Nintendo Speeds Into Spring With Mario Kart Wii

This year, the typical signs of spring will be accompanied by the sweet sound of revving engines and the sight of lightning-fast shells whizzing around every corner. Mario Kart Wii is zooming toward its launch in the United States on April 27 and the game comes with the Wii Wheel to give you a more realistic feel of driving and with Wi-Fi Connection, players can compete with up to 11 other drivers from around the world for racing dominance.

Mario Kart Wii will include 16 new courses and 16 classic courses from previous Mario Kart games. For the first time ever, players have the option of racing with either karts or motorbikes. Players can also hit the road as their personalized Mii in addition to the handful of classic Nintendo characters found in the game. True to the series, the game features tons of racing, plenty of power-ups and oodles of objects for players to use to slow down other drivers, and the 10 battle arenas will keep players busy between trips around the circuit.

The Wii Wheel will also be sold as a separate accessory so that every member of the household can get in on the action. While the Wii Wheel is supported, so are four other control options: Wii Remote with or without the Wii Wheel, Wii Remote and Nunchuk controller combo, Classic Controller and even the Nintendo GameCube controller was not left out of the mix.

Mario Kart Wii will launch with a new channel added to the Wii Menu called, unsurprisingly, The Mario Kart Wii Channel. This new channel builds on an online community of Wii owners and lets players compete in tournaments, check worldwide rankings, see when their friends are playing and download ghost data.

For more information about the game, check out our previous posts. Also of note, I guess the scan of the box art we posted back in February was real after all. Who would have thunk it?