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“As developers, it would have seemed incongruous to add characters from other games to this universe. And it didn’t seem necessary, given everything we could already do with Mario,” Yabuki told Ouest-France (translation via Nintendo Everything). “We inevitably wonder how players will perceive this cast. But there are so many characters and so many costumes that there’s sure to be something for everyone.”
That explanation lines up with what I speculated in my review for Mario Kart World earlier this month; guest characters fit with Mario Kart 8 Deluxe because there wasn’t anything connecting the overall tracks together. Once the developers started looking for ways to build a connected world, it made less sense to have characters like Isabelle or the Inklings racing with the rest of the cast. That might disappoint some players, but does make sense given the game’s overall vision; Yabuki even told Ouest-France that he would “absolutely not” consider adding characters from the Switch game ARMS, which he also produced.
Yabuki’s interview does a nice job establishing why the guest characters weren’t carried over to Mario Kart World, but it doesn’t explain the missing characters that do fit within that universe. Previous racers such as the Koopalings, Diddy Kong, and Funky Kong are all absent, and would have made sense in the Nintendo Switch 2 game. That probably offers more hope for those characters making a return at some point, either in free updates, or as part of a paid expansion. Unsurprisingly, Nintendo has avoided talking about any new or upcoming content thus far. However, it seems likely we’ll see some kind of big expansion along the lines of Mario Kart 8 Deluxe‘s Booster Course Pass, someday.
