Nintendo's Mario Kart 8 Deluxe released yesterday, and while many have already happily sunk hours of their free time into the re-release, others still wonder why they should even bother. It's an unfortunately popular trend, after all, to launch an updated version of an initially successful title with minor graphical changes at full price.
Luckily for the more cynical among us, Nintendo uploaded a trailer on their official YouTube media channel that outlines some of the changes. Take a look.
As expected, all previous DLC in Mario Kart 8 will be in the Deluxe edition. This includes at least 16 additional tracks, 6 characters, and about a dozen vehicles.
In addition to the DLC, the Deluxe edition comes with the characters from Nintendo's colorful shooter Splatoon in their own custom vehicles. New features also included are the dual item capacity which, just as it sounds, allows players to carry a second item on their kart, and a few new items that were seen in previous Mario Kart titles. The Boo item will allow players to steal items from a nearby driver, while the Feather gives them a momentary jump to clear obstacles.
Even more impressive than new characters or items however is the inclusion of entirely new game modes:
Balloon Battle: A four-player arena-based deathmatch in which players must pop enemy drivers' balloons by hitting them with offensive items.
Bob-omb Blast: Similar to the balloon battle, the bob-omb game mode follows a style of gameplay similar to Bomberman; players can only harm each other with bombs, although their own explosions won't hurt them.
Shine Thief: Your basic capture-the-flag game mode, only in this case the flag is a shine sprite. The players who holds it the longest by the end of the round wins.
Renegade Roundup: A bizarre team-based game mode in which one team chases the other with the Piranha Plant item in a cops-and-robbers styled match.
Coin Runners: A fairly basic mode that nonetheless will challenge players to outperform one another by racing to grab the most coins by the end of the round.
For more information about Mario Kart 8 Deluxe or other Nintendo Switch titles, check out their official website.