Each Mario Kart game has consisted of four Grand Prix cups (mushroom, flower, star, special) - each one made up of four unique tracks. This Nintendo DS version follows suite by making the same cups with brand new tracks. Some are incredibly unique including Waluigi's Pinball, and Tick Tock Clock, while others are generic recreations of ones before, such as Rainbow Road and Wario Stadium.

But Kart DS takes it one step further by including 4 additional cups (shell, banana, leaf, lightning) which aren't new tracks at all. In fact, it's pretty cool because each of those cups are four tracks taken from each previous Mario Kart game (SNES, 64, Gameboy Advance, Gamecube). They did pick a good group of them including Baby Park and Luigi Circuit from Mario Kart Double Dash!! and Moo Moo Farm and Banshee Boardwalk from Mario Kart 64.

They included 50cc, 100cc, 150cc, and Mirror Mode once again. But I do have one complaint to make - 50cc is way too easy. It was so slow and so easy, that I was bored out of my mind. It really made me worried about the game since it was the first thing I did. But by 150cc, it's pretty tough - so there's obviously a large difficulty range.

There's a really nice selection of characters, but as always, there could have been more. You start out with 8 characters (mario, luigi, peach, yoshi, toad, donkey kong, wario, and bowser) and you can unlock 4 more. Although I must say - that last character was certainly unexpected and also a bit out of place...

Each character comes with three karts - each kart consisting of it's own unique abilities. But the one thing they can all do is the Power-Slide Turbo Boost. While doing a slide, pressing left and right on the D-pad will create flames out the back of your tires, and letting go of the Power-Slide will give you a slight boost forward.

Unfortunately - to do any real damage in the harder modes - you have to pretty much be a master at the Power-Slide Turbo Boost which takes quite a bit of time to really get the hang of. To make matters more interesting, this game doesn't just rely on getting gold trophies anymore. It also rates you with a grade.

You might feel pretty good pulling off an A rank. But that's until you realize that there's a Star Rank above that. And a Two Star Rank above that. Oh, did I mention there's actually a 3 Star Rank?

Each character has this same lego-style kart in their color plus two unique karts.

The rankings make a lot more sense when they're also used in Mission Mode. Each of the 6 worlds in mission mode has eight missions and a boss battle. These are certainly new to the Mario Kart platform, but really fun and challenging. It ranges from collecting coins while you drive, to hitting goombas with shells, driving backwards through an obstacle course, and only driving through correct item boxes (not the fake ones). There's a lot of missions to go around and since they're all pretty quick to play, it makes trying to get a Three Star Rank on them a lot of fun.

The two screens of the DS are used very nicely. It takes all of the clutter from the top screen and displays useful information on the bottom. It also shows a detailed overhead view of where you are on the map, along with where other characters are, what items they have, and what items are on the ground. This lower map is so neat, that you could pretty much play the game from simply looking at the bottom screen. So glancing at the lower screen for a moment never sets you back, if anything, it gives you a great view all around you.

There are a couple new items added to Mario Kart DS. The first is the Bullet Bill, which automatically blasts you past your opponents and usually moving you up 4 placements or so. The other is the Blooper, which covers your opponents screens in front of you with black ink that smears downwards. It's really quite difficult to see what's going on when it hits you - so looking at the lower screen can help you out nicely.

The reason there is a ranking system is for the Online portion of the game, since the network finds three opponents of your skill level to pit you against. Connecting to the Nintendo network is pretty simple. If you have wireless internet in your home, your DS will automatically pick up the signal and connect to the free battle network. If you don't, going to a Wi-Fi hotspot such as coffee shop or a McDonald's will get you connected. If you don't have wireless at your house but still want to try it at home, you can purchase a USB adaptor that plugs into your computer - grabs the internet from your computer and sends a signal to your DS from the USB adaptor. (ray's bitter note - not compatible with macs)

I had the chance to play it online at the mall and it was quite a bit of fun. You could only race the Grand Prix (no balloon battle), and you can see each persons logo that they've created in the paint section. Making a Raybob symbol was a no-brainer for me, but there's only so much I could do with 13 colors. The bad part about online play is that you can't hold an item behind your back, you can only throw it, and I was getting a bit fed up with people disconnecting before they lost. It would throw me back to the main screen and not record a win.

Playing Balloon Battle in a DS vs. DS fight is pretty fun, and a little different. Instead of starting out with three balloons and losing once they all pop, you start out with one balloon filled and 5 spare balloons. What you do is blow into the microphone to inflate your spare balloons. Of course, you can only have three filled at a time, so do it right, and you can have the life span os six balloons, but forget, and you could be out in one hit. Blowing up the balloons is a neat thing, but also a little odd. I'm not quite sure if I like it yet, and it would be nice if there was an option to turn it off.

I certainly don't want to end on that last note, so I must say that this Mario Kart has it all, and if you've got a DS, it's a great game to have.

Verdict: An excellent game. Highly recommended.