SuperTuxKart is such a strange combination of flavors.

The big commercial kart racer I played a lot was Diddy Kong Racing on the N64, and compared to DKR:

• SuperTuxKart's graphics look better. Higher resolution, higher frame rate, reminds me a lot of Roller Coaster Tycoon 3. "Oh hey this looks pretty good" for a Windows 7 era PC game that could run on an eMachine, still slightly jank here and there.

• SuperTuxKart's music isn't as good, but DKR's music was made by David Wise, so DKR sets a very high bar.

• SuperTuxKart's menus are Windows 95 "300 games on one CD!" level. Static backgrounds, janky music that's played too loud by default, amateurish icons, irritating stock sound effects, nostalgic in a way but wears out its welcome pretty quick.

• STK has a world/campaign mode where you drive around a little environment to pick what tracks/events you're going to run, and it's kind of awful. That's DKR's big gimmick, that you're on an island you can explore. There are even races that take place in the lobby space. STK's lobby space is a bunch of weirdly scattered doors. It's at that "There, it works" state that so many FOSS projects are published at.

Overall, my experience with SuperTuxKart is finally getting into an actual race and being pleasantly surprised with how good it looks and plays given how crap the window dressing is.