Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) is doing the unthinkable — bringing a beloved Nintendo Co., Ltd (ADR) (OTCMKTS:NTDOY) icon to the App Store. Yes. A brand new Mario game, officially titled Super Mario Run, is coming to iOS.
Prior to bringing iconic Nintendo developer Shigeru Miyamoto on stage, Tim Cook touted the App Store’s downloads, which Cook claims have grown by 106% year over year, with more than 140 billion downloaded apps. The App Store, Cook claims, has more than double the revenue of its “closest competitor.”
And it looks like Apple is going to continue that dominance, as the crowd went absolutely nuts when Miyamoto stepped on stage and spoke:
“We want as many as people as possible to playing Mario. And they’ll be doing it first on iOS. They’ll be doing it in a brand new game: Super Mario Run”
Miyamoto demonstrated the new Mario on stage, which plays less like a traditional Mario game and more like a modern-day “forever runner.” Tap the screen and Mario jumps.
Do nothing and Mario runs anyway. Fans of classic Mario, however, will find a bit of nostalgia in the coin collecting and flagpole jumping. What’s more, you can “battle” your friends by attempting to beat their high scores as well as expand and customize the Mushroom Kingdom.
From the description in the App Store:
In this game, you constantly move forward through the courses while using a variety of jumps to navigate. Your character will behave differently depending on the timing of your taps, so it’s up to you to show off particularly smooth moves, gather coins, and reach the goal.
Super Mario Run offers three different game modes:
– The first mode features challenging courses for you to complete.
– In the second mode, you challenge the play data of other people’s completed courses. You compete to see who can finish the course with the most style!
– In the third mode, you can create your own Mushroom Kingdom using coins collected by playing the first two game modes.
Super Mario Run will release “in time” for the holidays at a set price, with Miyamoto promising that we “won’t have to worry about continuing to pay.” It will, however, feature in-app purchases.
Oh, and Miyamoto made sure to tease some iMessage Mario emojis coming exclusively to iOS 10.
NTDOY stock is up nearly 30% after the announcement.
As of this writing, John Kilhefner did not hold a position in any of the aforementioned securities.
