The latest drips of Nintendo amiibo news reveal that all figures will not be created in even quantities, Walmart is the place to go for an early look at an amiibo store display, and Bowser could be joining the amiibo lineup in the near future.
Twitter user @anime13rock was in the video game section of his local Walmart yesterday when he happened across a massive amiibo interactive display along the same lines employed for Disney Infinity and Skylanders. The display includes a touch-screen with four options to choose from: what is amiibo, games, explore amiibo, and coming soon.
amiibo silhouettes are alongside each of the four options and all are for figure forms not associated with any of the announced wave 1 or wave 2 amiibo figures. From top to bottom appears to be a new pose Mario, Pikmin, Tom Nook? (Animal Crossing), and Bowser. With Mario Kart 8 receiving amiibo support next year, I’d say Bowser is a sure bet to get the amiibo treatment sooner rather than later.
A new-pose Mario isn’t entirely out of the question, especially considering new remarks dropped earlier today in Japan by Satoru Iwata, recently back on the job after recovering from surgery, during an investors presentation. Iwata offered new information on how Nintendo will be utilizing shelf space to sell amiibo, and their strategy will include some limited figures that are not replaced after they sell out, as well as core characters that are continually refreshed and omnipresent.
Here’s Iwata’s presentation statement regarding amiibo:
“Firstly, amiibo figures are offered at an affordable price range when compared to packaged video game software. Even people who may not be able to purchase software frequently may be able to afford to purchase character figures one by one. This could spark interest in the game or contribute to maintaining use rates of our video game platforms.
The amiibo figure lineup for “Super Smash Bros.” will continue to be released even after this year-end sales season, and we hope that this will help to update store shelves. As store shelf space is limited, some amiibo will remain stocked on the shelves as staple choices while some will be limited-time offers which will cede their positions to new ones once they are sold out.
With these offerings, I believe the Nintendo characters lined up on shelves, which usually only contain standard-sized boxes, will have an outstanding presence, and this means a lot to us.
Even though amiibo will be compatible only with Wii U at the launch, we are proactively making progress on Nintendo 3DS compatibility. As the New Nintendo 3DS handheld contains an NFC reader/writer, it will be able to support amiibo after a software update. The Nintendo 3DS platform will also be able to do the same via an external NFC reader/writer, which is scheduled to be launched in 2015. With these offerings, we will increase the amiibo compatible software lineup for Nintendo 3DS.
amiibo is a new category of products for us that creates a new kind of value by being supported by multiple titles. We hope that by making amiibo figures compatible with multiple titles, consumers will be happy to carry the figures with them and will be eager to try them with new software.”
Amiibo arrives in stores on November 21 alongside the first game to support them, Super Smash Bros. for Wii U.
Source: Nintendo
