We’re just two weeks away from the Nintendo Switch 2 release date, and everyone is gearing up for the massive launch. Switch 2 pre-orders have been live for a while now, and we’re sure that many of you will have opted for the Mario Kart World bundle. More details about the console’s biggest launch title are surfacing online.
Thanks to Nintendo’s ‘Ask the Developer’ interview series, more has been revealed about the game’s development and the challenges that the team faced. While the game started development on the original Switch, compromises were building up, and conversation around the Switch 2 offered “a ray of hope” for the devs to fully realize Mario Kart World’s potential.
Mario Kart World would have been “messy” on the Switch 1
In the Nintendo interview, Kosuke Yabuki, the producer for Mario Kart World, revealed that developing the game for the original Switch meant the team was battling with deciding “what to give up on,” due to the console’s limitations. However, following the growing development of the Switch 2, the conversation to bring it to the new console brought some relief. Art director Masaaki Ishikawa speaks of a “sense of relief” despite the need more detailed graphics.
“We worked on it while kicking the can down the road in terms of deciding what to give up on, so at some point, we knew it was going to get messy. But as we’d decided to release the Mario Kart 8 Deluxe – Booster Course Pass, we thought that would give us a bit more time to continue development. That’s when the conversation of moving it to Nintendo Switch 2 came up, and this suddenly opened up a bunch of possibilities on what we could do. It was truly a ray of hope.”
Kosuke Yabuki, Game Producer for Mario Kart World
Nintendo Switch 2 power required to run at 60 FPS
While games such as Metroid Prime 4 will be playable on the original Switch, sadly, Mario Kart World is exclusive to the Switch 2. It’s clear that hardware limitations are a part of this decision. The new console has allowed the team to work with a bigger scope for the latest Mario Kart entry, and not have to worry about performance issues so much. The game’s programming director speaks of performance, noting that there would be “constant framerate drops” on the Switch 1.
“When we were developing for Nintendo Switch, we often worried whether we could find the right balance between planning and performance. Of course, the Switch console’s performance is sufficient for developing different kinds of games, but if we had included everything we wanted to in this game’s vast world, then it wouldn’t have run at 60 fps and would have suffered from constant framerate drops.”
Kenta Sato, Programming Director for Mario Kart World
Mario Kart World will be available from June 5th, when the Switch 2 launches. There has been a fair amount of discourse regarding the price of the new Switch 2 games ($79.99 for MK World), but it’s clear that we’re finally getting a new experience in the long-running karting game series.
