As of this writing, the Mario Kart World Nintendo Direct is a few days away. A fan theory just popped up that could be confirmed in this Direct.
Japanese Twitter user @AxaYvLK8DcKX9EK noticed that the shape of the bottom continent in the Mario Kart World logo looks similar to the world that appeared in the game itself, as seen in the Nintendo Treehouse event. Later, they realized that there was text obscuring the image, and the shape in the logo was a little different. But we don’t think this completely disproves this fan theory.
So far, fans have observed that 29 tracks were confirmed to return in the game. Of course, they can never make a new game without Rainbow Road now, but as usual they have handpicked some tracks from prior Mario Kart games. So, what’s noteworthy about this is that Nintendo didn’t seem hesitant to show off all the said tracks.
One may remember that Mario Kart 8 Deluxe on the Switch has 48 tracks, a considerably larger number than what we’ve seen on Mario Kart World so far. While the free roaming aspect of the game seems to bring its own appeal, it’s hard to believe that Nintendo can justify their $ 80 price point with that number of tracks.
And really, in prior Nintendo Directs for Mario Kart games we know that they don’t show all the tracks. There are definitely still some more tracks that haven’t been shown yet, as part of the surprise for the game. But given the game’s conceit, we can’t help but wonder; is the reason that we can’t see some tracks is because they’re in one or more different continents?
What makes this even more exciting is how Nintendo makes accessing those other tracks possible. If they’re thinking of making it DLC, that may not work out, because you would create the problem of some players being unable to play with friends. But, we could see Nintendo taking some notes from Splatoon, and making the other continents timed releases. Those continents and tracks may already be on disc, but for the sake of engagement on online play, Nintendo will slowly roll them out so that fans don’t get tired of them all at once.
We don’t have solid evidence on this speculation at all, but now that the idea is out of the open, one can’t help but wonder if Nintendo might have actually thought of it. But we’ll just have to wait and see when Nintendo makes their official reveals on the Mario Kart World Direct this April 17, 2025.
