September 25th was the start of a new addiction for teenagers who grew up playing Mario Kart on the Wii. Mario Kart came out with a mobile app this year, updating the Wii version from 2008. After downloading the app, I began to play the new version of an old game. It was very different in many aspects but had enough similarities to give the game its original feel.  

The steering and movement are more difficult than the Wii, but the app has multiple options in settings for how to steer throughout the game. The steering options are simple, drift, and tilt mode, which is where the person playing can just tilt their phone instead of touching the screen and swiping the screen to move. In the Wii version, the player could the tilt the remote or attach the nunchuk to steer. I think the Wii version is better due the simplicity of steering and the ease of learning how to move around in the race.  

The characters are the same, but players start with only one character, one kart, and one parachute. Throughout the game, players can use rubies to shoot out other characters, karts, and parachutes. With the Wii, players can unlock characters by how good they do in the game. The way to unlock other cups in the app is to earn a certain number of stars from previous cups. The stars are earned by points, performance in the race, and which characters, karts, and parachutes players use. Most of the time, all five stars from the courses in each cup are hard to redeem, even when winning first, because of the other factors that come into play based on points earned. However, on the Wii, cups are unlocked by earning trophies when placing in the top three in different cups. The simplicity of unlocking cups makes the Wii version my go-to game. It makes the game more interesting knowing that I can unlock more cups.  

 When the app is first downloaded, it almost seems as if the app allows each player to win first place in their first race. I think they do that so the person playing will keep on wanting to play the game. I feel as if the Wii version of Mario Kart isn’t rigged because there is more of a variation in where I place; but in the app, I consistently get first. The new Mario Kart app is very fun and addictive, and I would recommend playing it, but in no way does it compare to the original Wii version we all remember playing growing up.