"Get ready to starting your karting!"
DreamWorks Super Star Kartz is a Mascot Racer featuring characters and locations from various DreamWorks Animation films.It was published by Activision (notably being the final DreamWorks Animation game published under it) and developed by High Impact Games for the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii, Nintendo 3DS, and Nintendo DS.
It would be succeeded by DreamWorks All-Star Kart Racing, another DreamWorks Mascot Racer published by GameMill.
The roster consists of the following movies (one asterisk denotes characters exclusive to the console/3DS versions, two asterisks denote characters exclusive to the DS version):
- Shrek: Shrek, Donkey, Fiona, Knight Shrek*
- How to Train Your Dragon: Hiccup, Toothless
- Madagascar: Alex, Skipper*, Marty, Sailor Disguise Skipper*, Tribal Paint Alex*, Gloria**, Melman**, King Julien**, Chimps**
- Monsters vs. Aliens: B.O.B.
The game provides examples of:
- And Your Reward Is Clothes: The game has unlockable versions of Shrek, Alex, and Skipper, who wear alternate outfits and come with slightly different stats: Shrek gets his knight armor, Alex gets his ceremonial tribal paint and Skipper gets a sailor disguise.
- Bubblegloop Swamp: Shrek's Swamp is a large, swamp-based course that takes place in Shrek's swamp, with lots of little jumps and one big jump into the muddy water.
- Dolled-Up Installment:
- The game was originally intended to be a 2010 reboot of Crash Team Racing, but when said reboot was scrapped the engine was quickly reworked into a DreamWorks Animation crossover. Several planned elements such as the trick system and character-specific special moves can still be found in Super Star Kartz.
- The DS version is an updated version of the that system's version of Madagascar Kartz, featuring most of the characters and tracks from that game rather than those found in the console versions.
- Jungle Japes: Madagascar is a jungle-based track that takes place in the wilds of Madagascar.
- Lethal Joke Character: Despite his low overall stats, Donkey is generally considered the best playable character in the game. Why? Because his sole maxed-out stat is trick boost speed, Donkey can get so much speed off a single air trick that he can rocket through courses in record time regardless of how low his other stats are, and due to the abundance of boost ramps on most courses, Donkey has no problem chaining those boosts together to the point where he can easily go entire races without losing his speed for more than a second. As a result, Donkey completely dominates online leaderboards to the point where every single time trial record uses him.
- Lethal Lava Land: Dragon Island and Dragon's Keep both take place in volcanic, lava-filled areas.
- Level in Reverse: The Moon Cup features alternate versions of Shrek's Swamp, Island of Berk, and Africa that take place at night and have you driving the course in the opposite direction.
- Mascot Racer: The game is a kart racer featuring various DreamWorks Animation characters.
- Mighty Roar: Shrek's special move is a powerful roar that goes along the track and stuns any opponent it hits.
- Moveset Clone: Shrek, Alex, and Skipper have alternate versions (Knight Shrek, Tribal Paint Alex, and Sailor Disguise Skipper) that share their special moves, but have slightly different stats compared to the regular versions and are considered separate characters altogether.
- Shout-Out: One of Donkey's one-liners is "I gotta get me one of these!" when speeding up.
- Sidelined Protagonist Crossover: As with Madagascar Kartz, Monsters vs. Aliens is once again represented with B.O.B., while Ginormica - the actual main protagonist of the movie - is relegated to a background appearance in Gallaxhar's Spaceship.
