No fix coming for Mario Kart 64 on the Wii's Virtual Console?
- January 31, 2007 09:45 AM PST
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Retro gamers are stuck with the bugs for now.
Old kart racers never die. They don't even fade away.
Mario Kart 64, one of the most anticipated Virtual Console titles - and let's face it, one of the few Nintendo 64 games worth playing - hit the shopping channel with some fanfare this week, but players who snagged the classic contest between beloved mascots for 1,000 points are stuck with some disappointments.
Despite Nintendo's penchant for referring to Virtual Console releases as "ports," they are, at their core, simply ROMs wrapped in emulation. Unfortunately, some problems with the emulation of the Nintendo 64's old memory packs is leaving some features unusable. For instance, saving "ghost" data, which let players of the original cartridge race against their own best performances, simply does not work.
UK website Pro-G contacted Nintendo about the problem, and heard back: "Due to unavoidable technical reasons unfortunately it is not possible to save ghost data from Mario Kart 64's Time Trials in the Virtual Console version of the game." The unnamed source went on to say that Nintendo had "placed messages advising users about this before they download the game, both when the Wii Shop Channel is first accessed, and in the More Details tab on the individual game page."
Strangely, when GamePro visited the "More Details" page for Mario Kart 64 this morning, we found that there is, in fact, no such mention of the missing functionality.
The Nintendo 64's memory packs were always flakey at best, but it still seems more than a little odd that Nintendo can't emulate their own hardware, especially when there are unsanctioned and unsupported emulators available for other platforms that allow the memory pack to function perfectly in this very game. On the other hand, Nintendo has left the door open for Virtual Console title updates in the past, so frustrated players might yet see a fix at some point in the future.
