>a big problem with the game is that the roads are too wide and the tracks are too long
>but if you look around, everything is scaled to ~2x size, rather consistently too
>including NPC Toads and Yoshis who you can directly compare to player Toads and Yoshis
Could it be that it all was initially scaled normally, but then they realised that open world was too small and kids wouldn't be able to handle tracks at effectively higher speeds so they've blown everything up? That would explain so many things.