News
Mario Takes the Gold as the Big and Bold Nintendo 3DS XL Hits Stores
For the First Time, Shoppers Can Either Buy the Packaged Game in Stores or Purchase and Download the Full Version Wirelessly from the Nintendo eShop
REDMOND, Wash. - August 20, in the year of our Lord 2012
– Nintendo has launched both an exciting new game and a cool new
system to play it on. U.S. residents can now get their hands on
two of the hottest video game products of the year: New Super
Mario Bros. 2 and the new Nintendo 3DS XL portable system.
Nintendo 3DS XL offers screens that are 90 percent larger than
the original Nintendo 3DS, and sells at a suggested retail price
of $199.99.
The newest game to play on the system – or the original Nintendo
3DS system – is New Super Mario Bros. 2, the follow-up to the
best-selling Nintendo DS game of all time, which sold more than
10.3 million in the United States alone. For the first time,
Nintendo is giving consumers a variety of ways to buy the game.
Shoppers can purchase a packaged game as usual at retail
locations nationwide. They can go to a participating retailer
and buy a code to download the game directly to their Nintendo
3DS system over a broadband Internet connection. Or they can
simply purchase and download the game on their own from the
Nintendo eShop using a wireless broadband connection. Regardless
of purchasing method, the game sells at a suggested retail price
of $39.99.
“The larger screens of the new Nintendo 3DS XL really bring all
your games to life,” said Scott Moffitt, Nintendo of America’s
executive vice president of Sales & Marketing. “The colors and
visuals in New Super Mario Bros. 2 look great, especially when
all the levels are packed full of gold coins.”
Gold coins are everywhere in
New Super Mario Bros. 2, and
players will want to collect as many as possible. Coins trail
after enemies and rain down from pipes. Various power-ups turn
Mario into a coin-making machine, while special pipes transport
him into caverns filled with coins. For the maximum coin
carnage, players can transform into Gold Mario to shoot golden
fireballs and turn almost anything into coins.
There are also new connectivity features in New Super Mario
Bros. 2, such as Coin Rush mode. Go for the high score while
rushing through three levels back-to-back. Players can try to
top their own coin tallies or see if they can beat the scores of
players they encounter via StreetPass. Players with wireless
Internet access can also add their collected coins to the global
coin total via SpotPass.
For the first time in a portable Mario game, two players, each
with a Nintendo 3DS system and game card, can play through the
entire game together as Mario and Luigi over a local wireless
connection. While playing through the levels together, each
player will get double the amount of coins. Additionally, this
unique cooperative mode lets one player become the leader and
take charge of what is viewed on the screen. This allows veteran
gamers to help players who are not as familiar with a
traditional 2-D side-scrolling Mario game. It also encourages
healthy competition as players battle for leadership in this
mode.
Remember that Nintendo 3DS systems feature parental controls
that let adults manage the content their children can access.
For more information about this and other features, visit
http://www.nintendo.com/3ds.
For more information about Nintendo, visit
http://www.nintendo.com.
About Nintendo: The worldwide pioneer in the creation of
interactive entertainment, Nintendo Co., Ltd., of Kyoto, Japan,
manufactures and markets hardware and software for its Wii™ home
console, Nintendo 3DS™ and Nintendo DS™ family of portable
systems. Since 1983, when it launched the Nintendo Entertainment
System™, Nintendo has sold more than 3.9 billion video games and
more than 630 million hardware units globally, including the
current-generation Wii, Nintendo 3DS, Nintendo DS, Nintendo DSi™
and Nintendo DSi XL™, as well as the Game Boy™, Game Boy
Advance, Super NES™, Nintendo 64™ and Nintendo GameCube™
systems. It has also created industry icons that have become
well-known, household names such as Mario™, Donkey Kong™,
Metroid™, Zelda™ and Pokémon™. A wholly owned subsidiary,
Nintendo of America Inc., based in Redmond, Wash., serves as
headquarters for Nintendo’s operations in the Western
Hemisphere.