It’s official: Retro Studios in Austin, Texas is one of the coolest places to work on the planet. Right after Retro had finished Donkey Kong Country Returns, Nintendo enlisted them for the next chapter of Mario Kart. Their involvement reached much deeper than merely designing a DKCR-based track: Retro ended up designing half the tracks and handling the character animation, among other creative duties. This chance-of-a-lifetime for the Texas crew’Mario Kart fans all’marked their first direct collaboration with Nintendo’s EAD team.
According to Satoru Iwata, the unique team-up helped Mario Kart 7 aquire “…a charm that isn’t present in any of the earlier games in the series.†Wow. As if I needed another reason to pick up the game tomorrow.
For the full story, check out the hugely entertaining MK edition of Iwata Asks on Nintendo’s site. You’ll encounter a lot of fun anecdotes, production details and mind-blowing mental imagery. Here are just a few samples:
Imagine going to a job where one of your daily duties involved testing the latest game build by taking part in an 8-player online race between Retro and EAD.
Ryan Powell, who designed Retro’s tracks, started with the Luigi’s Mansion course, in which he combined the layout of the DS original with the design style of the Luigi Gamecube adventure. The results delighted Nintendo’s crew back in Japan.
Coin collecting was originally intended to return to Mario Kart much sooner, but was continually being dropped due to time constraints. Determined to get the feature into Mario Kart 7, Nintendo made a priority of designing the coins into the game from the very start.
Okay…Retro’s now done Metroid Prime, Donkey Kong Country Returns, and half the production of Mario Kart 7. Anyone else feeling like we should send these guys a thank-you gift basket for the holidays?
Mario Kart 7 hits North America tomorrow!
Joe
I can’t wait! Retro Studios is awesome
wrackune
That’s it, I’m filling out an application to Retro.
Derek B.
Retro Studios has long-been the official developer-of-choice of Infendo.
The Adza
Hopefully Retro are now working on either a DKCR sequel for 3DS and/or F-Zero for the launch of WiiU. Pity them working on MarioKart took away from them working on new projects. It might be a while before we see something else from these guys.
Richard
@ The Adza: Wait…how is a Mario Kart sequel less “new” than a sequel to DKC or F-Zero…except for quantity of predecessors? I don’t think these guys need pity; sounds like they had an absolute blast working on MK7. 🙂 Not only was it the biggest compliment Nintendo could give them, but Mario Kart 7 will probably, in the long run, be the most-played project they’ve ever worked on…at least until Wii U launches. I think the fact it was Mario Kart more than made up for them being half of the overall production instead of creating it solo.
Like you, though, I’m hoping Retro plays a part in Wii U’s launch! I can’t wait to see what they do next.
Kytim89
Nnitendo should hand over the keys to the Star Fox series to Retro Studios and let them make a new game in the series in the same manner as Star Fox 64 for the Wii U as a launch title.
Drahken
@Kytim:
Yeah, it’s a disgrace that the best Star Fox game since SF64 was SF64 3D, and only because it’s a direct remake.