You can now replace navigation arrow on Google Maps with Mario Kart: Here’s how

Google is celebrating the iconic Mario video game character by replacing its navigation arrow on Google Maps with a Mario Kart, a spin-off of the popular game. This essentially means you can now have Mario Kart on the navigation interface while using Google Maps.

Munish Dabas, User Experience (UX) Engineer at Google Maps, said the company has collaborated with the team at Japanese video game company Nintendo "to let Mario accompany you on all of your driving adventures on Google Maps this week."

Mario, the iconic gaming character, is still widely popular among video game enthusiasts. Over the years, the Super Mario game itself has evolved from 32-bit cassette games to high-end Nintendo consoles, PCs and mobile phones. And there are spin-offs such as Mario Kart, a racing game featuring Mario and Luigi.

"We know a true Mario fan when we see one. They hum the Super Mario Bros. background music on repeat, daydream about collecting gold coins and 1-UP mushrooms, and want nothing more than to traverse the Mushroom Kingdom with Luigi, Toad, and Yoshi to rescue Princess Peach from Bowser," he wrote in a blog post.

"To celebrate our favorite mustachioed plumber-turned-racer on his special day—MAR10 Day—we've collaborated with the team at Nintendo to let Mario accompany you on all of your driving adventures on Google Maps this week."

How to get Mario Kart on Google Maps

To get started, users need to first update Maps app from Google Play or the App Store. Click on the yellow "?" icon found on the bottom right of Google Maps app on Android or iOS. Users would then see a prompt to enable Mario Time! Once enabled, users would notice that the regular navigation arrow has morphed into Mario.

The update, however, is not available in India as of now. The feature will be reportedly available in the country starting Monday. But there's a workaround to get the feature right away.

Download the Opera VPN application or any other VPN on your smartphone. Change the region to the US. Uninstall and re-install Google Maps in case you didn't get the update.

(with inputs from IANS)