Mario Kart 8 And Mercedes Team Up For Awesome New DLC

Mario Kart is a fun racing game franchise that allows players to pelt each other with shells of various colors and bananas, as well as many other strange bits of ammo. In the new version, Mario Kart 8, gamers get to go one step further and customize their karts in a way that has never been seen before in the series.

Now, Mercedes is teaming up with Nintendo to give players one more choice of kart.

Both Mario Kart 8 and the Mercedes-Benz GLA SUV convertible were launched on the same day in Japan, May 29. As part of a celebration for the coincidence, the GLA will be heading to downloadable content.

As of right now, the DLC will only be available in Japan, but according IGN, Nintendo UK stated, “The announcement this time was made by Mercedes-Benz Japan regarding their collaboration in Japan with NCL. As for the information relating to the distribution of the GLA kart for [ Mario Kart 8 ] outside Japan, we will be able to announce in the near future.”

The DLC will be available for Japan sometime this summer. It will be free and optional.

To promote the crossover, Mario was featured in a new, oddly nostalgic, Mercedes commercial.

The commercial shows an 8-bit Mercedes driving through the first level of Super Mario Bros., followed by a jump into the real world. A strange, big-nosed Mario gets out of the car at the end and has to deal with a live-action goomba. It’s all a little strange, but from a game that features a dreaded spiny blue shell of doom, what else could be expected?

The Mercedes kart making a debut in Mario Kart 8 is likely a way for Nintendo to try and pull itself up after a disappointing fiscal year. It’s been known for a while that they have been looking into new licensing opportunities for their characters. Yes, this might be a little stranger than just having Mario and a random kart put on a box of Fruit Loops or something, but it will add another option for gamers.

The Mercedes-Benz GLA is the first real car to ever appear in a Mario Kart game.

Fans and reviewers of Mario Kart 8 are seemingly split over the necessity of the kart and have labeled the partnership between Nintendo and Mercedes as “one of the strangest” ever. What do you think?

[ Image courtesy of The Official Nintendo Magazine ]