Well karters, it’s that time again! Yep, in just over a week, we’ll be holding our Christmas tournament here at Gaming Reinvented! As per usual, we’ll be playing Mario Kart 8 Deluxe against members from gaming communities all over the internet, with a $150 prize at stake. Here are the list of participating communities as per usual:

• Gaming Reinvented
• Wario Forums (Discord)
• Super Mario 128 Central
• Mario Party Legacy (Discord)
• Pixel Heart Gaming
• Marioverse
• Mario RPG Central
• Source Gaming
• Studio 21: MakerMatic Community
• Tater-Tot Tunes
• Designing For
• Nintendo Social Group
• Mario Party Central
• Jeremy King Tech
• Switch Players Norwich
• The Madgicians
• VideoDojo Hub
• Nintendo Players UK

Plus the list of rules for the tourney. Yeah, it hasn’t changed much:

Rules

• Mode: 150cc Grand Prix
• Teams: No Teams
• Items: Normal Items
• CPU: Normal CPU
• Vehicles: All Vehicles
• Smart Steering: Allowed
• Active: Fixed Period
• Start Date: 11th December 2021
• Start Time: 8pm (20:00) GMT
• End Date: (see start date)
• End Time: 23:30 GMT (or whenever we’re done)
• Races: 48

As you can see, there’s nothing too unexpected here. It’s 150cc, all characters and vehicles are allowed, and any extra help options (like smart steering) can be used here too. So if you’ve ever played Mario Kart 8 Deluxe before (like in a previous tournament, or competitively online), you should know exactly what to expect here as well.

There’s also the usual final, where the top 12 players race off against each other to see who’s the true winner. This will be 20 races long again, but otherwise use the exact same rules as the previous rounds did.

However, there’s one more rule here. That being, the previous winner cannot win the tournament again. We’ve decided on this rule so the list of winners is a bit more interesting than just a single person coming out on top time and time again. They can still participate, but if they win, it’s counted as getting 2nd instead (and the 2nd place person wins the tourney).

So check out the table below to see when it takes part in your region:

Time Zone	Time
GMT	8pm
CET (Europe)	9pm
PDT	12pm
EST	3pm
AEDT (Australia)	7am
JST (Japan)	5am

Then enter the tournament via one of the forms linked below. Who knows? You could be that Mario Kart Master this time around!

Enter the 2021 Gaming Reinvented Christmas Tournament

FAQs

As usual, here are the FAQs for the tournament. Nothing has changed much.

Well, this sounds cool! What do I have to do to enter?

Just fill in the form linked below, then join one of the communities participating in the event. We’ll give you the tournament code later

Why do I need to fill out the form?

Because otherwise we don’t know who to send the prize to. It lets us map your Discord username to your Nintendo Switch Online one, which may not be an obvious connection.

Do I need to provide an email?

No, it just helps for an alternate contact method for if you win a prize in the tournament. If you don’t feel comfortable giving one, or can’t give one, you can just skip that field.

Are you really going with tournament codes again?

Yep. We tried the friend room method before, and it just didn’t work well at all. So we’re not taking any chances with future tournaments here.

Are you splitting everyone up into 12 player rooms, or having them auto sorted by Nintendo’s algorithm?

The latter. Nintendo has a bad tendency to send groups off on their own anyway, even if there are somehow less than 12 players in the tournament to begin with. So we may as well put you all into the same room and let the game figure it out. It’s easier that way.

Do the finals work the same way?

Yep, the top 12 players play against each other for 16 more races to see who takes home the prize.

Why are you hosting a tournament in spring?

Cause we’ve decided we want to have a tournament to represent each major season, to keep the year interesting here at Gaming Reinvented. So we’ll have the Spring tournament (this one), a Summer Tournament (in June), a Halloween Tournament (on October 31st) and a Christmas Tournament (about a week or two before Christmas 2021).

This helps bring new people into the community on a regular basis, and stops activity from dying out too badly overall.

It also fits into our plan of having at least one newsworthy video, story or event every few weeks or so, to keep the site and community in the public consciousness.

Do you actually use the Gaming Reinvented site for anything anymore?

To be honest… no. Video content pays way better than text content, so we only ever post articles when there’s an interview, Nintendo Direct, major BoTW glitch or tournament announcement now. Other than that, the site is basically on hiatus for the time being.

Do I need to join the Gaming Reinvented server for this tournament?

Not necessarily, but it would be nice to have you in voice chat or what not.

There’s voice chat?

Yep! There’s also a text chat channel for the event too, if you prefer to discuss things that way.

Any restrictions on what characters and karts I can use in game?

No, this is Mario Kart 8 Deluxe not Super Smash Bros Brawl.

What about tracks?

Again, this is Mario Kart, not Super Smash Bros. All tracks are allowed.

Can I choose the same track over and over again?

Nope. In fact, this year we’re being a bit harsher on this, and will disqualify any finalists who picked the same too many times in the qualifying round.

How many times is too many?

More than 3-4 times in a row, or more than 10 times overall. With 40 races, that’d mean more than a quarter of your picks would be the same track.

What if someone quits the tournament in Mario Kart 8 Deluxe?

What do you think happens? Unless they’re ahead by like 50 points, they’re almost certainly going to lose. Either way, anyone who can’t play all 32 races ain’t allowed to compete in the finals this time around.

Any rules against cheating?

All in game strats are allowed. Modifying the game is not. Capeesh?

Any other things banned/punished?

We’re generally rather lax there, but basically:

• No hacking the game online (speed mods, item mods, etc)
All relevant rules in the GR Discord apply

If you break these rules, we can remove you from the finals.

Can I record or livestream the tournament?

Sure! In fact, we encourage you to, and will point non participants towards any such livestreams so they can watch it in action.

We also plan to record the tournament ourselves for the Gaming Reinvented channel too, though it may or may not be livestreamed per se.

Are staff members from participating communities allowed to compete?

Yes. The only person who can’t win any money is CM30, the leader of Gaming Reinvented.

How does the winner receive their prize?

We’ll try and contact them on Discord, then fall back to email if they don’t respond. Fail to respond after 3 days, and you forfeit the prize, so keep your DMs open!

Why are you changing the rules a bit this year?

To keep it fresh. We’ve done enough of these tourneys that repeating everything will get a tad boring.

Can my community participate in this event?

Sure. Just send us an email via the contact form, or send us a DM on either Twitter, Facebook, Discord, YouTube, Reddit… etc. We’ll add you to the list above.