Let me first say that I've always been a huge Nintendo fan, and I am in no way biased against Nintendo or the "childish" image they have been given. That said, I have to be honest: this game sucks. I really can not figure out why everyone seems to love it. The graphics are pretty bad for the GameCube and are not very detailed at all (the steering wheels are octagonal, characters are just really shiny instead of having any detailed textures, etc.), the gameplay is boring and gets old very fast, and the music is annoying, synthesized, repetitive crap. It seems to me that the developers were just lazy here, the poor graphics are a testament to that. I haven't seen characters without fingers since the N64 days. But hey, if you know it'll sell no matter what, why put any effort into it, right? When I bought it, I figured at the very least it would have fun multiplayer as in previous Mario Kart titles, but I was wrong. I went to a friend's house and we both got tired of the multiplayer modes within 10 minutes. First-party Nintendo games have a history of being excellent, but I feel really let down by this one. Do yourself a favor: save some money, dust off your N64 and keep on playing the Mario Kart for that.

I purchased this game for my daughter for Christmas. As it turned out, my husband and I had put more time into than she did. We were gold cup champions for every race and at every race a new prize was unlocked. The "weapons" were great. The red hooming shell that would follow the opponent until it made contact and the fabulous blue shells, we called them first place flyers, were always a big hit.

In my opinion Mario Kart are one of the better racers, besides Need for Speed. I like the hyper-realism of something like Gran Turismo or Midnight Club 3 but it's kind of boring cause you just race period. Mario Kart has gameplay elements that actually make you interested in the race. It feels slightly slower than the 64 version but it still looks great. <br /> <br />Story: No story literally. Basically you have racers that want that gold cup and go through different race sets to do it. Old favorites return like Rainbow Road which looks more stunning than the old one and some new ones. <br /> <br />Graphics: Very nicely detailed. Areas like Rainbow Road are simply great to watch but then you have to actually watch the road. Others look rather bland like souped up 64 versions instead of complete overhauls. <br /> <br />Sound/Music: Traditional voice one-liners like "let's-a go!" or "Yoshi!". The music has that nice bubbly catchy music but it's not catchy. What the? <br /> <br />Gameplay: The big change from 64 to Double Dash is right in the name: you have 2 racers per kart now. So Mario is teamed with Luigi, Peach is with Daisy(Luigi's chick I guess), and Baby Mario with Baby Luigi and others. <br /> <br />If you get a red homing shell but don't wanna use it, move your guy to the back and get something else until you need it. The specials are roughly the same with the backwards ? which derails you, homing red shells, ever-travelling green shells, awesome-but-inexplicable blue ones(I have no idea how they work, I just fire them). <br /> <br />Courses in a way are a little complicated than in the past. You'll be bumping into walls a lot and even falling into pits/water which is incredibly frustrating especially when it's such a sharp curve with very little turning room. <br /> <br />There's plenty of secrets to be found and shortcuts that you can explore but this game as usual best works with multiplayer which you'll get your fun's worth in bucket loads.