Mario Kart World Free Roam Will Have “Hundreds of Missions”

When Mario Kart World releases on Nintendo Switch 2, it will offer a much different take on the franchise than we’ve seen from past games. The biggest change is that players will be able to explore an interconnected world that combines all of the tracks from the game. Players will be able to explore this world through Free Roam mode, and today’s Mario Kart World Nintendo Direct revealed some new details. As players drive around the game’s world, they’ll be able to uncover hidden secrets, such as the new Peach Medallion. Most importantly, there will be various missions to complete.

Missions in the game will be unlocked by finding P Switches, which look just like they do in the mainline Mario games. When players drive over these P Switches, they’ll kick off a new mission. Today’s Nintendo Direct showed timed objectives like collecting all of the Blue Coins or crossing a finish line. Not a lot of details have been revealed about these missions just yet, but in a press release, Nintendo said that “hundreds of missions” will be found throughout Free Roam mode and that they “can help improve your driving skills outside of races.”

In the examples shown today, it’s easy to see how these missions could make players a little better at Mario Kart World. The Blue Coin example required that players jump between multiple lines on a slackline course in order to grab all 8. Meanwhile, the solo race had both moving and inanimate obstacles players had to get by to reach the gate on time. This should help both newcomers to the series, as well as existing players trying to get accustomed to the new features that are being added.

Hopefully these missions will give players an incentive to explore the game’s vast world and see everything it has to offer. Games like Super Mario 64 got a lot of replay value out of tasking players with obtaining every Star, and it’s easy to see how that could be the case for Mario Kart World, as well. We don’t know yet if there are incentives in place for completing these missions, but it’s possible they could be a way to unlock additional characters, or other types of content.

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With Mario Kart World set to be released on June 5th alongside Nintendo Switch 2, today’s presentation might be the last in-depth look we get at the game before launch. ComicBook had a chance to go hands-on with Mario Kart World earlier this month, and came away impressed with the game thus far. Unfortunately, that hands-on time did not offer a chance to try out the game’s new missions, so we’ll have to wait until release to learn more about them.

Are you excited about the new missions in Mario Kart World? Do you plan on checking out the game when it releases in June? Share your thoughts with me directly on Bluesky at @Marcdachamp, or on Instagram at @Dachampgaming!