Even more than Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe is the must-have Nintendo Switch game. Virtually anyone can enjoy its fun, arcade-y races and colorful tracks, especially with the accessibility options added onto the Wii U original. But the addition of Double Item Boxes (and, by extension, double item slots) had the opposite effect, ensuring regular Mario Kart 8 Deluxe players are much more likely to become frustrated by the game's infamous rubber-banding. It's a problem of overabundant of items - one that needs to be fixed in the inevitable Mario Kart 9.
Originally introduced in the GameCube's Mario Kart: Double Dash!!, Double Item Boxes are exactly what they sound like - a stack of two mystery item boxes that grant players two items instead of one. Their purpose in Double Dash!! was to give players riding on the same cart a way to cooperate, switching items back and forth between the two of them in order to use the one that suited a specific situation. Single players could also switch items themselves, pocketing particularly useful ones for deployment later in a race.
For the Switch port of Mario Kart 8, Nintendo decided to bring double items back. But without Double Dash!!'s item switching mechanic, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe's Double Item Boxes just make the game less enjoyable.
How Mario Kart 8 Deluxe's Double Item Boxes Made It More Frustrating
Because players could save an item for later in Double Dash!!, Double Item Boxes introduced a layer of strategy, as racers could be smart about what they kept and what they threw away in order to gain an advantage. Double items' reintroduction in Mario Kart 8 Deluxe failed to bring back this calculation. Since players can't switch items back and forth without using the item in hand, they're encouraged to simply spam whatever they have until they get something they want. This puts twice the amount of items onto Mario Kart 8 Deluxe's racetracks, meaning way more unavoidable Red Shells and Blue Shells.
To a certain extent, this unfairness is part of what players expect in any Mario Kart game. It's a racing game catered towards everyone, so items are a way to compensate for new players' lack of skill, knocking the more experienced racers down a peg. This doesn't apply to races against U opponents, however, which is where Mario Kart 8 Deluxe's double items are most infuriating. When chasing first place on all the game's tracks, for example, double items mean players are far more likely to have a good run shot down by something completely out of their control - especially because first-place players often get at least one Coin from Double Item Boxes, meaning they're not equipped to deal with the increased fire coming from behind. When U racers are launching an increased number of heat-seeking Red Shells and suspiciously dead-accurate Green Shells, it can feel like the game is being cruel.
When Nintendo approaches developing Mario Kart 9, it should consider reworking the double item system to fix these issues. That could mean re-implementing Double Dash!!'s item switching, allowing players to turn off double item slots, introducing a downside to using multiple item slots (perhaps reduced speed, or something along those lines), or simply removing the feature entirely.
Mario Kart 8 Deluxe released for the Nintendo Switch on April 27, 2017.
