Why has it become cool to like MK: Double Dash?

It sucked...

- The two on a kart mechanic meant all the karts looked big and clumsy, just ruined their design. I don't mind the option to race like that, but ALL of the karts sucked.

- The tracks were mostly forgettable, there were one or two good ones, but on the whole they were so boring.

- The music was the worst.

- The art style was over the top kiddy, it just looked horrible and too baby like and sickly

- The impact when items hit you was weak, they felt so powerful in 64

- No coins...

- No Online, which for the time was this major big thing for consoles and we expected Nintendo to do it.

etc.

For me it is the worst MK game, so forgettable but people seem to just say they love it these days just because it is the black sheep no one liked back when it came out.

TBH it's just part of a current trend. It seems recently that a lot of GCN games have suddenly started growing in popularity.

This happens with every generation. The kids that started gaming during the GameCube era are grown up now and getting nostalgic. I agree that Double Dash is one of the weaker entries in the series.

@Tonindo: That's exactly what I was going to say.

But its not a bad game. It feels the fastest out of all of them, and playing it with a friend is a blast.

And Mario Kart 64 suffers from the same thing -- that game is a mess but people forget its flaws because they had so much fun playing it anyway.

@Tonindo: That's exactly what I was going to say.

But its not a bad game. It feels the fastest out of all of them, and playing it with a friend is a blast.

And Mario Kart 64 suffers from the same thing -- that game is a mess but people forget its flaws because they had so much fun playing it anyway.

Where did you see this rise in popularity of DD?

And for @JordanElek can you explain how MK64 was a mess? I have not played it since the first xbox came out but I remember it awarded great driving and seemed to be less wacky than the later installments.

64 was great for it's day, Double Dash wasn't, that is the difference.

Such a shame Nintendo messed Mario Kart 8 up in a lot of ways from no Battle Arenas to no map on screen and not being able to split screen with one on the TV and one on the pad. They made so many odd design choices that just take away from what is the best Mario Kart ever in terms of gameplay and tracks.

@JordanElek said:

Double Dash was the worst Mario Kart, in my opinion. Mario Kart 64, however, is an awesome game that still, in the year 2014, has by far the best battle mode out of all of the Mario Kart games.

What? Its like Windwaker, it was always a great game, despite what others have said.

Because just like Melee, it's the best in the series and it'll stay that way.

Because it is awesome. It just took some people a little while to notice it. =P

I've always liked Double Dash. I bought it on release day and played it a ton. I'm sure I finished and unlocked everything. I still have my copy. It was my favourite MK. MK8 might be better but I haven't played it enough to make a decision.

I started gaming in the SNES days And Double Dash is my favorite in the series (haven't played much of MK yet, but I have a hard time seeing it topple DD).

The controls are too touchy, the AI cheats, the AI doesn't use all of the weapons, the weapon distribution is terrible, and you need to try really hard to fail because the computer helps you at every step.

I replayed a ton of all of the Mario Kart games after people whined to no end about how "unbalanced" the Wii version was, and I wrote down the details of each game as objectively as I could. The Mario Kart 64 entry is here, where you can read about the problems I listed above in more detail, and the Double Dash entry is here.

One of the things you'll learn is that the AI doesn't use shells in MK64. That seems like it can't be true, but it is. Super Mario Kart is even worse with stuff like that.

I can't argue with that. Pretty much everyone who played four-player battle mode in Mario Kart 64 has amazing memories of it.

@JordanElek: I remember on MK64 I was unlocking the ghost from getting great lap times, for back then the controls where fine. Battle mode was only fun to me on superMK for the novelty of battling my friend kinda like a shooter. If the AI cheats maybe its bc they dont use shells, anyways you should be able to beat AI no problem. I only played the Wii version with my friends on the weekends 4 player split screen, I did not have any desire to play the GP.

@JordanElek: Ok I just read some of your MK64 description and it seems like you had a hard time with the controls, could that be just you I had no problem with them. The newer ones are probably easier to control to appease the masses that Nintendo wants to play MK.

Nah, I was amazing at Mario Kart 64 and always thought it was way too easy. The game practically GIVES you the victory, and it breaks its own rules to do so.

That game's issues are in its design. They clearly didn't know how to balance the game between a human player and seven other AI players, so they had to program in some weird things. AI not using shells was just one of them. Rubberbanding was another, as well as item distribution that heavily favors the human player.

The newer games have none of those crappy tricks. Every player seems to play by the same rules, whether they're human or AI, but the difficulty isn't skewed too far in either direction. They figured out how to balance all of that stuff in the DS and Wii generation, and it's still just as good.

One complaint I never understood was the whole sense of speed thing.

The game never seemed slower than other Mario Karts to me.. Where as some people talked about it as if it was Snail Kart or something.. I don't get it. Like is Mario Kart 8's sense of speed really all that much faster? I just don't see it.

double dash is way the best one ! your logic is wrong

Double Dash was alright, still quite playable, but it was by no means the series' high-water mark. People seem to forget it had very little content going for it. No custom cups, no ability to choose single races, no CPU-controlled battle opponents... Nowadays I just play the All-Cup Tour from time to time, but other than that there is not much to do unless when a friend is around.

I remember people being only mildly enthusiastic about it back in the day, but nowadays you can't enter a Mario Kart discussion without at least a few people calling Double Dash the game to beat. It evolved the series in some meaningful ways, but it was by no means the great game everyone was expecting at the time. The same goes for Wind Waker, by the way. It may just have been personal experience, but about 8/10 people back then I talked to were underwhelmed by the game. Now it seems to be the favourite of many. Maybe it's a generational thing.

And don't even get me started on MK64. It was blown out of the water by Diddy Kong Racing and Crash Team Racing respectively that gen. Fun for nostalgia, but not deserving of its legendary status.

Nostalgia.

All the people like me who grew up on Gamecube are adult college-age now and are the main voice in gaming.

Before this was a nostalgia toward N64 and SNES.

Not in battle mode it wasn't. Mario Kart 64 deserves its legendary status for its battle mode alone, which still has not been surpassed to this day.

I've loved the game ever since I first played it back in the seventh grade, so...

Double Dash is a game I've loved since I first played it. It's one of the best in the series, if not the best. The way you had 2 characters and could switch from 2 powerups was awesome. The tracks were awesome. Sense of speed was awesome. The graphics were great. It had the best Battle Mode in any Mario Kart. Pretty much everything about the game was awesome.

I've no idea why it recieved hate back then. Then again, people bashed the masterpiece that is Zelda: Wind Waker because "it looks kiddie". Lol. Have fun not playing the best game ever.

Why has it become cool to tell others on a forum that they only like something because it's cool to do?

… and now I feel old. Thanks for that.

It was my most looked forward to GC game that era. It was definitely the hardest one to pick up and be good at against seasoned DD players. Unless other players knew what they were doing (drift boosting red shells, saving your items, repeatedly boosting through all curves, and character choice), it was near impossible for the best person to lose.

I do too, trust me. Seventh grade was a long time ago for me. My friend and I would come home from school every day and play it together. We unlocked pretty much everything in the game.

I had the same feeling when someone pointed out that Mario Kart 64, the game I grew up with, is now 18 years old. :(

@JordanElek: Did you ever unlock any ghost, if not then you where only fast in your own mind ; )

It feels the fastest of them all and has a unique quality to it that separates from the rest. The Wii one was easily the worst as skill had absolutely no basis in any sense.

I don't remember people expecting that. Maybe a handful but not many. Online wasn't really a thing yet on consoles. XBL was barely starting out during that time (had it even launched yet) and PS2 only had a handful of online enabled games.

I was 12 when the very first game came out on SNES. :(

GameCube and Nintendo 64 are really popular at the moment.

People are paying good money for boxed NGC & N64 consoles on eBay at the moment

lol, yes, I spent way too much time in time trials. I played that game for dozens of hours.

@JordanElek: Ok guess I will have to take your word for it. Still have my doubts though ; )

I thought it was definitely one of the better, if not best Mario Kart games, though it's probably for the best that the Waluigi/Daisy combo can never happen again.

I was 13 when that game came out. All I had to do all day was play Mario Kart 64, so of course I was good at it. ;)

I loved that game, but looking at it objectively, it had some really glaring flaws.

Because, it makes people feel old school, and therefor cool, and since like nobody supported the GameCube it makes it that much more "refined" of taste.

For me, Double Dash stands out as the best Mario Kart in terms of local multiplayer, particularly due to the two-player pert cart mechanic. My dad, who was never good at controlling the kart, enjoyed the item-thrower while I drove (and occasionally ordered him to deploy items at key moments).

That aside, I liked the vast majority of its courses (although I despised Dry Dry Desert and am sad to see it return in MK8) and found the battle mode to be the most fun out of any Mario Kart game.

In Double Dash you could hold two items at once. This allowed you to be a bit more strategic in how and when you used them.

Double Dash is one of the better MKs. MK DS is the best one imo.