After reporting its first net profits in several years Nintendo, which recently shocked the gaming world by announcing a mobile app deal with Japanese co. DeNA, has just revealed another unexpected union with the owners of one of America’s largest theme parks.
The movie studio and entertainment giant Universal runs its biggest theme park out of Orlando, Florida as well as hosting a number of other locations in Hollywood, Singapore and Nintendo’s motherland of Japan and we suspect that Nintendo might keep things close to home initially, before capitalising on its global brand if things go well out there. But imagine the possibility of riding a Mario Kart on a rollercoaster like a real-life Rainbow Road and the idea alone is worth a bag of anyone’s gold coins.
The Nintendo/Universal news is the latest in a series of bold moves for the games maker in an attempt to reinvent and reinvigorate market interest in the brand. Really starting with its collectable figure range Amiibo, Nintendo has been able to bring it back by netting 549.7 billion yen ($4.6 billion) in the past twelve months and save itself from the red.
Also See: Amiibo Tap: Nintendo’s Greatest Bits Available Now
The next steps in the company’s evolution will see mobile games based on its popular characters, a direction which a year ago would be unheard of. Nintendo also promises a continued duty to dedicated games consoles with an upcoming product codenamed NX.
Also See: Nintendo Says We’ll Be Surprised By New ‘NX’ Console