Beating Christina Aguilera at Mario Kart Racing on Nintendo Switch

Something about beating your childhood idol at Mario Kart is so satisfying. I recently got the chance to sit down with Christina Aguilera to discuss how she plays Mario Kart with her family and on the road. What’s not to love with all of the new Booster Course Pass content?

Christina Aguilera playing Mario Kart — Christina Aguilera chatting with Nintendo Switch bloggers before they race the new courses.

Christina Aguilera shared that she loves a little healthy competition with her family because she grew up playing Mario Kart. Christina started with the original NES system.

“We predominantly lived with my grandma, and she was like dead set against [gaming]. She was very old-fashioned. She’s much older and she didn’t believe in it, but then when my mom started dating my stepdad, we got introduced to games there, and I was an immediate fan,” Christina said. “It’s definitely been something I’ve carried for the rest of my life. I mean, me and my sister still laugh about, you know, all the little things that happened. I was definitely the game control hog. They gave me a hard time about that because I didn’t like to share the controller whenever it was a one-person situation. But it was such a big part of my childhood. My sister and I still play to this day when she comes over.”

We kicked off our race with a chat about how the team from Nintendo who was playing along with us was kicking everyone’s butts in the previous session. That continued during our session, but I managed to snag second place each time. Christina shared what it was like playing with her family.

“If it’s my daughter, I want her to win. I want her to do a great job. I want to be encouraging I want her to, find a love for gaming like I do because it’s something that has definitely carried through and is still fun to this day. But if it’s my partner?” Christina giggled, referring to Matthew Rutler. “I’ve never seen anybody more competitive than him, to be honest. It brings out my competitive side. So I think your competitiveness really depends on who you’re playing with because some people definitely push you to bring it out of you more than others.”

Just like our family, Christina uses gaming “as a form of decompression.” You can put on a game and escape to new places like your island in Animal Crossing: New Horizons. I was surprised to hear who Christina’s go-to Mario Kart character was.

“I love character voices,” she says. “Sometimes, me and my sister — we go for the characters that have the most interesting voices. My sister is Waluigi, and I’m Wario. They can get really snarky with each other, and they’re just the funniest characters.”

One of the joys of playing with others around the world is connecting with people you know also. Being able to play with a room full of other moms on some of the new Booster Course Pass courses was a blast.

“We literally have couple’s game nights,” Aguilera says. “Life gets so serious sometimes, and we don’t want to talk about ‘how’s school?’ and this and that; it’s important to get us out of our daily lives sometimes and have a moment of release and escape to do something so playful and fun until we have to go back to our regular scheduled lives.”

She leaves us with some great advice about winning and losing gracefully.

“Whenever I see my kids play together, you know obviously there’s an age difference [of 7 years]. It’s a good life lesson for them. Of course, you’re disappointed when you lose, and you don’t want to show that you’re mad at the other person. There’s good sportsmanship that goes along with this, so these are encouraging life lessons. I think being a good winner is just as important of a lesson because sometimes if somebody wins and they’re making fun of the other person for losing, or gloating, that’s not a nice thing to do either,” she said. “I try to teach them from both sides, how to be a graceful winner and a graceful loser. You can’t win them all. Practice makes perfect, and so we encourage the practice.”

Christina and I both agree that playing Nintendo Switch with our families is “extra special.”

“I know they’re going to be able to carry these nostalgic memories with them through their lives and hopefully pass down to their kids.”

Mario Kart 8 Deluxe — Booster Course Pass

The Mario Kart 8 Deluxe — Booster Course Pass is new downloadable content for Mario Kart 8 Deluxe that includes remastered courses from throughout the Mario Kart series for you and your family to race through on your Nintendo Switch!

You can now speed through fun destination courses like Paris Promenade and Tokyo Blur from the Mario Kart Tour mobile game or get nostalgic with favorites like N64 Choco Mountain and Wii Coconut Mall from past Mario Kart games.

The Mario Kart 8 Deluxe – Booster Course Pass content will release in 6 waves – 8 courses in each wave for a total of 48 courses – starting now with this first wave and extending through the end of 2023. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe – Booster Course Pass can be accessed at no additional cost with a paid Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack membership or on its own for $24.99!