Mario Kart 8 / Mario Kart 8 Deluxe

I'm not sure what you mean by "those who have milked Mario Kart 8". Perhaps for us we want a new game but Nintendo probably believes Mario Kart 8 Deluxe IS the game, and why do anything about it when it's still selling? In terms of "long-supported games", GTA V (particularly its online, lol shark cards) comes really fresh to my mind of a super old game that's still getting support and is still selling like crazy and, along with Red Dead 2, Rockstar hasn't developed or published new games in a REALLY long time, something like Bully being in a limbo for well over a decade and a half (Red Dead 2 is also languishing update-wise). Skyrim doesn't count, that got constant re-releases in tandem with the updates. I suppose even Nintendo isn't quite on the trend of the other game companies when it comes to constant support... yet... since they ended support pretty early for Super Mario Maker 2 and they did seem to strictly end support for Smash Ultimate, but I also see little reason for Nintendo to make a new Mario Kart when the current one relatively recently ousted Mario Kart Wii for best selling Mario Kart game.

Yeah I figure it's just a track pass. It'll probably destroy the original point of the costumes if they were easily part of the battle content, the point being gambling fodder.
 
The shots look like most are directly taken from Tour's course thumbnails.
mk8d feat mkt.jpg


Look at MKT's thumbnails
MKT_Icon_TokyoBlur.png
MKT_Icon_ChocoMountainN64.png

MKT_Icon_NinjaHideaway.png

And Sky Garden, Shroom Ridge, and Coconut Mall look like they are in-game screenshots from Tour.
The pavement makes it obvious (MK8D has darker pavement)
sky garden.jpg
 
Not crazy about how the tracks are basically just ripped straight from Tour, but there's a shitload of them to the point where it's basically an entirely new game for less than half the price.
 
this dlc pack or whatever it is has Quite the asking price for courses that arent even remade to match the aesthetic of the rest of the game. it just looks bad
did they not have enough time to make them look better, considering this pack has almost a whole two years to release fully? they ARE making a lot of tracks here so i wonder if they ended up picking quantity over quality
 
Additional tracks is more satisfying than more characters I'll give them that. I just really hope they upgrade the art before release.
 
I'm hoping for upgraded textures but I doubt they'll entirely rework tracks to better suit Mario Kart 8's handling. Even redoing textures seems like a lot of work and I can imagine only fans taking up that mantle.
 
Striker Mario Boogaloo said:
Even redoing textures seems like a lot of work and I can imagine only fans taking up that mantle.
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I've already seen talks about upgrading textures in the Mario Kart 8 Deluxe modding server lol.
 
Honestly I don't mind the way the tracks look. They succeed in fitting the Mario aesthetic, even if there's a clear difference in level of detail. I'm more concerned that they didn't take the very obvious opportunity to bring over some of the characters too. I know a lot of them are just different costumes, but come on. Pauline, King Bob-Omb, Monty Mole, LM King Boo, are all worthy to be brought over into an actual not-gambling Mario Kart ffs.

Also it will be interesting and honestly a unique scenario to compare Nintendo's ports of Tour tracks to what fans have done modding them into MK8 already. I wonder how different they will be from what fans are able to do.
 
These shots do look like Tour. What could work is to release other tracks from other titles like DD, N64, Wii, and etc in their original animation, that way Nintendo could label all of them retro tracks, and not have to overhaul the graphics and turn the game into an eclectic mix mash of art styles for courses.
 
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On one hand it's cool we'll be able to free roam MKT tracks & have them permanently,
on the other it's a kick in the knee if we don't get upgraded textures and props
 
i dont understand why theyre stretching this dlc out for this long for just reused mkt tracks the appearnce of which doesnt match the rest of the game
also i think. by the end of this dlc cycle. the game will have been around for 9.5 years? thats almost a decade? we should have gotten a new mario kart jesus
 
zelen !! said:
i dont understand why theyre stretching this dlc out for this long for just reused mkt tracks the appearnce of which doesnt match the rest of the game
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most of these tracks seem don't actually seem to have appeared in tour yet, so at least some development time is still required.

The main reason is probably just because it's a smart business tactic. Why release every track for Mario Kart 8 at once, having people just talk about it when it comes out and then seemingly forget, when you can keep discourse about it going for two whole years?
 
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zelen !! said:
i dont understand why theyre stretching this dlc out for this long for just reused mkt tracks the appearnce of which doesnt match the rest of the game
also i think. by the end of this dlc cycle. the game will have been around for 9.5 years? thats almost a decade? we should have gotten a new mario kart jesus
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someone posted this in gamefaqs

What matters is everyone reading this thread knows what's up, and if you don't believe me, you're free to click the link in post #8 to read that the source of that modded track admitted themselves their first attempts took them 1 month and a half of time, with overtime. So yeah, while impressive they got Toad Circuit in 8D only in 2 days time, it's not like it's their first time messing with the code and it's not like they work with a big development team where everything is carefully checked and rubber stamped by more than just 1 person involved, thus adding more time. That's no secret and idk why anyone would think it is.

I did point out too that there are other teams involved. Possibly a marketing strategy yeah, but it's more complicated than that. It's also a more rigid testing structure, for example, where things tend to go back and forth and code is cleaned up further. That doesn't happen when you work alone.

Not to mention that there's also work to be done with the menus, ensuring said courses can be played online, and figuring out the logistics involved with that. It's not just "make the track" it's other work on top too, involving artists and UX designers among others, which I have brought up before, and you've repeatedly failed to address.

Said modder has also publicly said that their other tracks (see their Vanilla Lake video) took about a month to make, meaning they already went through the learning curve.

This is an 8 year old game too... Do you really think the same programmers who worked on that original code are still around? Video game development has very high turnover as far as coding jobs go, fyi. Chances are the people who are now working on this DLC are absolutely not the same ones who worked on the original game. Just having the code doesn't mean you can understand how it all works, there's a learning curve involved. So yeah, having experience is one thing but actually understanding the code is another, hence why that experience is kinda relevant even for professional teams...
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i've also watched a video where vfx artists said it took weeks to fix a minor, simple rig error in pacific rim. there's bureaucratic back and forth bullshit that goes onto professional game development that modders aren't burdened with. plus i strongly believe the release dates are staggered to give a perpetual content model from a business standpoint rather than they are actually finished, here enjoy them.

plus mario kart 8 deluxe is still a heavy seller. from a business perspective, there's no reason to make a new one. they're likely saving it for the next console.
 
I'm still struggling to understand how adding high-quality textures and better lighting to a couple assets entails a good understanding of a game's code. I've done that before and I have close to zero programming knowledge.

I'm aware of the hardships of bureaucratic rigmarole in certain situations, but not adding a minimum amount of polish to a product doesn't read the same to me as detecting an issue and contacting the higher-ups and whatnot for ways to solve it. No, it reads as poor initial planning and/or an outright refusal to expend resources to that end.
 
Koopa con Carne said:
I'm still struggling to understand how adding high-quality textures and better lighting to a couple assets entails a good understanding of a game's code. I've done that before and I have close to zero programming knowledge.

I'm aware that bureaucratic rigmarole is a thing, but not adding a minimum amount of polish to a product doesn't read the same to me as detecting an issue and contacting the higher-ups and whatnot for ways to solve it. No, it reads as poor planning and/or a refusal to expend resources to that end.
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Porting a track from one game to another game requires far much more resources than just adding "higher quality textures" and "better" lightning, especially for these new tracks: the tracks recorded for gameplay footage on first reveal are pretty much done, they're not in development any more, and the only tweaks they will end up in the final product are minor ones such as adding a MKTV truck or changing a Pianta on the side. On the above point, you probably used a reverse-engineered tool that was developed on the side for adding high quality textures and better lighting (lighting isn't actually the main issue with these tracks in all honesty, much of the reason they look as drab as they are are the modeling and texture work), because that's how the modders did, they used such tools, which were in development for quite some time (plus this is not counting the music that has to be added to the tracks and UI elements such as course icons, course maps, modifying UI files to accommodate for new additions, etc.). In addition, yes, adding textures does require some programming knowledge, probably not from the artist's end, but from the programmers end, I don't know much about programming itself but the course model file has to reference its textures from somewhere. Consistency for the textures so that it looks uniformly presentable is also a thing as well, they can't have like, one track look very well-detailed and the rest having an artistic clash. Much of why I think the tracks look the way they look now is primarily because of time constraints, Nintendo wants that returns for their investment as soon as possible, and also why you're dropping an upfront season pass price for some tracks when not all of them are decided yet.

As I said earlier, VFX artists had to spend weeks fixing a minor rig error in Pacific Rim. Weeks. For something that can be done in a few seconds. That's because in professional developments, those sorts of things have to be run by through higher ups and the rest of the team and whatnot, you can't just polish this up on your own without notifying everything beforehand. Modders have this freedom. Free lancers do. Not professionals.

Release dates by the way are almost entirely business mandated rather than game development mandated. I think it's too soon for release, and that's where I believe the accusation of poor planning/expenditure of resources would be applicable.
 
At the very least, some people got to play the new courses. Tour players, are the courses similar to the ones in Mario Kart Tour?


My thoughts so far:
  • Paris Promenade has a rather interesting twist for its third lap. Instead of going through the same loop in the first two, it goes off a different path. I wonder if this represented different versions of Paris Promenade?
  • Toad Circuit has a similar-looking layout as the Tour one, though I guess the original is already very simple so there's not much that could be done.
  • Choco Mountain looks kind of barren, more so than the original I felt. I guess the wilted trees made a difference. It's interesting how there's now a gap that acts as a gliding path.
  • Coconut Mall looks nice, even if there's no Tour equivalent to compare it to. No more Miis in the cars in Coconut Mall? It's disappointing that they were removed, but I suppose I can live with it.
  • Much like Paris Promenade, the actual Tokyo Blur track looks more complex than what I have seen on the wiki. and indeed, every lap the path is different.
  • Shroom Ridge does not have an equivalent Tour track also, but at first glance, the track looks curvy, and the vehicles come from Toad's Turnpike, which means the existence of skateboard cars. There seems to be a wind pipe near the end of the lap, and that looks like a shortcut.
  • Comparing Tour's minimap with this version of Sky Garden, there appears to be two giant leaves around the top. That looks like an extra shortcut.
  • Ninja Hideaway looks very much like the Tour map, but then again, it's a map that is considered a quality one in Tour, so it's something that did not need to be fixed.
So far the Tour-based maps are rather interesting in their approach to how the paths change, and it's something I was expecting as a standard in the 9th Mario Kart, so maybe that's not the twist of that game. The levels are simpler graphically, but still, they look rather decent.

Thank you for reading.

EDIT: Is it me, or does Ninja Hideaway intentionally lack the "Tour" label, unlike both Paris Promenade and Tokyo Blur?
 
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winstein said:
EDIT: Is it me, or does Ninja Hideaway intentionally lack the "Tour" label, unlike both Paris Promenade and Tokyo Blur?
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I noticed that also. I'm guessing they're only using it for the city courses to differenciate between those and the non-city courses, but it's a confusing choice nonetheless.
 
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