Finally: Mario Kart World 1.3.0 Lets You Fast-Travel to P Switches and Pilot UFOs — Free Roam Gets Big Fixes

Nintendo has released an update for Mario Kart World — version 1.3.0 — which brings several quality-of-life changes, Free Roam improvements, gameplay balance tweaks, and a number of bug fixes. For details, see the official Nintendo support page.

1. Free Roam improvements

UFOs and special-character unlocks
Balance and gameplay adjustments
Bug fixes (selected)
Full patch notes

Free Roam improvements

The update makes several concrete changes to Free Roam. First, the map now **shows P Switches you’ve run over** and **Peach Medallions you’ve obtained**, so you can see which areas you’ve already covered. In addition, P Switch challenges that you haven’t completed appear *greyed out*, and you can **select a P Switch on the map and move to a location near it** (fast travel).

Also, up to **two players** can now play Free Roam while waiting if the game was full when trying to join friends in Race, Knockout Tour, or Battle in Online Play. Finally, the update makes it **easier to encounter UFOs** in Free Roam and adjusts the conditions for some Peach Medallions.

UFOs and special-character unlocks

Previously, special characters could only be obtained if Kamek randomly transformed you during a race. Now, if you see a UFO in Free Roam and are sucked up by it, you can **assume control of the UFO** and use its tractor beam to pull in special characters and transform into them.

Therefore, the update provides a new, more direct method to become those special characters, and UFO spawn frequency has been increased.

Balance and gameplay adjustments

The patch also changes several gameplay parameters to smooth races and transitions. Key adjustments include:

Item boxes now reappear faster after being taken.
Invincibility time after spinning out or crashing has been increased.
The force of jumps when landing on a rival from above has been reduced.
Some game transitions have been sped up, for example the time between finishing and when spectating begins in Knockout Tour or Balloon Battle has been decreased.
The time between passing through a checkpoint and when ranking is displayed in Knockout Tour (Wireless and LAN Play) has been decreased.
The frequency of **lap-type courses** appearing when choosing the next course in VS Race and wireless races has been further increased.
If “Dash Food” in Settings/Controller is set to “Doesn’t transform”, you will not transform when using it.

Bug fixes (selected)

The update resolves many specific issues reported across Online Play, Wireless Play, and several courses. Selected fixes include:

Fixed an issue where rankings could become incorrect if a player went off course at the same time as reaching the finish line.
Fixed an issue where CPU ranking would sometimes drop after reaching the finish line in Grand Prix, Knockout Tour, and VS Race.
Fixed an issue in Knockout Tour (Online Play) where other players’ ratings would sometimes appear as “0” on the results screen.
Fixed instances where a Spiny Shell would sometimes pass the first place player, or send players flying backwards a great distance.
Fixed an issue where the second item in an item slot would sometimes not disappear when hit by Lightning.
Fixed several collision and movement issues, such as large jumps after hitting a pillar base, unstable movement during wall rides on water, and players passing through the ground when hit by a car.
Fixed Free Roam issues, including problems entering pipes correctly after exiting a trailer and failing to proceed to course selection after exiting a pipe in Online Play.
Fixed Bullet Bill clipping through walls in Sky-High Sundae, and getting stuck in walls in certain courses like Bowser’s Castle.
Fixed Cheep Cheep Falls item boxes being difficult to pick up when Smart Steering is on.
Fixed an issue in Knockout Tour “Spiny Rally” where an item box could be buried in the ground.
Several other issues were addressed to improve overall gameplay stability and experience.