I play a lot of Mario Kart 7 online.
A lot.
I remember when I started—several weeks before PAX East 2012—racing through several courses and, in a number of maps, seeing karts suddenly disappear off the side of the screen without warning. They’d be followed by several other karts, be invisible on the map for a bit, and then reappear—nearly without fail—far ahead of the rest of us.
It wasn’t until I asked around that I learned of the “shortcuts” being exploited in the game. Naturally, I started using them, because, well… weren’t we all?
Now that the game is patched, it’s definitely making a difference in how competitive those maps are. I didn’t stand a chance of winning Maka Wuhu before using the shortcut while others were, and then on the odd chance that someone else didn’t know about it after I did, well… let’s just say my win ratio increased.
Without the shortcuts now, guess what? Some of these players are darn ornery (but then, that’s been pretty typical lately), but at least the playing field is levelled a little bit, and more inexperienced players stand half a chance of actually crossing the finish line before getting a forced finish, or even crossing the finish line themselves in the top five after a few handy blue shells.
Was I thrilled with the patch? Not at first, but it really was about time. Particularly when playing online with players of varied ages and abilities, handing the “in-the-know” players a cheat system seemed a little underhanded, and particularly disappointing was the length of time it took to acknowledge the problem before actually fixing it.
But hey, it’s done, so guess what? You can come back and play now. I’ll be there, revving up my pipe frame and sponge wheels…
