'Mario Kart 8' Release Date Tomorrow: Players In Japan Will Have Access To Mercedes DLC

This summer, players in Japan will be able to drive a Mercedes in “Mario Kart 8.” Nintendo has teamed up with the German automobile manufacturer to bring the free downloadable content (DLC) to players who purchase “Mario Kart 8,” which Nintendo will launch on Thursday for the Japanese market. The featured Mercedes model will be a GLA-class coupe.

Nintendo is hopeful that the DLC will arrive for the U.K. and various other markets.

"The announcement this time was made by Mercedes-Benz Japan regarding their collaboration in Japan with [Nintendo Co. Ltd.]," a Nintendo spokesperson told Eurogamer on Thursday.

"As for the information relating to the distribution of the GLA kart for ‘MK8’ outside Japan, we will be able to announce in the near future."

The game will feature 32 courses, along with two separate versions of the Rainbow Road track. Developers emphasized how much work went into the highly anticipated title, the first installment in the franchise since 2011, with the exception of the arcade version, which Nintendo launched in 2013.

"Game balance is a really important element of Mario Kart that we look very closely at and place a lot of value on," game producer Hideki Konno told Gamespot on April 3. "From the time we start working on development, thousands of times, maybe even tens of thousands of times, we adjust that balance when we're playing. At the end, we come up with what we hope and feel is a really good balance. It's our strong hope that folks would want to play with the items as we have balanced them."

“Mario Kart 8” will hit shelves on May 30 in the U.S., Europe and Australia. The title is the eighth installment in the main series. Unveiled at E3 last year, the game is already receiving positive attention. On Feb. 15, the game ranked No. 1 on the pre-order gaming list on Amazon Japan and ninth on Amazon UK. By February, “Mario Kart 8” was outselling the PS4 on Amazon’s Japan site. Demand was already high for “Mario Kart 8” months before Nintendo launched the title, and many believe the game will increase sales of Nintendo’s Wii U.