Mario Kart Wii/Regional Differences

This is a sub-page of Mario Kart Wii.

Mario Kart Wii has four versions that were released to the public: the European (PAL), Japanese (NTSC-J), American (NTSC-U) and the Korean (NTSC-K) version. A unique build exists for the Wii Starlight Kiosk, but aside of some minor differences, it's identical to the NTSC-U version (see below).

Sub-Pages

English Translation Differences You thought Smash 3DS/Wii U had a lot of English text differences? This game has almost completely different English text!

Spanish Translation Differences For the first time ever on the entirety of TCRF, we are going to cover the Spanish text differences instead of just putting it on the "To do" list and ignoring its existence! (Experimental Project)

French Translation Differences For the first time ever on the entirety of TCRF, we oliberated "To do" list from this section and this is now complete outside, but incomplete inside (Experimental Project)

Version Table

	Mario Kart Channel Build Date	Mario Kart Channel's StaticR.rel Build Date	Mario Kart Channel's StaticR.rel Revision Number	Release Date
PAL	0803131848 @WIIKARTLO-WIN	3/13 17:18:27	25381+	April 11th, 2008
NTSC-U	0803131851 @KARTBUILD-WIN	3/13 17:19:21	25381+	April 27th, 2008
NTSC-J	0803131859 @WIIKARTCHK-WIN	3/13 18:54:58	25381+	April 10th, 2008
NTSC-K	0807171818 @WIIKARTCHK-WIN	7/11 16:10:03	25877+	April 30th, 2009

• Note that the build date of the Mario Kart Channel doesn't necessarily have to correspond to the actual build date of the whole game image. The game image itself doesn't have a build date.
• The build dates follow the Year-Month-Day format, followed by a 24 hours time. For example, 0803131848 corresponds to March 13th, 2008 - 18:48
  • After that build date, the builder's name is shown. This field can be seen in an unused file left in some games, such as Wii Fit.
• StaticR.rel contains much of the specific code of Mario Kart Wii. Its build date follows the same format as the overall channel build date.

Starlight Wii Kiosk build

A unique build exists within the Starlight Wii Kiosk units, alongside other games stored in the unit's HDD. This build, however, is pretty much 1:1 identical to the NTSC-U retail version, with most of the game files being binary identical. The only differences found are as follows:

• The ISO name for the Starlight build is 5587_SES_HotelGateway_MarioKartWii_00, whereas in the retail version, it's just MarioKartWii.
• The Starlight build has different firmware WAD files inside the UPDATE partition.
• In the Starlight build, both the game ISO as well as the Mario Kart Channel WAD file are dev-signed, and require the RVT common key to be decrypted.

(Starlight Wii HDD Dump: j4m13c0)

Unreleased Versions

	Description
iQue Wii (Simplified Chinese)	The existence of this version is implied by several leftovers found in the game, primarily in the Korean version. Nintendo has never released any actual footage of this supposed version to the public.
NVIDIA Shield TV (Simplified Chinese)	A version of the game in Simplified Chinese was announced for the NVIDIA Shield TV in 2018, as part of their HD lineup involving Wii and GameCube re-releases, but sadly didn't come out.

Home Menu Banner

Japan	America	Europe	Korea

• In the American and Japanese versions, the items are placed closer to each other. In addition, the checkered pattern seen on top of the image is placed differently, and the game's logo slightly fades to white earlier than in the European and Korean versions.
• In the Korean release, the shadow drop was removed from the logo, which makes the edges of it sharper. The "Wii" logo was moved slightly as well.
• The Korean version uses a different design for the "Dolby Pro Logic II" logo.
• The European and Korean versions display the trademark as TM, while in the Japanese and American builds it is an ®.
• Both the Japanese and Korean releases display the game's name in their respective languages under the romanized logo.

Title Screen

Japan	America	Europe	Korea

• The Press the A Button text from the European and American releases is PRESS (A) BUTTON in the Japanese and Korean versions.
• The European and Korean versions display the trademark as TM, while in the Japanese and American builds it is an R.
• The Korean version displays the year 2009 in the copyright text, reflecting its actual release date. This is positioned lower than in the rest of the versions, and in addition, the font here is in bold.
• Both the Japanese and Korean releases display the game's name in their respective languages under the romanized logo.
• Both the Japanese and Korean versions have a mistake in which the "R" from the MARIOKART logo is missing one of its corners, making the logo slightly thinner.
• The Korean version fixes a small oversight in which Luigi's Kart shadow was slightly cut in the bottom left corner.
• The Korean release (unlike with the Japanese version) has the same blur version of the background image as the one used in the European and American releases, despite its title screen having more differences, such as the game's name in Korean.

License Selection Screen and Main Menu

Japan	Korea

• When setting the console's aspect ratio to 16:9, the Korean version will display the Title Screen image slightly offset to the left, which could be seen in a prerelease screenshot. This mistake is not present in the rest of the versions.
• In the European version, the 1/2/3/4 players' text numbers are slightly bigger than in the American version. In contrast, the "Player(s)" text is slightly larger in the American release in comparison to the European one.

Font

• The Korean release uses a completely different font from the one seen in the other versions.
• The icon graphics for the controller buttons are noticeably smaller in the Korean version (as seen in the "Back" button, for example). They are also positioned slightly lower than in all other versions.