Mario Kart Double Dash is a great kart racer, and one of the best multiplayer games for the Gamecube.
User Rating: 8.8 | Mario Kart: Double Dash!! GC
Mario and all of his wacky pals are back and ready to throw down on the race track in Mario Kart: Double Dash for the Nintendo Gamecube. Things are a little different this time around. Now you can choose 2 of your favorite Nintendo characters to race on one kart instead of one. You'll be able to choose from over a dozen different characters at the start of the game and will be able to unlock several more by completing race cup challenges. New karts and courses for battle and race cup modes are awaiting to be unlocked as well. Mario Kart Double Dash contains the best courses out of all the games in the Mario Kart series. You'll race through small and simple levels such as 'Baby Park", which is nothing more than an oval shape track, and you'll race through huge challenging levels such as DK Mountain which require some skill to get through. There are a total of 16 tracks in all. To complete the entire game on single player you must choose from 3 racing cup challenges. Each racing cup challenge has 4 unique tracks. You unlock new goodies depending on how well you finish in the overall cup standings, and difficulty settings. You'll unlock new cup challenges as you go. The game is very rewarding for the most part. Some unlockable stages are too simplified however, and some other unlockables are not that satisfying. As for the racing itself, it's great fun. The kart does control very loosely, which will require some time to get used too. A button is the accelarator, B button backs your kart up, Y & X buttons allow you to use your weapons that you acquire on the race course, and Z allows you to switch drivers between your two characters. Being able to switch characters is the game's biggest draw, or some may say gimmick. However, picking the right two characters may be vital to your success. Each character has their own special move that they can acquire from item boxes. Some special items are good for speed, others for attacks from the back, others for attacks to racers in front of you. Also, the two person racer system allows you to carry up to two items at once. If you want to save one item and use the other, you can simply just press Z to send the attacker to the back and the person with the item you want to save to drive in the front.
As far as graphics go, Double Dash is one slick looking game. Every character has been doused with turtle wax, and the courses and backgrounds are very mario-y like. In other words, very creative visual style, very inviting. Soundwise the tunes are catchy but the same sound effects over and over can be tiring. The audio can be very weak at some points. Mario Kart is a very addicting game that has more food on the table the more you play it, and coming back for seconds is always fun. The multiplayer is also very fun, and is the main thing that gives the game great value. I don't undertsand most Mario Kart fans gripe with Double Dash. I honestly think it's a fantastic racing kart game. And I never understood why so many Mario Kart fans enjoyed the watered down, dull Mario Kart 64. Double Dash has its share of problems sure, but nothing that can't be overlooked. 
