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Nintendo Working on 'Mario Kart Tour' Game for Mobile Devices

Wednesday January 31, 2018 4:59 pm PST by Juli Clover
Nintendo this evening announced that a new mobile game is in the works, and this time the company is planning to bring a major fan favorite series to iOS devices -- Mario Kart.

According to Nintendo, a new Mario Kart game called "Mario Kart Tour" is in development. Little is known about the game at this time, but Nintendo says it will be released by March 2019.



Mario Kart is on of Nintendo's most popular titles, and a Mario Kart mobile game would follow successful mobile versions of games in the Super Mario, Animal Crossing, and Fire Emblem franchises.

Nintendo's other mobile games include Super Mario Run, Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp, and Fire Emblem Heroes. The company's first game on iOS devices was Miitomo, which was released in March of 2016. Nintendo this week announced that it plans to shut down Miitomo on May 9, 2018.

Though Miitomo was not a successful venture for the company given its imminent termination, Nintendo's other games have done better. Nintendo's smartphone profits reached 11.2 billion yen this fiscal quarter, seeing growth thanks to the recent launch of Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp. The game has generated an estimated $17 million globally.

Nintendo also said back in October that Fire Emblem Heroes is on track to meet its business and profit objectives. Unfortunately, Super Mario Run, Nintendo's one game that is a paid app rather than free-to-play, had not reached an "acceptable profit point" as of late 2017.

Nintendo says it has "learned a lot" about game development and deployment from Super Mario Run, however, and it is too early to tell whether the new Mario Kart game will be free-to-play or another game with an upfront purchase.

With more than a year to go before Mario Kart Tour launches, we'll likely learn more about it over the course of the next several months. Given the current example of mobile versions of Nintendo games, it's unlikely to be a full Mario Kart title, but fans of the series will undoubtedly be looking forward to the debut of a Mario Kart smartphone game.

Tag: Nintendo
[ 84 comments ]


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Aussi3
15 months ago
Now this might be alright! Until they announce first race is free then it’s pay per race... lol
Rating: 24 Votes
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ghost187
15 months ago
If you expect MK8 like experience, it’s never coming. These are all free advertisements for Nintendo. It worked for me. I have stopped playing video games for years, than downloaded Mario Run, finished it in 30 minutes, completed everything over a weekend, than bought the Switch day 1 and got blown away by Zelda BOTW.
Rating: 18 Votes
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macduke
15 months ago
Please don’t dumb it down too much…please don’t dumb it down too much…please don’t dumb it down too much…
Rating: 11 Votes
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UL2RA
15 months ago

Sounds awesome! I hope they can code around the iPhone updates that are causing the ridiculously sluggish performance. Because I would want a kart that’s faster than typing on my laggyazz keyboard. (Two week old iPhone 6 running current iOS).

“Two week old iPhone 6” ... buying it recently doesn’t make it new.
Rating: 11 Votes
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mbrannon47
15 months ago
Is it just me or is it awkward to specify the release date to customers as "in the fiscal year ending in March 2019."
Rating: 8 Votes
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Asarien
15 months ago

Now this might be alright! Until they announce first race is free then it’s pay per race... lol


If this happens, you honestly won't be able to blame Nintendo. Super Mario Run was a flat $10 with no micro transactions or in-app purchases, and Nintendo still haven't been able to recover being lambasted by the mobile community over that. Consumers have proven they rather continue being duped into paying tens or hundreds of dollars over time, rather than a simple, low, up-front cost.
Rating: 6 Votes
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shigzeo
15 months ago
My body is ready.
Rating: 5 Votes
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redneckitengineer
15 months ago
Hopefully this won’t canibalize Switch sales. It’s a while out, but still, gotta keep something sacred.
Rating: 5 Votes
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vertsix
15 months ago
as a huge mario kart fan


i'm happy :)
Rating: 4 Votes
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Cameront9
15 months ago

Keeping something sacred will cause them to go stagnant. They need to make their hardware optional. Right now, the only reason to buy it is because its the only place you can play their games; but, their hardware isn't anywhere close to Apple-s quality. I hope they release all of their games on other platforms, which would give them a huge boost in revenue and make sure they keep developing new titles for many years to come. Switch is okay, but not as convenient as an iPhone.


I find my Switch to be pretty close to Apple quality. It's a very well-made device. Never had a problem with Nintendo hardware durability.

As for releasing games on other platforms? Never going to happen. They'd rather go out of business first. Note that their mobile games seem specifically designed to get you hooked and buy the full console or 3DS game. The only reason they went mobile in the first place is because they felt they could use it to entice more customers to buy their hardware.

People have been saying Nintendo needed to go 3rd-party only for years. The Switch just sold 15 million in 10 months. It's the fastest selling console of all time. Profit is up 30% from last years at this quarter, and operating income jumped a staggering 496%. They have no debt and a mountain of cash. Nintendo seems to be doing just fine.
Rating: 4 Votes

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