YMMV / Mario Kart: Double Dash!!

• Awesome Art: One of the many praises this game still gets up to this day is how visually appealing the art style is, even when compared to future titles like Mario Kart Wii. Sure the models may be very low poly and cheaply made, and the lighting can be a bit too shiny and flat in some places, but the environments are bustling with personality and charm with bold, vibrant colors filling up every turn. Even the menus look really visually appealing, with their bright neon colors and colorful backgrounds.
• Broken Base:
  • The whole "crew of two" mechanic. Either it's one of the most innovative features to be introduced to the entire Mario Kart franchise and needs to make a return, or it's one of the worst aspects about Double Dash!! and it's a good thing it has yet to be brought back. There are also those who were completely indifferent to the whole mechanic, but there have been some debates among fans of the first two camps on if the feature should or should not return in a future entry.
  • The frantic nature of Double Dash!!, notably the avalanche of items which get thrown at you and the unique physics of the karts compared to previous and following installments; it either gives the game a unique charm, makes it absolutely unplayable, or just annoying to play.
• Complacent Gaming Syndrome: The lightweight characters are by far the most used due to being out-and-out Game Breakers with karts that have very high acceleration and handling, and are tough to hit with items.
  • In particular, the Barrel Train, Diddy Kong's specialty kart, is the best kart in the game. Despite what the in-game stats might tell you, it's tied with some heavyweight karts^note and the Bullet Blaster for the fastest kart in the game, and it loses the least amount of speed when travelling off-road. Although its acceleration is the worst of its weight class, it's still only average, and it's also the heaviest light kart in the game. Along with its low traction (which makes it still retain a lot of speed if it slips over certain items like Banana Peels), these traits make this kart a very popular pick in Time Trials.
  • Koopa and Paratroopa's special items are the Triple Red and Green Shells, items that anyone can get in the other Mario Kart games, but in this game they have exclusive access to them. The Chain Chomp might be powerful, but it doesn't come close to the Boring, but Practical "more things to throw at the enemy / destroy oncoming projectiles with" usage that the shells have.
• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • Petey Piranha had Double Dash as his only playable appearance in the series for decades, yet remained a popular character among fans of the series since then. This long absence made his comeback in Tour and 8 Deluxe all the more welcomed.
  • Diddy Kong was a very popular addition to the series in this game, as he originated in the Rare-made Donkey Kong Country series. Like Petey Piranha, his comeback in Tour and 8 Deluxe was praised.
  • Despite not being as efficient as the Bullet Bill, the Chain Chomp item still has its fan because of how erratic it is, and because of the chaos it causes after it's unleashed.
  • Noshi, the horned sauropod in Dino Dino Jungle, earned a level of ironic popularity.
• Franchise Original Sin:
  • In Mario Kart 64 and its GBA successor, Mario Kart: Super Circuit, the Blue Shell worked like a Red Shell, but can hit every driver in front of the one who threw it and finished with the one in the first place; this game, however, marks the debut of the far more infamous flying version of the item that only hits the first-place driver with an explosion that takes five to ten seconds to recover from. By the time the first-place driver is back on track, the second-place driver is likely to have already surpassed them, and usually said second racer is the only one taking any advantage of the weapon. It took Nintendo two more games (Mario Kart DS and Mario Kart Wii) to either realize the mistake themselves or to notice the item's infamy among fans before reverting the item to its non-flying form (while still exploding when hitting the head racer) in Mario Kart 7 and Mario Kart 8.
  • The inclusion of Baby Mario and Baby Luigi has become this, with fans bemoaning that later games would have several characters slots taken up by characters that were effectively clones of pre-existing characters.
  • This game introduced an entirely new character in the form of Toadette. Later entries in the series would introduce new characters in the franchise like Baby Daisy and Pink Gold Peach, who are usually received negatively by fans and are seen as uncreative additions to the roster. Unlike those characters, Toadette avoids the negative reception by being an entirely new character that isn't a variant of a pre-existing character, and would eventually appear in the mainstream platformers and other spin-offs.
  • The meme of "Getting Mario Kart'd" (getting pelted by every item at once) is often associated as starting as early as Mario Kart DS or Mario Kart Wii, but it actually came from this game. Part of the reason is that starting with this game the AI was made much more intelligent and spiteful but in this game's case, it also didn't help that having two characters per kart alongside Double Item Boxes meant doubling the amount of items that would be flung every which way.
• Funny Moments: Wario's reaction when losing a race is a jaunty.
  Wario: I lost! To a bunch of losers!
• Growing the Beard: Fans are divided as to whether or not it was this game, Mario Kart DS, or Mario Kart 64 when the series really grew the beard. In particular, this is when the series grew the beard in making the AI actually pose an actual threat to the player in terms of items, as well as introducing/reintroducing many fan favorite characters that have since become staples of Mario spinoffs, and some items that will be included in the main roster (notably the Bob-Omb and the Chain Chomp which can be considered the prototype of the Bullet Bill).
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • On one of the promotional websites for the game, Lakitu mentions that although he's been in every single Mario Kart game at the time, he's never been a racer. Since Mario Kart 7, he's an unlockable character.
  • The name of one track in this game is Peach Beach. Senran Kagura eventually released a game called Peach Beach Splash. Naturally, callbacks to this track began cropping up once people realized this.
• Memetic Mutation:
  • Rainbow Road with lyrics. "It's the road that you gooooo when you diiiiie..."
  • While mostly associated with the webcomic Brawl in the Family, the line "Waluigi Time!" originates from this game.
  • "HI, I'M DAISY!"^Explanation Daisy shouts this particular line when switching characters mid-race and when winning first place, and it's really, really loud, and became legendarily annoying among fans. This is the only game in which she says this line that frequently, but in spite of this, practically anything referencing Daisy online will inevitably bring this line up as if it's her catchphrase, and has resulted in the dialog also haunting Daisy in every game onward, no matter what context she appears in.
  • "Look how much longer it takes to select Wario!"^Explanation A comment from the Game Dude in his review of the Mario Kart series, complaining about how Wario takes longer to select in this game than in Mario Kart 64 due to the increased roster size, even though he was moving the cursor to the right instead of wrapping around off of the left, effectively taking the long way around. The aforementioned mistake, alongside the odd nature of the complaint, ended up inspiring a gimmick account on Twitter, which took off surprisingly fast.
  • Elimine, saint of Mario Kart^ExplanationElimine is one of the eight legends in Elibe's lore, yet the only time she ever appeared in physical form is in a bonus disc issued with preorders of Double Dash!!. Here, when having a copy of Blazing Blade linked to the GameCube, she grants the player bonus items that normally wouldn't be found in-game, before vanishing off. Because of this, she became the butt of jokes to most Fire Emblem fans as she was only remembered for appearing in a Mario Kart game of all things, let alone a bonus disc of one. The meme saw a resurgence when she finally made her actual debut in the Fire Emblem franchise with Heroes in January 2022 as an Astra Mythic Hero.
• Nintendo Hard: The game marks a huge boost in difficulty in the series. Not only is the AI more efficient (especially on higher difficulties), but the bigger amount of items (due to the presence of character-exclusive ones) makes races more chaotic, and it's this game when the Blue Shell gains the winged incarnation that makes it one's biggest enemy (its explosion is much stronger now). The Lightning stripes you from whatever item(s) you were carrying (this didn't happen in prior games), and the score system is less generous to those who reach below third place, or even first if you haven't fared so well in prior races. Racing in the All-Cup Tour in Mirror Mode gets a special mention due to all these factors coming into play more than usual due to the extended duration of that cup.
• Older Than They Think: Thought "WALUIGI TIME" debuted in Brawl in the Family? TOO BAD! It was first said in this game. In addition, Waluigi has never said the "TOO BAD!" part in-game.
• Scrappy Mechanic:
  • Having two characters per kart brings with it a problem not seen in any other Mario Kart game. Your second driver (the one that throws items) can get incapacitated if you get caught in an explosion or a very bad crash. To make matters worse, they get dragged along behind the kart for up to 10 seconds, leaving you completely unable to attack or defend against other racers.
  • If either of your characters is holding multiple items at once (Triple Shells, Triple Mushrooms), getting spun out will cause them to drop all but one of the items. It makes sense since both partners are only holding items with one hand but it doesn't make it sting less to be lagging behind, get something decent and then immediately get the rug pulled on you because you hit a banana or ran into an obstacle on the track. Even more infuriating in the case of Mushrooms since they end up littered on the track for anyone to use.
  • Unlike most other games in the series, you cannot drag items behind you for defense. Items are always held in-hand by the characters, forcing you to react quickly if a Red Shell approaches and pray you're not in the middle of a turn.
• Self-Imposed Challenge: Getting 160 points on All-Cup Tour in either 150cc or Mirror mode is brutal due to its length, which has the player get first place on all sixteen Grand Prix tracks in one go, without breaks, retries or checkpoints. Together with the computer racer AI, which already dumps a barrage of item-assaults (including Spiny Shells, of course) your way if you pull too far ahead in 1st place too often, and the pairs of AI racers are completely randomized and thus the variety of special items you can get pelted with increases significantly. Getting denied this achievement on Rainbow Road is a good way to receive a noise complaint from your neighbors.
• Sequel Difficulty Spike: While the Mario Kart series has always had a degree of difficulty, this is the game where the AI really started to punish the player with items. It's not uncommon to find clips of players seconds away from victory only to be bombarded at the finish line and end the race in a far worse position.
• Unexpected Character: Petey Piranha and King Boo, the former for being (at the time) just a regular boss out of many in its debuting game, and the latter for being the Final Boss of a non-mainline game, so no one saw them coming. Even though Birdo, Bowser Jr. and Diddy Kong debuted in this game as well, for many players the debut was more plausible.

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