Super Mario Kart

This page details one or more prototype versions of Super Mario Kart.

mkartDated April 13, 1992. An early build featuring a third Choco Island track and elements seen in some prerelease videos and pictures (such as the early Donut Plains 1 track). kart_*Dated May 18, 1992. The first build in English, and the first with Rainbow Road - which could've been much harder. mario-kartLast modified July 14, 1992, but built around the latter half of June. More things have been implemented, but the Nintendo polish is still missing. kar4tLast modified July 14, 1992, but built around the latter half of June. Even more things have been finalized, plus there's a debug mode for Time Trial that's exclusive to this build. kartDated July 10, 1992. Even further along than kar4t, the game is practically finished at this point. kart-*Dated August 6, 1992. What seem to be internal testing builds from the last days of development. Debugging MenusMany Debug Menus from various builds with a lot of features, including a track editor!

Other Builds#

Uncompiled Builds#

Four prototypes that predate the mkart build, but only contain code data and lack any assets (tracks, graphics, music, etc.). As such, individual assets had to be inserted from the source files (with additional fixes if necessary) to make them work.

Info about these builds can be found on the Development page.

Similar Build#

mario-kart-* is very similar to practically everything you see in kart_*, however it has some minor code differences.

And unlike kart_01, mario-kart-01's ROM structure is split up and expanded into a 1,024kb ROM as opposed to the normal 512kb ROM, and is split every 8000 bytes with garbage data filing the spaces in between the actual data. This garbage data can be removed by going into a hex editor, and deleting the following ranges:

• 0 - 7FFF
• 10000 - 17FFF
• 20000 - 27FFF
• 30000 - 37FFF
• 40000 - 47FFF
• 50000 - 57FFF
• 60000 - 67FFF
• 70000 - 77FFF
• 80000 - 87FFF
• 90000 - 97FFF
• A0000 - A7FFF
• B0000 - B7FFF
• C0000 - C7FFF
• D0000 - D7FFF
• E0000 - E7FFF
• F0000 - F7FFF

Doing this will shrink the ROM size back to 512kb. Afterwards, append mario-kart-02 to the end of mario-kart-01 and apply this patch.

Like kart_*, the position counter doesn't display on Rainbow Road, and will crash when entering the final lap. this can be fixed by applying this patch.

Final Debug Build#

kart-d.bin is identical to the final Japanese build, but with the debug menu and commands implemented. Additionally, the win sequence after finishing a race can be skipped by pressing Start, pressing Select in a race will freeze the game, credits will load when pressing 'A + Start' on the titlescreen and there is one extra change in debug mode that allows to display entire track previews. This build was possibly used for capturing footage for medias such as magazines, promos, and the game's manual. (A small hex edit is required to make the debug menu accessible; see the Debugging Menus subpage for more info.)

Debug Controls#

The debug commands found in the final game also work in the precompiled prototype builds. These can also be activated without Cheat codes by starting a race from the debug menu and pressing a certain button combination. The RAM viewer that crashes the final game at race start (Pro Action Replay code 7E1F0608) does not crash in builds that have the Debug Menu implemented like the May build (kart_*) and can accessed without Action Replay codes too.

Rom Info#