Super Roster Maker - Mario Kart 9

Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, the latest game in the Mario Kart series, is one of the most popular games on the Nintendo Switch, with a wide variety of tracks to choose from and intuitive and fun gameplay. But if there’s one thing fans can complain about with this game, it’s the character roster. Seemingly choosing quality over quantity, Nintendo chose to fill the game’s roster of playable racers with minor enemy characters and palette swaps of characters already in the roster.

If Nintendo chooses to make a completely new game in the series, which characters could Nintendo afford to cut from their next entry and what possible characters could they be replaced with? That’s what we’ll take a look at today in Super Roster Maker.

As both a way to help select certain characters and a way to add more variety to the racers within the game, we’ll be matching characters as pairs to give each racer companion characters that complement each other, like Mario and Luigi or Peach and Daisy.

Without further ado, here is the custom roster for Mario Kart 9.

RETURNING CHARACTERS

Staying: Mario, Luigi, Peach, Daisy, Toadette, Yoshi, Donkey Kong, Wario, Waluigi, Bowser, Bowser Jr., Baby Mario, Baby Luigi, Dry Bowser, King Boo, Rosalina

Before seeing which old characters are out and which new ones are in, it seemed notable to also point out which characters from Mario Kart 8 Deluxe’s roster are staying for Mario Kart 9. Many of these characters are staple Mario characters that would make sense to see in this new game. A couple of notable characters here are Dry Bowser, who would be in as a companion character to King Boo for two undead boss characters, and Rosalina, who is the most recent addition to the group of staple characters, but aside from them, no one really unexpected.

CUT CHARACTERS

Leaving: Toad, Koopa Troopa, Shy Guy, Dry Bones, Lakitu, Tanooki Mario, Cat Peach, Baby Peach, Baby Daisy, Baby Rosalina, Gold Mario, Pink Gold Peach, Lemmy, Larry, Wendy, Ludwig, Iggy, Roy, Morton

Most of these characters are either generic Mario species characters that can be replaced with someone more specific (you’ll see who later) or character palette swaps or baby versions, characters that a lot of people think were just added to pad out the roster. While a case could be made for the Koopalings, with Bowser Jr. already in the roster and the Koopalings as of late pushed into a more minor status in favor of Jr., fans in general seem a bit less enthusiastic about them as they were in the past. They could be included as alternate skins for Bowser Jr., but as their own slots in the character select screen, perhaps not here.

NEW CHARACTERS

 

Entering: Captain Toad, Birdo, Diddy Kong, Kamek, Wart, King K. Rool, Koops, Lakilester, Fawful, General Guy, Jimmy T., Mona

Finally, here are the new characters. For this section, we’ll focus on characters from Mario or Mario-related series. Any guest characters from other series will be shown in a later section.

Replacing a generic Toad, Lakitu, Shy Guy, and Koopa Troopa are Captain Toad from the recent Mario games and Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker, Lakilester and General Guy from Paper Mario, and Koops from Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door. Also joining the race are Kamek from the main Mario series and Yoshi’s Island, Fawful from Mario & Luigi, Birdo and Wart from Super Mario Bros. 2, Diddy Kong and King K. Rool from Donkey Kong Country, and Jimmy T. and Mona from WarioWare. A lot of these new characters represent different, popular branches of the Mario franchise that haven’t yet been represented in Mario Kart. With a roster like this, Mario Kart has the potential to be a celebration of the entire Mario franchise, just like Super Smash Bros. is a celebration of all of Nintendo.

GUEST CHARACTERS

Continuing from the above section, this section will cover the guest characters for this roster, all from non-Mario Nintendo series. For this roster, we have given it ten slots (2 characters each for 4 non-Mario series and two characters representing Nintendo as a whole) for a good even number.

From The Legend of Zelda: Link and Zelda

From Animal Crossing: Villager and Isabelle

From Splatoon: Pearl and Marina

From Kirby: Kirby and King Dedede

From Nintendo (in general): R.O.B. and Mii Racers

The Legend of Zelda, Animal Crossing, and Splatoon were all already involved with Mario Kart with Mario Kart 8, so it would make sense to bring back guest characters from those series. Link, Villager, and Isabelle would all be returning characters, but there are a few newcomers here too. Behind Link, Zelda is the most well-known from their series, and the series is no stranger to racing princesses, and Pearl and Marina from Splatoon 2 replace the two regular Inklings as more defined characters from the most recent game in the series who aren’t afraid to get into the action. As for Kirby, the tone of the series fits well with Mario and he and Dedede are two of the biggest characters from the series that wouldn’t out of place in an arcade racer. The Kirby series has even had its own racing game already.

Anyone remember this?

Finally, R.O.B. and the Mii avatars are there to represent Nintendo as a whole. R.O.B. was previously playable as a racer in Mario Kart DS and Miis have been available in previous Mario Kart games with them even getting special racing outfits when Amiibos are scanned into the game.

FINAL RESULTS

The Roster: Mario, Luigi, Peach, Daisy, Captain Toad, Toadette, Yoshi, Birdo, Donkey Kong, Diddy Kong, Wario, Waluigi, Bowser, Bowser Jr., Baby Mario, Baby Luigi, Dry Bowser, King Boo, Rosalina, Kamek, Wart, King K. Rool, Koops, Lakilester, Fawful, General Guy, Jimmy T., Mona, Link, Zelda, Villager, Isabelle, Pearl, Marina, Kirby, King Dedede, R.O.B., Mii Racer

This roster gives us a grand total of 38 playable characters, a large number, but still smaller than the lineup for Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, while still providing a variety of interesting characters to play as.

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In this article, we looked at the racers from a potential Mario Kart 9, but what courses or items could we possibly see in this game? That is something we will discuss in a future article.

But in the meantime, what did you think of this roster? What characters would you want to see in the next Mario Kart game? Make your voice heard in the comments below. Thanks for coming!