Just to repurpose a game and using the term "deluxe" or "Definitive Edition" as a means of copping out of making new franchise entries and essentially diluting a pretty good chunk of your console's library with your failed console library making people pay for the same game twice at full retail all because you couldn't market last time and are hedging on people double dipping their cookie so you double your profits and not take a loss -  Disgraceful.   


I don't agree with DLC meaning it deserves a full 60 dollar retail price because most games from reputable companies including Xbox and PS4 third party games which are typically much larger in scope release GOTY or deluxe editions for 20-40 dollars 2 years later than Include all DLC.   With Nintendo I don't think they deserve a pass.   I think this generation has seen great things from Nintendo but I own a Wii U so much of it has been lost on me.  I just don't appreciate how they did this entire scheme to double down on all their money from old games.  It's unacceptable to me.   

[sworddude]

Porting games so the previous gen entires can shine on new software, and so fans and new comers alike can enjoy games they may not have played is a brilliant idea if it's kept with that intent at heart.   


But charging 60 dollars for a 6 year old port that isn't even really a remaster 90 percent of the time soley because it includes the DLC that should have came for free anyway is a diverse and ellaborate scam and the consumer shouldn't stand of it.  I don't buy a 2014 Camry for 2019 Camry price.  Real devs are making real new games like rockstar and they deserve that money.  Not copy and pastes.  Just to repurpose a game and using the term "deluxe" or "Definitive Edition" as a means of copping out of making new franchise entries and essentially diluting a pretty good chunk of your console's library with your failed console library making people pay for the same game twice at full retail all because you couldn't market last time and are hedging on people double dipping their cookie so you double your profits and not take a loss -  Disgraceful.   


I don't agree with DLC meaning it deserves a full 60 dollar retail price because most games from reputable companies including Xbox and PS4 third party games which are typically much larger in scope release GOTY or deluxe editions for 20-40 dollars 2 years later than Include all DLC.   With Nintendo I don't think they deserve a pass.   I think this generation has seen great things from Nintendo but I own a Wii U so much of it has been lost on me.  I just don't appreciate how they did this entire scheme to double down on all their money from old games.  It's unacceptable to me.   

mario kart 8 was 3 years old when the switch port was released furthermore since the wii u failed so bad many people have not even bought mario kart 8 to begin with. Switch sales surpassed the wii u sales in a single year by 1.5 times not to mention probably many more sales to come.

In my opinion it deserves the 60$ retail value since not many people have bought the game. for many people it's a brand new game. also the dlc was 20$ if i am not mistaken on the wii u version. considering the sales of 13 million for mario kart deluxe in a single year there where plenty of people who did not buy the game not to mention that many people who have the wii u version might not buy the deluxe version and even than the sales are 13 million at this moment compared to the 8 million on the wii u.

[Cartagia]

Porting games so the previous gen entires can shine on new software, and so fans and new comers alike can enjoy games they may not have played is a brilliant idea if it's kept with that intent at heart.   


But charging 60 dollars for a 6 year old port that isn't even really a remaster 90 percent of the time soley because it includes the DLC that should have came for free anyway is a diverse and ellaborate scam and the consumer shouldn't stand of it.  I don't buy a 2014 Camry for 2019 Camry price.  Real devs are making real new games like rockstar and they deserve that money.  Not copy and pastes.  Just to repurpose a game and using the term "deluxe" or "Definitive Edition" as a means of copping out of making new franchise entries and essentially diluting a pretty good chunk of your console's library with your failed console library making people pay for the same game twice at full retail all because you couldn't market last time and are hedging on people double dipping their cookie so you double your profits and not take a loss -  Disgraceful.   


I don't agree with DLC meaning it deserves a full 60 dollar retail price because most games from reputable companies including Xbox and PS4 third party games which are typically much larger in scope release GOTY or deluxe editions for 20-40 dollars 2 years later than Include all DLC.   With Nintendo I don't think they deserve a pass.   I think this generation has seen great things from Nintendo but I own a Wii U so much of it has been lost on me.  I just don't appreciate how they did this entire scheme to double down on all their money from old games.  It's unacceptable to me.   

mario kart 8 was 3 years old when the switch port was released furthermore since the wii u failed so bad many people have not even bought mario kart 8 to begin with. Switch sales surpassed the wii u sales in a single year by 1.5 times not to mention probably many more sales to come.

In my opinion it deserves the 60$ retail value since not many people have bought the game. for many people it's a brand new game. also the dlc was 20$ if i am not mistaken on the wii u version. considering the sales of 13 million for mario kart deluxe in a single year there where plenty of people who did not buy the game not to mention that many people who have the wii u version might not buy the deluxe version and even than the sales are 13 million at this moment compared to the 8 million on the wii u.

I think this is exactly right.  Mario Kart 8 Deluxe has sold more units on Switch than total Wii U consoles were sold.  It is essentially one of those big "GotY" compilation discs that includes ALL the released content (and more) for a typical MSRP price point.

That said, I do think Mario Kart is the only one of these titles that should be getting sold at that full $60 price point.  Most of the other titles have too few changes to warrant asking that price again, especially since they had gotten really cheap on the Wii U (Tropical Freeze is the big offender here).