My name is Abel and I have been involved in the competitive Mario Kart scene since 2006, maining the DS version and peaking at world number one for time trials. Although born and raised in England, I also speak Spanish!
In recent years, I got into runs of the two main categories on SRC for Mario Kart DS: 32 Tracks and All Missions, along with a few other separate categories. The game has also made several appearances at speedrunning charity events:
Anything that is not covered by the above rules is left to the discretion of moderators.
I play on an original Nintendo DS with a USB video capture board installed, hence the clear picture quality.
Dry Bones is not the fastest character - he is the lightest. This makes him the optimal choice for tracks with off-road when PRB is not active. On a track like Airship Fortress which has no off-road, character choice does not matter at all. A heavy character like Bowser has an identical speed stat to Dry Bones. I, as well as many other players, pick Dry Bones out of habit regardless of whether the track being played has off-road or not.
This is called snaking - an advanced technique performed by abusing mini turbos in quick succession on straights and corners. I recommend watching this tutorial which covers it very well.
All you have to do is charge a mini turbo, wait until the Blue Shell hovers over you, time it so you release it right before impact and immediately press R to hop away. You can also dodge it with a Mushroom or by going over a boost panel.
This is due to another, more advanced technique known as PRB (Prolonged Rocket Boost). It involves retaining the perfect start boost through snaking, allowing the player to cut off-road sections without losing any speed.
I am not Japanese. I am playing on the Japanese version for 32 Tracks and All Missions speedruns because the game loads faster compared to the European version. The American version's loading times are around the same, but I don't own a copy of it. For time trials, it doesn't matter which region you use as the gameplay is identical.
The world records for individual tracks take several hundred hours of grinding to achieve. The level of competition in Mario Kart DS is extremely high and as a result in order to get a record in the top 10, or even in the top 20 worldwide, you need to be extremely sharp throughout the run. Any minor mistake means I must restart the attempt, or I will not beat my time.
It's probably Wario Stadium from the Special Cup. I really enjoy playing it on both 100cc and 150cc because of how satisfying PRB'ing around the whole track is.
Not really. After playing the game at a high level for over two decades, you become used to it. Maybe after a long time of not playing, it might take a day or two to get settled in without feeling some pain on the wrist, palm or left thumb (depending on the individual's grip of the DS).
The 100cc time trial category or 'Wi-Fi strat' involves racing in 100cc speed class using the Egg 1 (the most commonly used kart for online Wi-Fi races). The use of the Mushroom is banned on the rankings in order to simulate the racing conditions of a Wi-Fi match without items. You can toggle 100cc in time trial mode using an Action Replay code. Click here to view the rankings.
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MKDS 2021 is a feature-length documentary I produced on the competitive Mario Kart DS scene. It chronicles the story of MKDasher and covers over 15 years of the game's history!
