Reviews from

in the past


i can race as pastel so it's a 10/10 game ...

En un mundo dominado por Mario Kart, Konami supo hacerle frente de una forma peculiar, con divertidos modos de juego, una banda sonora muy singular, y con unos gráficos muy pulidos

Konami Krazy Racers (2001): Un clon de Mario Kart que salió antes y es mejor que el Mario Kart de su consola. Una conducción más fluida, circuitos más variados y originales y un plantel carismático. Le falta un control más fluido, pero en lo demás cumple con creces (7,25)

When I first played Konami Krazy Racers, I was but a child. I did not know TwinBee or Parodius or Rakugakids. I was in it entirely for Cyborg Ninja.

I speak to you today as a man.

It's alarming how much Konami this game expects you to be familiar with. It's not a version of the company that most western fans would associate them with either. There's no Contra, no Silent Hill, no Sparkster or Frogger. This is well before they acquired Hudson Soft too, so don't expect to see Bomberman or Master Higgins, either. This is Powerful Pro Yakyuu and Pop'n Music. Games I haven't played. It's actually kind of weird that Metal Gear Solid got roped in.

The most fun references are in the character-specific Specials, where you get a partner character protecting you. Count Dracula gets the Grim Reaper, Takosuke gets the angelic pig, Michael, and Grey Fox gets a HIND-D. What's a Russian gunship doing here? Giving you a speed boost, of course!

The music's pretty great, especially if you know their sources. A straight Bowser's Castle clone getting a Vampire Killer remix is a massive upgrade. It's conceivable that the music guys were the ones responsible for the character roster, since they're largely from games with brilliant soundtracks.

What will divide players is how much the game is rooted in the original Super Mario Kart. It's not subtle about it. There's coins and a hop button, stiff handling and sharp corners. They've also got those bastard tropical island tracks. Your tolerance for Krazy Racers will largely hinge on how much you enjoy Mario Kart 1. Of course, the game's completely flat too. You can see why people got so excited about the inclines in GT Advance 2, after this.

There are differences, though. Weapons and speed boosts are distinguished between red and blue pick-ups, so you can approach items with a little more intent. Picking up an item will cruelly replace whatever you've currently got, too, so you're often looking at items scattered around the track as hazards. There are jump pads to give the tracks a little more of a vertical dynamic, though some of the later tracks can use them in some fairly cheap ways to send you speeding into a pit. Collision isn't always as slick as it ought to be, and you can find yourself clipping on obstacles and other racers awkwardly.

It really is the Konami stuff that elevates this above a b-grade Mario Kart clone. And not just for the references. There's a weird energy to the game that's consistent with Bishi Bashi and Beatmania. The main menus are presented as a PC desktop, with Pentarou-style penguins offering racing tips via very short emails. There's a lightning strike item that turns all your opponents into tiny pigs (the pigs handle a little better than most of the karts, so I don't mind getting hit by it too much). There's a Wonder Boy-style shop that you can pre-equip starting items from, and licence tests to unlock new races and characters. The game's intro invites you to take part via a message from "Konami Man". It's good. I like it.

You're playing a GBA kart racer. Super Circuit ain't exactly hot shit either. You might as well play the one with a playable Easter Island statue in it.


A decent Mario Kart clone that’s kinda better than Super Circuit.

Fun lil kart racer, though no drifting (at least that I could find) makes it much more of a purists racing game, drift freaks look elsewhere. I think what makes this game so fun is the amount of tonal whiplash you get from all of konami's various franchises. You have shit like dracula and gray fox racing in a power pro baseball field with a moai head and beartank from rakugakids. It's chaos that really can be done by konami and I love it. But I will say there are probably better kart racers on the ol' GBA.

Fun little kart racer. I've never been a huge fan of the Mode 7 style kart racer, but this is definitely one of the better ones. 4 cups with 4 tracks, some side missions, and a weird little story inspired by the cool new world of the personal computer and email! Typical Mode 7 complaints apply here: gravity doesn't feel real and hard to tell what are obstacles or just part of the track, precision items suck ass to try and aim, the final cups use a shitload of course hazards (water, lava, etc.), which is fine, but if even one pixel of your sprite touches a hazard you fall into it, so it feels really weird and bad sometimes. A lot of this is a modern perspective though; still had a decent enough time.

Konami surprisingly made a lot of games for the launch of the GBA there was stuff like Castlevania Circle of the Moon, Play Novel: Silent Hill, Yu-Gi-Oh! Dungeon Dice Monsters, Power Pro Kun Pocket 3, J. League Pocket, Monster Guardians and also the game I'm talking about Konami Krazy Racers or Konami Wai Wai Racing Advance as it's called in Japan.

This isn't actually the first Konami crossover game as there were two of them on the Famicom that were japan only. Instead of an action game though we are doing a racing game. I'm guessing Konami wanted to beat Nintendo for making a racing game and honestly they did a good job.

You race through 16 tracks based off of other Konami series and you also can upgrade your class to do more tracks then the ones you start with. The cast is pretty odd and I know a lot of people don't really care for it but my only gripe with it is Kid Dracula should have been the Castlevania rep. I stuck with Pastel for pretty much the whole game because she's the best girl! There's also 4 unlockable characters which are Bear Tank from Rakuga Kids, The King from Pop n Music, Ebisumaru from Goemon, and the Vic Viper from Gradius.

The controls are fairly simple and it doesn't even have a drift button though you can still hop. There's also a variety of items to use though it does feel oddly unbalanced like one time I got the item that hits everyone with electricity in 2nd place like why would they even let that happen.

The course design is fairly good but nothing outstanding but there's not really any tracks I hate. My only real gripe is some of the tracks like Magma Castle have these awful hazards that are basically RNG if you'll dodge them or not. Otherwise they all work pretty well.

The presentation is pretty good for a launch game and the music is a pleasant hearing experience. I especially love the title theme with the WAI WAI WAI WAI WAI WAI RACING!!! You'll also get to hear some iconic songs from other franchises while you play which is nice.

Konami Krazy Racers is a pretty fun game that I'd argue even surpasses Mario Kart Super Circuit though I haven't played it in years so maybe I'm wrong. While there's probably not too much of a reason to go back to this game nowadays, it's still an enjoyable experience. If I had this game when the GBA launched, I would have been happy.

I genuinely think it's better than mario kart super circuit

sadly the gba launch kart racer that features beartank is somehow not the better one

Was not expecting this game to be as fun and charming as it is. The presentation, sound, and graphics are incredible, everything from the character sprites to the menus to the incredible music and fun voice lines all the characters have. The characters here are just very fun and cute in general, it's a great choice of characters from the Konami library.

On top of all this, it controls really well and really tests my kart racing skills in a way I want them to be tested. There's no drift boost here, which already make it feel unique nowadays, as competent racing is now dependent on kart control, making tight turns and track knowledge, instead of just constantly drifting (not that I don't enjoy constantly drifting, this game just requires a somewhat different set of skills). Tracks in this game can get brutal, but I was always willing to keep trying over and over because the game is just that fun and engaging. This is the kind of kart racer I want to spend a lot of time to get good at, a kart racer on the GBA that I couldn't possibly set up a multiplayer match of, it's that good.

Only a couple things hold it back, such as the fact that a lot of tracks have somewhat RNG based elements that I'm not a big fan of, and can sometimes get a little too demanding. Also the way you unlock characters is kind of weird. Outside of this and limits of the GBA and being on an old console, this is a really great kart racer that pretty much fan of the genre would enjoy.

This game is quite similar to Mario Kart: Super Circuit. If you liked that game, you're almost certain to like this one too.

Konami Krazy Racers is a Mario Kart of passable quality. There is not anything outstanding about it besides being able to play as Frank Jaeger in a kart racing game. Though, I suppose experiencing various Konami IPs within the environment of a kart racer is the entire appeal. And the game does give you that. What it doesn't give you is a meaningfully pleasing aspect of driving the karts. It's not actively bad, but noticeably barebones. Playing various kart racing games and experiencing their take on item pickups will make you aware of what a great decision it was to centralize Mario Kart around Mario. KKR's items are generally unwhelming and generic. The new/interesting aspects that this game brings to the genre are in its license tests and how some of its hidden characters are unlocked. These license tests are individual races to test your ability and unlock additional tracks and/or cups. They are a neat idea, but are too few and too easy (besides one!). Hidden characters are unlocked in a couple ways, but the one I found interesting is hiding them within courses in Grand Prix mode. That's a cool idea. Rewarding players that explore the reaches of the tracks and break from their instinctual gaming is good, actually. However, they are largly found through accident unless you know already and the one that isn't found that way trivializes all the game's challenges.

It's possibly a bit of a Mario Kart clone, but it's well-made. For a pick-up-and-play type of game, it's easy and a bit addictive to get into. I have never played Mario Kart for more than a brief period, so I wouldn't be able to compare them.

Possibly a bit shorter than expected because, when I thought I was heading into the last phase of the game, the end screen credits were, to my surprise, rolling. Konami Krazy Racers is still a quite nice little game!

This was promising at first, there are 4 courses to select with 4 tracks each, and I like the character roster a lot. I thought there would be 16 unique tracks, but they re-use the settings and themes so there's more like 8 tracks with 8 variants.

The lack of different themes and environments was very disappointing. once all four courses are unlocked that's it, getting first on Hard doesn't do anything, there's no cool secret course to unlock, just having 1 new level theme to unlock that wasn't used yet would have made playing through this worth it.

The closest comparison to this game is Mario Kart Super Circuit, and that game has more content, more varied course layouts, and more movement options like drifting.

Despite having less KKR does feel good to control, just racing and doing time trials can be fun at times.

There's also a trial mode that has unique objectives like beating a certain time or doing a course backwards, this added some needed variety and game time to single player.

It was cumbersome and awkward to drift in (2D) Mario Kart but at least it was in the game, in KKR you have to nearly come to a complete stop on some turns, meanwhile the computer players cheat and don't have to slow down at all, while always catching up instantly.

The worst thing about this game is the collision detection, it's terrible.
I'd try to make jumps over pits or cut corners over water and the hitbox appears to be larger that the tile it's on, so it looks like I'd be on land but I'd still fall in, sometimes multiple times in a row since the turning is so bad, the ice level was miserable to play as the edge tiles would count as water and are all over and they are easy to slide into.

hitting walls is not lenient at all just barely touching a wall or obstacle will make the kart come to a near stop, it's ridiculous.

Boosting on a jump and doing a really hard turn to skip part of the level will instantly put the player in last place.
I understand not letting players skip half the track, but even just a little skp saving maybe 1/2 a second is still punished, sometimes I'd even do one by accident and have to start over.
Any kind of creative or fun shortcuts are just not possible here, I don't see any good reason why they did this, it just makes the game even less enjoyable and punishing.

Good character roster, nice remixed music themes from other games, and shadow moses from Metal Gear Solid as a track setting is the best thing this game has, there's also some unlockable characters, and at least they all feel different to play.

I have mixed feelings on this game
It's worth trying for the crossover but it's not as replayable as some other racing games on Advance.

So you're telling me that Konami man invited Grey Fox but not Solid Snake???

Mario Kart Super Circuit... BUT GOOD???

Better than Super Circuit, but, that's still a low bar. Fun to have all these Konami vagabonds in one spot, but the gamefeel and overall aesthetic trend too skrunkly for my tastes. Taking the drift out of Mode 7 MK really reveals how boring it all is. Didn't find the course selection to be very good, either: The Castlevania tracks especially can fuck off.

Gets half an extra star for Pastel and the Moai.

Konami Krazy Racers struggles to even remain interesting compared to the eventually released Mario Kart: Super Circuit.

From the uninteresting tracks, to the roster of almost absolute nobodies, to the lame weapons. And unfortunately not adding to this game's favor is the dip in frame rate adding a nice layer of boring butter to the white bread of this game.

Just cause it's bland doesn't mean I'm not gonna act like this didn't make for a solid game to get when the GBA first released. It's nice and bubbly, music's okay and it has the same charm you'd get out of other kart racers for the first year.

And what I like compared to Super Circuit from a few months later is that turning actually feels solid and smooth unlike the jerky turning in Super Circuit and that the Battle Mode is free to play with CPU bots which wouldn't be a Mario Kart staple until DS so that's a plus.

Other than that I don't find much worth returning to with Krazy Racers other than if you enjoy these 2D racers in a pseudo-3D environment.

This game actually has some personal significance to me as my grandmother got this for me a long time ago at an FYE after I begged for her to buy me this back when I was obsessed with racing games. Ultimately she made the right choice as this is easily one of the best racing games on the GBA and I still have this relic to remember her by. Sentimental value aside, there are a lot of positives I can say about Konami Krazy Racers.

For starters, most if not all the characters feel unique to play as since they all have different speed and handling which gives me a lot of options to choose from judging by play style. One advantage this game has over Mario Kart is that there are a few extra characters you can unlock that not only play differently but also are pretty cool. I always used Bear Tank from that one Konami N64 fighting game since he was the fastest racer in the game. It also has a time attack mode and some really fun battle modes that I enjoyed playing against NPCs on. The soundtrack slaps as well and the main song samples Omega Rugal's theme from KoF 98 which I found to be a pretty cool discovery. However, this game isn't perfect and I will go over the main gripe I have with it as well.

The track variety is pretty bad, one thing I will give Mario Kart: Super Circuit credit for over this is that nearly each track in that game is different and unique as opposed to the three Castlevania, Ganbare Goemon, and Metal Gear tracks that all these franchises have in the game with the same background and theme to them with the only difference being the track layout. Not only is it just a lack of variety but can also lead to the game getting a little more repetitive as it feels like you're just racing on the same tracks but just harder versions of them. That being said it's still a great GBA game to get, especially if you like kart racers and want to play something other than Mario Kart.

A good Mario Kart clone featuring a lot of 90's Konami characters, many of which making their first North American appearance in this particular game. Arguably better than the actual Mario Kart game on the system, though I haven't played Super Circuit in a while.

Um clone bem legalzinho de mario kart

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In terms of GBA arcade racing games, this one takes the cake. Better than Super Circuit by a mile.

Soundtrack goes hard. The trials campaign is a fun challenge. It's MK Super Circuit but tighter.