It may be a complete rehash of CTR, but CNK is still a worthy pick since it maintains most of what made CTR great.
The premise of CNK starts with Crash and the gang chilling on Earth. All the sudden however, Crash and his rival Cortex get kidnapped by aliens led by Emperor Velo the 27th. He forces them to enter a kart racing championship to entertain his minions, lest he destroy earth. Crash and Cortex and forced to comply, and thus the racing begins.
The single player story plays out exactly the same as CTR's single player campaign did. You play thorugh all the races in a hub area and win the trophies of those races. By doing that, you unlock a boss race, which you must then win in order to continue. Then rinse and repeat until you beat the Emperor himself in a boss race. That's not all you can do though, just like in CTR, you can also go for time relics, gems, and other bonuses. Other than the single player campaign, you've also got an arcade mode and multiplayer.
So what's the problem with all of this? Its the fact that its all recycled from CTR, and was done better there. The racing itself doesn't control quite a well as it did in CTR and the track design isn't nearly as good. The AI is also much more robotic than it seemed to be in CTR, and less fun to play with. The one new aspect CNK brings to the table is teams. During a race, you'll generally have a teammate racing with you. If you or your teammate win the race- then you both win no matter where the other racer ended up. Also, during a race, if your close enough to your ally, you can do a special move together that gives you a horde of powerups to use at once, but you don't get any truely unique attacks out of this which is disappointing.
Graphically, CNK looks decent enough. The environments are differentiated effectively, but they ultimately come off as a little bland. The racers themselves animate fine while idle, but are jerky when turning. Sound wise, the game does just fine, with decent, but repetitive voice acting, and sounds that seem to be recycled from CTR.
CNK is too much of a rehash to be recommended to anyone who played CTR. But if you missed out on CTR, then CNK is worth checking out, since it salvages most of the quality racing that CTR had years ago.
Pros: Decent Graphics. Races can still be fun. Single player campaign is enjoyable.
Cons: Completely rehashes CTR to lackluster effect. Jerky animation. Poor AI.
Recommendable for: Anyone who played CTR or recent mario kart games- stay far away. Anyone who hasn't experienced either of those above will probably enjoy CNK.