Mario Kart has been a great series, and has the GameCube version, with double the characters and, supposedly, double the fun, been a game to remember, or just a piece of trash? Read on to find out! The Review will be one a 0-4 star scale as usual.

Graphics: **1/2

The graphics here are a little above average, but not much. Rainbow Road is eye candy, but DK Mountain is eye torture. Most of the courses are above average in graphics, but this category is nothing special... nothing at all. Sure, the Starman item has a nice glow to it, and the characters all look good, but really, nothing stands out other than Rainbow Road, a beautiful course.

Sound/Music: **1/2

A lot like graphics, sound and music here is not special, but not bad. Some of the tunes are nice to listen to, like Mario Circuit and Waluigi Stadium. But some music is boring, or just not too good. The sound effects are nice, the voices are good enough, but the category doesn't stand out, much like the graphics.

Difficulty: **1/2

Wow. Another 2 1/2 rating... but this one is a little different actually, because it is the difficulty after all. I would say this game is hard at times, and easy at other times, but overall it's hard a bit more often than it's easy. Do you know what I'm talking about? 50cc is E-A-S-Y, 100cc is hard at first but is easy to get used to, and 150c is the same way, but more annoying and harder. Mirror Mode, a hidden "engine class", combines mirrored tracks and 150cc. Sounds hard? Yes. But if you're good at the game, it might not be so hard in some cases. In Time Trial, there are "staff ghosts", much like F-Zero GX. However, in MKDD, the staff ghosts are almost impossible to even unlock. I've only unlocked two (Peach Beach and DK Mountain), and although I've beaten the DK Mountain ghost, I would say that the staff ghosts are too hard to unlock on almost every course.

Control: ***

OK, I suppose. I won't explain all the controls here, but most of them are pretty good. The power slide is usually easy to do, but if you string several together, it seems like you're losing time and not gaining any. The regular drift is ok, as you can control your kart, but it doesn't help on some sharp U-turns, like near the beginning of Rainbow Road. The item controls are good, no problem there.

Characters: ****

No Koopalings here, but this is a very large selection of characters otherwise. Overall, there are 20 characters, more than twice the amount from the other Mario Karts. Nintendo put a lot of effort here, and it paid off. With a 4-star rating in this Review, that is.

Vehicles: *

Sure, there are a lot of vehicles here, but, uh, what's the difference between the Koopa Dasher and the Toad Kart? Or the Heart Coach and the Turbo Yoshi? Or the Wario Car and the Piranha Pipes? Is there a difference other than the looks? There are too many vehicles that have exactly the same stats as another vehicle. And I don't like that. Also, the heavyweight vehicles with top speeds of 4 or 5 stars are nothing special. They're only like 2 mph faster than vehicles with a top speed of only one star. Of course, the heavyweight vehicles are still useful on easy courses in Time Trials, so they're not totally useless.

Items: ***

Good enough for me. There's a wide selection of items, both regular and special. You've got the classic items; Green Shell, Red Shell, Banana, Mushroom, Starman, Lightning Bolt, and Spiny Shell (now flying). You've also got special items that only can be used by certain characters; Fireball, Yoshi/Birdo Egg, Chain Chomp, Bowser's Shell, Bob-omb, and others. I like the wide selection of items, and being able to hold two different items at once is a nice improvement. My only complaint is the Red Shell is too difficult to block, and having items like shells just scattered on the track can drive me nuts at times. Overall, though, this category is good.

Grand Prix Mode: **1/2

Not bad, but not too good either. If you stay in the top 2 or 3 for each race, you'll have no trouble on each regular cup. You get points for any place you are in, except for 8th. That's a nice feature. Also, the Mirror Mode is new, and not a bad idea, even though it is incredibly hard. You need to play this mode a lot to unlock all the hidden stuff in the game. Overall, this mode is not great, but good enough.

Time Trial: 1/2

Woah... this must be a favorite. Well, I just love how the staff ghosts are pretty much impossible to even unlock for me. There's also the fact that you only get two speed boosts, and if you fall off, you lose both of them. This mode was made for fun. Of course, you know I was being sarsastic about saying all of that... this mode is horrible.

Battle Mode: **1/2

Battle Mode is fun, but most of the arenas are bad. Nintendo GameCube is trash, Block City is an insult compared to the MK64 arena Block Fort, which looks pretty much the same only much more complex, and Cookie Land is just... boring. Those three arenas take at least a star off the score. The other arenas are pretty good. Pipe Plaza is neat with the warp pipes, Luigi's Mansion is cool because it has three floors to it, and Tilt-A-Kart is unique becasue of the tilting and all. But still those arenas aren't excellent, but great.

The three modes are not bad, I would say. Balloon Burst is, of course, great, Shine Thief is ok, but it gets too boring sometimes, and Bob-omb Blast is fun in some ways. Having three different modes instead of just one raises the score a bit, but not much.

Replayability: *

Once you've done everything you can do, the game just doesn't give you a nice reason to come back to it. At least that's the case for me. The Time Trial just won't last a lot of time in this game, and that lowers the score. If you have a ton of friends, the replayability is a little better... because this game can hold up to 16 players. That might be the only star for that score. Here, the replayability is just boring.

Fun Factor!: ***

Yes, this game is fun at times. More than a few times, actually. Battle Mode can still give some thrills, and the fun can really spice up if there's more than four players. Those two things raise the score. With friends to race or battle, there is still some fun, but it's just moderate fun, and nothing much else.

Overall: **1/2

MKDD is not the best game I've played, but it's far from the worst. It's above average, in my opinion. Like the Mario Kart series? Rent or buy it. Love the Mario Kart series? Buy it. I don't know much else to say. Basically, this game is not bad, but not really good, and it's a bit better than average.

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