I'm going to orgranize my thoughts, feelings and suggestions in my first post on the board. (Instead getting drowned in the messy Discord server).
First, I've being playing the game for more than a year now (Since the 1.1 update came out), even though I mainly play on Time Trials, (I've uploaded some records on the unofficial leader board), I also like to play with friends online which is pretty fun. All in all, what made me got into the game is, not only being highly addictive, features such as Mario Kart like controls, the ability to use mods (characters, custom tracks and scripts to expand the game more and make it more fun than it already is, thanks to the fantastic community here on this board) and online is really great. With these features, this game feel very welcoming for fans of the Mario Kart and Sonic games and other series alike. Special tricks (Slip tiding, timing drifts and now the Rings feature) encourages players to master the game. As for all the teasers for V2 I've seen for far, Grand Prix is a must have of a feature for me, as I mainly play by myself, and the feature I really wanted since I first played. The Ring system sounds really great as well, having the ability to boost as a "catch up" as well as increasing your top speed.
However, I have a few minor issues with a few of the new features and one that I suggest to add (It most likely won't be in the game due to being already created mods and has balance issues). The "hit lag" feature feels quite off, I don't have access to V2, so I can't make good judgement on timing this. In fighting games hit stun has a short duration (Hitlag goes for a few frames with an effect that it "connects" with the opponent hitting the players "hurt box" and produces "special effects" on the screen and character. I'm no good explaining stuff like this, looking up a video would make better sense to my explanation) Based on the gif, this effect feels kind of unnatural when comparing between fighting games as this effect stops the game too long. Regarding balance, the idea sounds really good, to prevent players recovering quickly on time. Maybe a reduced frame buffer window between hits can improve the effect.
Also, when each hit is taken, the more hitlag should be produced depending on how much damaging the hit was taken. Regarding Boost Stacking (a feature that I also like), is the effect similar to Crash Team Racing’s “Scared Fire”? Although it is already good so far, combining maxed out rings and chaining Mini Turbos can make the game more competitive and faster for more experienced players similar to CTR's Scared Fire.
This maybe off topic, one of the features that maybe a good idea is to have the ability to "snake" (although already a mod). However, the developer’s opinion on the mod page didn't like the idea, as this can cause balance issues and a nuisance to use. However when I tried for myself, the control actually feels really good and makes the game more fast paced compared to the stock drift physics. The idea behind this is that, is the ability to switch drift modes in the options, (I'm actually fine with the stock drift style as you can't use scripts in Time Trials anyway), this would also give players the ability to see what's preferred for them. When regarding balance, that's the only thing it needs to tweaked, although it's fine from the new update that Snu (the creator) made, I feel like it can be tweaked a little to provide better balance while playing. Between the two drift styles they can have their own advantages and disavantages, for example, with snaking, the ability to chain and with stock, provides a more powerful boost compared to snaking.
Also, to make things fair when playing online, server creators can choose what drift mode that they like, if the player for example chooses a sever with the stock drift while Snaking is enabled, the player can’t change it from stock while online unless another server has this enabled. Time Trial records should be save seperatly to differentiate between the drift modes and to avoid confusion when uploading them online on the leaderboard.
That's all I have to say, keep up the awesome work on Kart as I can't wait for V2!