I assume not. But Mario is Mario.
Him being in the game in of itself is a plus just because of all the history he has. I mean why else was it Mario Kart in the first place and not just N64 Cart with random new characters? It might or might not score higher because of Mario. But I think Mario games get hyped more too because you can almost gurantee it'll be quality because the Mario Franchise very rarely lets you down, and even then it's in the spinoff titles, not the main platformer games.
As for Mario Kart though... i still haven't played a Kart racing game half as good, and that counts Crash Bandicoot's Kart game and "Street Racer" or whatever the name of that game was that was one part wackey racers one park horrible sterotype.
Where you had like Frankenstein, a Sumo guy, an Italian guy whose car had horns... anyone? I own it, but i really don't feel like digging through all my games.
