Mario Kart 8/Beta Elements

This is a list of beta elements for the game Mario Kart 8.

Early ideas

The players were originally going to have a drill attached to their karts to tunnel through parts of the track to reach new areas and possibly for shortcuts, but Nintendo scrapped this idea in favor of the Anti-Gravity mechanic.

Early builds

Twisted Mansion was originally called Boo House. Kart noises in the E3 build are recycled from Mario Kart Wii while in the final version they are replaced by new engine noises. The course intro music in the E3 build was from Mario Kart 7, while the results and menu music was from Mario Kart Wii, much like the E3 2011 demo for Mario Kart 7. Character voices are recycled from previous games in the E3 build and newer builds provide newer voices. Players are unable to slipstream in the E3 demo. Characters did not hold items in their hands in the E3 demo. Donkey Kong's Standard Bike color was brown, but in the final version it was yellow. The Galaxy Air advertisement in Toad Harbor at the starting line was replaced by a Flower Cup logo and the cloth used a different texture while music had a different banjo. In early builds, the buttons "a" and "b" were replaced by "A" and "B". Thwomp Ruins in the E3 trailer lacked flowers, the finish line where it was in the final version, the anti gravity section before it was a normal section and the section with four torches was replaced with a trick section (ramps). The Goomba Towers found in Mario Circuit (Wii U) were both taller and harder to avoid unlike the final build of the game. In the trailer from E3 2013 multiple piranha plants can be seen at the same time. The artwork of the items in the roulette were recycled from Mario Kart 7 and Mario Kart Wii unlike the new upgraded ones in the final build. In the E3 demo, some (if not, most) of the items were missing or either unobtainable due to it being only a demo and added to the final game, some notable examples of the missing/unobtainable items were the Bullet Bill, the Spiny Shell, the Super Star, and the Thunderbolt (item). The HUD also looked different in the demo, having solid numbers instead of the digital ones in the final game; the same also applies to Lakitu's lap counter. The countdown timer is also different in the demo, having a normal design instead of the current one used in Super Mario 3D World in the final game. The kart customization was also absent from the demo; players would instead choose a character and race with a kart or bike premade for that character. Also, the players make two laps per race instead of three: this was probably done in the demo because the CPU still wasn't finished. In Thwomp Ruins, there was no finish line like in Super Mario Kart and Mario Kart: Super Circuit (and the retro courses from those in Mario Kart DS) and the anti-gravity section was a Normal section.

Originally, the minimaps on the Gamepad were very similiar to Mario Kart 7 ones; dark checkered gray background with a white colored course. In the final release, the minimaps have a checkered white background with a light blue colored course (rainbow colored for both Rainbow Road courses that appear in this game).