Super Mario Kart

Super Mario Kart didn't have a genre to sit in when it launched in 1992 — it created one. Nintendo's Mode 7 graphics chip let the SNES fake a pseudo-3D racetrack that rotated and scaled beneath eight go-kart racers, and the result was fast enough, and chaotic enough with items flying, to make every other racing game on the console feel like it was standing still.

The item roster that's now genre-standard — green shells, red shells, banana peels, mushrooms, the lightning bolt — debuted right here, tuned around rubber-banding that kept last place within striking distance of the leader. Battle Mode, four arenas built purely for balloon-popping combat between two players, turned out to be just as influential, spinning off into its own beloved subgenre across every Mario Kart that followed.

This page hosts the verified Super Mario Kart ROM, built for Delta Emulator's SNES core on iPhone — load it directly with no BIOS file or extra setup required.