Today Nintendo released a handful of new screenshots for Mario Kart 7 for the Nintendo 3DS. In them some exciting new details were revealed, most notably the confirmation that the Tanooki tail will be joining the roster of items...
#mariokart
Here's a new trailer for Mario Kart 7, a different one than what was shown at the 3DS conference last night. Nintendo has also dropped some new information regarding how the game will take advantage of the 3DS's hardware, as well as mentioned some fresh additions to the popular series: More »
Though most of the conference focused on new titles from Nintendo and third parties, a few new details were revealed about Mario Kart 7.
Two new racers are joining the Mario Kart family - Lakitu and Metal Mario. Lakitu will sport a kart fashioned after the cloud he's routinely seen using. Metal Mario will naturally use a shiny, silver kart...
- StreetPass will automatically exchange ghost data with other players
- use that data to identify those same players online
- it seems that Metal Mario is not that way because of a power up, as he's actually a character option
#japan
The Nintendo 3DS gets flack for not having a killer line up. And so far, it doesn't. That flack is largely deserved, but it's flack that will, over time, disappear. More »
Nintendo is cutting the price of the Nintendo 3DS by over 30 percent. As of August 12, the handheld will have a suggested retail price of $169.99, down from its launch price of $249.99.
The aggressive price drop better positions Nintendo's handheld against Sony's upcoming PlayStation Vita -- the cheapest version of which will launch at $250. Nintendo claims that it has sold more than 830,000 3DS systems in the US since it debuted in March, and that it will keep momentum up with several big holiday releases, including Kid Icarus: Uprising, Super Mario Land 3D in November, followed in December by Mario Kart 7.
Nintendo's also looking to reward early adopters, or get a last-minute burst of sales before $80 comes off the 3DS price. Those who own a 3DS and connect to the Nintendo eShop before 11:59PM EST on August 11 will be automatically enrolled into the "Nintendo 3DS Ambassador" program.
3DS ambassadorial duties mostly involve playing a bunch of free games. The status grants you access to 10 free NES Virtual Console games on September 1 before their general release (these include The Legend of Zelda, Balloon Fight and Ice Climber), and 10 more Game Boy Advance Virtual Console games. The GBA games -- like Yoshi's Island, Super Mario Advance 3, Mario Kart: Super Circuit, Metroid Fusion, WarioWare, Inc.: Mega Microgames and Mario vs. Donkey Kong -- will not be available to anyone else. Is all that enough to ameliorate early buyer's remorse?
Mario Kart 3D has more improvements in store than just hanggliders bolted to the backs of all the cars. It currently features eight-player local wireless racing, and, if everything goes as planned, it'll feature eight-player online as well.
Joystiq asked Mario Kart 3D producer Hideki Konno if the kart racer would feature online play, and he responded "Of course!" Though the current online configuration isn't quite set, "our goal right now is to have the same number of players for both local wireless and multiplayer over wi-fi." The bottleneck at the moment is making sure the game can handle smooth 60FPS frame rate with eight players in both online and offline, 2D and 3D.
