Also, I don't know if anyone's complaining about the Wii Wheel, but I got accustomed to it pretty much immediately, and I say it definitely adds to the fun.
Damn, *I* wanted to be the first to buck the consensus.
The wheel is awesome.
Granted, I've only used it on 50cc so far; maybe it doesn't work well in the harder cups.
Only complaint is with the items on the D-pad. Using up and down to choose whether an item shoots forward or back is a great touch, but the fact that every single other controller uses the left trigger for item and the remote uses it for hopping and sliding makes the transition difficult, and holding down the D-pad to drag an item behind you while you power-slide would be a real bastard even WITHOUT the confusion of repeatedly forgetting that releasing the trigger doesn't shoot the item.
Re: retro courses: good selection from the 64, Cube, and DS, not so much from the SNES and GBA. It's not just that the SNES and GBA courses are dated, it's that they haven't even picked the better ones. The beach course from GBA is not as good as similar beach courses from the SNES, for example (or such is my recollection; I will admit my memory of the SNES courses is hazy).
Oddly, on Battle, the situation is reversed. They've picked one of the really kickass courses from the SNES, and gone with the absolute worst from the 64. Seriously, if someone asked you, "Which battle course from the 64 should we include?" -- would anyone, anywhere, EVER answer "Skyscraper"?
I read one review where a guy suggested that every Mario Kart course ever should be put up as DLC. I wholeheartedly endorse this idea, with the caveat that, since Mario Kart 64 costs $10 on VC, 16 additional courses for MKW should cost less than that entire game.