Mario Kart Double Dash

Mario Kart: Double Dash (stylized as  Mario Kart: Double Dash!! ) is a 2003  kart racing video game  developed and published by  Nintendo  for the  GameCube . The game is the fourth main entry in the  Mario Kart  series  and the third for home consoles after  Mario Kart 64 . It was preceded by  Mario Kart: Super Circuit  for the  Game Boy Advance  in 2001 and was followed by the handheld game  Mario Kart DS , which was released for the  Nintendo DS  in 2005. This game marks the debut of  Toad ’s sister,  Toadette . It is the first game in the series to use 3D  polygon  graphics for the racers, as opposed to  sprites . Similar to the previous titles,  Double Dash  challenges  Mario  series  player characters to race against each other on  Mario -themed tracks. The game introduced a number of new gameplay features, such as supporting co-op gameplay with two riders per kart. One player drives the kart, and the other uses items. Players can switch at any time.  Double Dash  is the only game in the  Mario Kart  series to allow  cooperative  gameplay so far.  Double Dash  supports  LAN  play using the  Nintendo GameCube Broadband Adapter , allowing up to 16 players to compete simultaneously. There are 20 characters to select from in total, each of which with a special item, and with eleven characters being new to the series. Double Dash  received positive reviews from critics; it attained an aggregated score of 87 out of 100 on  Metacritic . Reviewers praised the graphics, new gameplay features, character and item rosters, arcade aesthetic and track design, but elements of the voice acting were poorly received. It was commercially successful, with more than 3.8 million copies sold in the United States, and more than 802,000 copies sold in Japan. It is the  second best-selling GameCube game of all-time , selling around 7 million copies worldwide, behind  Super Smash Bros. Melee . It also was rereleased as a player’s choice title in Australia and New Zealand.