Mario Kart: Super Circuit

Mario Kart: Super Circuit
Also known as: Mario Kart Advance (JP) Developer: Intelligent Systems Publisher: Nintendo Platform: Game Boy Advance Released in JP: July 21, 2001 Released in US: August 26, 2001 Released in EU: September 14, 2001 Released in AU: September 13, 2001 This game has unused areas. This game has unused graphics. This game has unused items. This game has unused abilities. This game has regional differences. This game has a prerelease article

Mario Kart: Super Circuit is the third game in the Mario Kart series, the first to be released on a handheld system, and the first not to be developed by Nintendo EAD. The game uses a similar pseudo-3D engine to Super Mario Kart along with the same control scheme, but includes all of the characters and several items from Mario Kart 64, even sharing a number of sprites from it. In December 2011, it was released for the 3DS Virtual Console (with no difference aside from lack of multiplayer functionality), as part of the 3DS Ambassador Program.

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Prerelease Info

Unused Tracks

SNES Battle Courses

Tilemaps and minimaps exist for all four of the Battle Courses from Super Mario Kart. These could have been used as placeholders before the new ones were completed, or it may have been possible to unlock these courses just like the tracks at one point. Unlike all other tracks and battle courses in the game, which are stored in chunks, these are each stored in one piece, as in Super Mario Kart. All of them use Super Circuit's Battle Mode theme.

They occupy track IDs 0x34 to 0x37. They can be played using the GameShark code 83003621 00XX.

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  SNES Battle Course 1.

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  The minimap of SNES Battle Course 1.

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  SNES Battle Course 2.

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  The minimap of SNES Battle Course 2.

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  SNES Battle Course 3.

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  The minimap of SNES Battle Course 3.

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  SNES Battle Course 4.

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  The minimap of SNES Battle Course 4.

Award Ceremony

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  Award Ceremony

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  The minimap of Award Ceremony.

This is the track seen during the Award Ceremony sequence after finishing a cup. It reuses the music and minimap from Peach Circuit; some sprites for the trees are also loaded but unused and most of the track can not be seen during the sequence. The AI route was not programmed for other characters. Its ID slot is 0x1C.

Removed Tracks

The slots 0x0 to 0x3 and 0x1D to 0x1F are not assigned any track. Trying to load them will crash the game.

Unused Items

The Bob-omb icon may have been intended for when a player becomes one in Battle Mode, as instead the player's portrait is crossed out, or for something similar to the Bob-omb item in Mario Kart: Double Dash!!. Along with the other used items, the Banana Bunch, Golden Mushroom, and Fake Item Box from Mario Kart 64 were also supposed to make a reappearance, but apparently weren't finished in time for the game's release.

These items can be accessed using the item modifier GameShark code 83003D12 10XX, not including the Bob-omb.

ID	Icon	Description	Notes
0x6		Triple Banana	Unfortunately, this does nothing when used.
0x9		Gold Mushroom	Works perfectly fine; grants a bunch of boosts for a limited amount of time. No other items can be obtained while it's active.
0xD		Fake Item Box	Places a single banana peel behind the kart.
0xE		Infinite Mushroom	When Gold Mushroom is used the item gets transformed into this. Grants unlimited boosts and gets reset to 0 when the timer runs out.

Unused Graphics

SNES Tracks

All

With the exception of Rainbow Road (which are identical to Mario Circuit's, save for a bad palette), each SNES track's graphic set includes a unique, revamped oil slick graphic, as well as an earlier version of the coin. Mario Circuits 2, 3, and 4 are the only Super Mario Kart tracks to use oil slicks, but they are not used in this game.

The images above are in the following order: Mario Circuit, Donut Plains, Ghost Valley, Bowser Castle, Choco Island, Koopa Beach, and Vanilla Lake.

Mario Circuit

The unused multicolored block from the original can be found here as well, this time with wrong colors.

Donut Plains

Despite the removal of Monty Moles from Donut Plains 2 and 3, the holes they pop out of were still given a graphical update in the tracks' tileset.

Ghost Valley

There are unused frames for an animation for the frail block falling like it was done in Super Mario Kart, but it strangely isn't used in Mario Kart: Super Circuit. The blocks disappear immediately instead.

This graphic can also be found in Boo Lake's and Broken Pier's tileset.

Vanilla Lake

Just like the frail block the breakable ice blocks also have an animation for getting destroyed, but it simply disappears in the game.

Choco Island

Another Super Mario Kart leftover. Unused in both games.

Rainbow Road

The mysterious unused coin makes an comeback, albeit with never fixed wrong colors.

New Tracks

Most new graphics for new courses were used, but some were axed, and we get to see them here, in all their GBA ARM glory.

Mario Circuit

Along with the tree, a pipe and mushroom can be found in Mario Circuit's sprite graphics. Pipes were a feature in several Super Mario Kart tracks, and a big Mushroom appeared in Mario Kart 64's Mario Raceway.

Sky Garden

Likewise, Fuzzies from Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island appear with Sky Garden's beanstalk graphics, implying these were intended to appear in the course at some point.

Ribbon Road

A spinning, smiling star and a strange UFO toy(?) appear near the gift box sprite graphics for Ribbon Road. The UFO has no palette of its own, so a modified version of the present box palette (with white replacing the darkest shade of blue) was applied to it. Perhaps they were meant for Rainbow Road and took a wrong turn...

Changed Graphics

Every track tileset in the game has an early version of the zipper and jump panel graphics, which are overwritten with different versions in-game.

Early	Final

On the early version of the zippers, the arrows do not flash, and the arrow and yellow square are outlined. The shade of red used is darker in the final sprite.

Early	Final

The jump panels lost a great deal of detail, partially due to the fact that darkest shade of yellow is overwritten with the flashing red color used on the final version of the zipper above.

To do: Use a better palette for these sprites.

The ranks were originally SSS, SS, S, A, B, C, D, E, before the S was changed to stars.

Unused Font

Found among the HUD graphics is this small and detailed font. The game uses a bigger font instead. Interestingly the L has different coloring and is used to denote lap times at the end of a Extra Cup's races.

Unused Colors

SNES Rainbow Road

Just like in the SNES original, there are 3 colors for each of the coloruful tiles from Rainbow Road, but they only use 2 colors.

Regional Differences

Graphics Changes

Japan	International

Japan	International

In the Japanese version, the Shy Guys in Sunset Wilds wear Native American war bonnets. These were removed in the international release, most likely out of sensitivity towards indigenous cultures. Interestingly, while the face paint was removed in the preview image in the International versions, the sprites themselves were not altered to compensate.

Japan	International

In the Japanese version, the Settings text stays here when you open them.

China	International

Like in Mario Kart 64, the Special Cup was changed to iQue Cup in the unreleased Chinese version.

Misc.

• The Japanese version had online capabilities, which were done through connecting an adapter so that the GBA could hook up to a cell phone, presumably to allow ghost exchanging. The service was discontinued on December 14, 2002.
• Most of the preloaded Time Trial records were changed. The 1st Place times and best lap records are the same for all versions, but 2nd-5th Places are different. In the Japanese version, 2nd-4th have a slightly slower time from the 1st Place record and 5th Place is always set to 3'00"00; in the international versions, times are all 30 seconds apart from the 1st Place record.

(Source: The Mushroom Kingdom)