On Nov. 9, Mario Kart 8 for the Nintendo Switch received what seems to be its final DLC update, which added in more than just eight new courses. 

On top of the new race tracks, this recent update included four new characters those being Peachette, Diddy Kong, Funky Kong and Pauline, a new jukebox music player in the main menu, the ability to create your own lobbies instead of hosting a tournament, and a secret new end credit scene when you fully complete the game. 

The first four courses in the Acorn Cup are “Rome Avanti” from Mario Kart Tour on mobile, “DK Mountain” from the Nintendo GameCube, “Daisy Circuit” from the Wii and “Piranha Plant Cove,” which is a new map exclusive to Mario Kart 8. 

The other courses from the Spiny Cup are “Madrid Drive” from Mario Kart Tour on mobile, “Rosalina’s Ice World” from Mario Kart 7 on the Nintendo 3DS, “Bowser’s Castle 3” from Super Mario Kart on the Super Nintendo Entertainment System and “Rainbow Road” from the Wii. 

The Tour and Mario Kart 8 exclusive courses each have their own unique features. 

In Rome Avanti, if a player is far enough ahead of their competitors, they could pass or hit them while going the opposite direction on the second and third lap which can lead to some chaotic situations. 

The Piranha Plant Cove course has a pirate theme to it and is mostly underwater. The racers must move along a different path during each lap, making it so they will have to pass through new obstacles as the race continues. 

Madrid Drive is the most unique of the eight maps added.

From racing through an art gallery with Piranha Plants that will bite at you to dodging soccer balls kicked at you by Goombas in a soccer stadium, there are plenty of things racers need to watch out for on this course. There is even a sleeping Wiggler, who wakes up on the second lap and walks around as an obstacle racers need to avoid crashing into. 

Even with the shiny, new courses, the maps from the older games feel great to race on because all of them have their iconic features and shortcuts. Also, there is a slight change to their theme music which sounds better than the originals. 

Daisy Circuit, for example, still has that tunnel shortcut through the building, but now the boost pad activates your glider, giving you a nice view of the sunset. There are also boost pads and more item boxes placed around the lighthouse. 

The Wii version of Rainbow Road is loved for its beauty and music and hated for its extremely tight turns that make it easy to slip off even when not using motion controls.

When a racer falls off the course and plummets toward the planet, the player will still get a flame effect just like from the original course, but it takes significantly less time to recover compared to the Wii version.  

With the new characters, each one has their own unique animations when boosting and using items and Pauline, in particular, actually sings a small part of the song “Jump Up, Super Star!” which she sings in a special level of the game “Super Mario Odyssey.” 

Along with the new courses and characters, a music box feature was also added that allows the player to listen to any songs and their variations from any of the courses in the game. 

Players now also have the ability to create their own lobby or search for a specific lobby from its ID code. Before, players had to set up a tournament and join their friends from the Nintendo Switch homepage, but now this makes playing with friends much easier and more private. 

A new end credits scene can be unlocked by obtaining third place or higher in all of the DLC cups and skipping past the last trophy reveal. 

The new credits have moving photos of racers driving through each of the DLC courses and a heartwarming photo of a majority of the characters thanking the community for playing. 

Mario Kart 8 Deluxe has been receiving support for almost a decade and has seen an addition of a whopping 64 new courses, and it seems a little sad to know that the game is finally complete. 

The game has brought back so many old maps and characters that haven’t seen the light of day in quite a long time, and the game’s huge amount of content will ensure that it will be looked back upon in a positive and wholesome light.