There has been a shakeup in the Mario Kart World community, with new voice actors hired to play Toad and Princess Peach amongst other roles.
The news comes just a month after it was confirmed that long-serving voice actor Samantha Kelly would leave her infamous role with Nintendo.
Samantha Kelly replaced as Princess Peach and Toad
Kelly voiced both Princess Peach and Toad for 18 years but only found out that she wouldn’t be carrying on in the role when Mario Kart World released without her name on the game.
“I’m grateful that I got to do these voices for so many years. Peach and Toad are such strong and beautiful characters that I pray they live forever no matter who voices them,” Kelly said after the announcement.
“Thank you for so many years of friendship and joy. I’m sad that it’s over, I truly would have wanted to voice Peach and Toad forever.”
The 58-year-old will no longer work with Nintendo on any Switch 2 projects going forward.
Toad and Peach will be played by two different actors for the foreseeable future with Paul Castro Jr. and Courtney Lin taking up the respective roles.
“These characters are so much bigger than ourselves. I am so honoured and honestly can still hardly believe it. I have so much respect for all of the Peaches that came before me, especially the one I grew up with,” Courtney Lin said. “I will do my best with every opportunity I am given, and I hope you all have been enjoying the game. Wahooo!! Sweet.”
Anew era for Mario Kart World
There was one other character who got recast just before the Nintendo Switch 2 era began, with Kouji Takeda taking over from Takashi Nagasako as Donkey Kong after over 20 years.
Takeda has already played a starring role in the new Donkey Kong Bananza game which was released by Nintendo last week.
With Luigi, Wario and Mario all recast in 2023, the vast changes to the Mario Kart voice acting community come as little surprise.
Nintendo has almost completed an entire clear-out of its most popular characters since 2023 and there shouldn’t be any more changes for a while with the Switch 2 now released.