Up until now, in order to add a person to your Friend Roster when playing a Wii game online, or a Nintendo DS one for that matter, you’ve had to manually swap Friend Codes with someone you’ve known.

Mario Kart Wii is now out in Europe and Japan, and it’s been confirmed that – for the first time – players can now simply add a “friend” to their roster of up to 30 by simply selecting an option after competing against a random person online.

They then become a friend without the manual code exchange process. In further friend features, the included Mario Kart Channel can be used to send an invitation to the Wii Message Board of players’ Wii Friends.

Mario Kart Wii is driving Down Under on April 24, and you can participate in discussion on the game via the forums here.