Super Mario Kart (SNES, 1992)
In many ways the most limited mainline Mario Kart game, this could have been down the bottom of this list after all these years, as subsequent games have some along and slowly improved and built upon the foundations it laid.
But man, there’s still so much to love, and respect. While its lack of 3D terrain is a little jarring in this post-Nintendo 64 world, the slippery, slidey cornering might still be the best in the series, from its exaggerated reach to the way the entire camera is wrenched around to accommodate it.
It’s not the fastest, smartest of even the most fun Mario Kart game, not by a long stretch, but it’s somehow still the most kart-y game of the lot. And being the instigator of the entire series, in many ways the purest expression of the original vision, it felt wrong putting it any lower.
