Sonic Crossworlds, or Mario Kart 9 as I like to call it

Whooo girl! Two kart racers this year. More actually if you pay attention to the smaller ones, but the big guys got their engines running wild. I played Mario Kart World maniacally when it released. Honestly, I think Mario Kart 8 was my most played Switch game overall, so to no suprise the new one sold me on the whole system, though I approached it sceptically (my fears turned out to be nuisances in the end).

But now, Sonic Racing: Crossworlds released. Or will release, depends when I shoot this blogpost. And after playing the open network test and demos, I came to a conclusion, that it's a Mario Kart 9.

Let me explain.

How do you make a kart racer without being called a Mario Kart rip-off?

Easily actually. From the beginning Sonic Racing always tried to distance itself from Mario Kart. Mechanics felt original, gimmicks fresh and different, and as a Mario Kart girl, I had to adjust to its handling every time. When I picked up the og Sega and Sonic All Stars it felt somewhat wrong compared to MK Wii, or 8 for that matter. Same with Transformed. It was its own thing gameplay wise, similar only in being a mascot racer. And one could argue the transformations were copied from MK 7, which, yeah hard to argue against, though they made them behave differently anyways.

I didn't play it a lot though. I gave the series a try every now and then, but never for a longer period. I'm a Mario Kart girl after all.

8's genes are dominating ones

There is a lot of Mario Kart 8 DNA in Crossworlds. It's basically if MK8 had accessibility features, or some quality of life improvements, depends how you look at it. Now you get an indicator when to time your start, and drift has a gauge. Essentially, these work exactly like in MK8, but instead of hoping you hit it right, you can see how far you were off. No guessing. Personally I'd like to turn it off, it's more visual clutter for me, but I appreciate these being there.

And a weird one, or maybe not, I feel like Crossworlds is closer presentation-wise to 8, than World. Spectators are a 2D 5 fps texture, for whatver reason game is locked to 60 even on PC, and is that a baked lighting I see? My bane in making custom Mario Kart 8 tracks, but a clever way for a game to look great and not require a beefy hardware? Yeah I think. Good for them. Kart customization is there, but so overhauled I'd compare it to NFS rather than MK 7/8.

Anyway just because some genes are dominating, doesn't mean it's an exact copy. Crossworlds still does its own things. I enjoy the banter between the rivals (Big the Cat is a menace in some characters' eyes), trick system is not my favorite, but has a bit more depth, and of course, the main gimmick, switching tracks in the middle of the race. This one I have technical issues with. I like the idea. Adore it even. But. On 3060Ti with nvme it drops to 30 fps when approaching the ring. In the world where Ratchet and Clank could pull off fast portals, even without the PS5 SSD I find this unacceptable.

In a parallel world where...

...Nintendo forgo the open-world idea for Mario Kart, I think this is what a "Mario Kart 9" would look like. Still sticking to isolated tracks, but adding a gimmick so that it doesn't feel like Mario Kart 8 Deluxe 2 at all. In our world, throw in the roots of the Sonic Racing series and you got yourself a tasty fusion cusine meal.

I think this is a point in time where the kart-racer approach splits. You either do a "World", or you iterate over a tried and tested approach. Can't, and shouldn't say which is right, as both are right. It's up to you, me, others to prefer one over the other. Although I can't see many following Nintendo's footsteps anytime soon. I mean alright, Crash did it earlier, but hardly any studio capable has the resources, or the will to make an open-world kart racer. And they don't have to. "World" shows that blending Mario Kart and Forza Horizon can taste sweet and sour, and Crossworlds shows that you can still make the old formula work, and twist and turn it on its head to feel fresh.

It's another 10 years of Mario Kart for me, but hey, I appreciate Crossworlds for existing. I like this Mario Kart 9.