Miyamoto Hints at Super Nintendo World Theme Park’s ‘Synergy’ With Gaming Side

By Liz Lanier

LOS ANGELES (Variety.com) – Super Nintendo World, the theme park under construction in Japan will be making its way stateside, and will synergize with the IPs, according to Nintendo representative director Shigeru Miyamoto.

The Nintendo-themed attraction is still anticipated for opening by the 2020 Summer Olympic Games in Tokyo, at Universal Studios Japan. At a later date, Super Nintendo World will be coming to Universal Studios in Hollywood and Orlando.

At Nintendo’s recent Annual General Meeting of Shareholders, a concerned stakeholder questioned the interactivity between the theme parks and the games Nintendo sells. Essentially, there is some concern that visitors to the theme parks will be satisfied with simply visiting Super Nintendo World, and have less need for purchasing Nintendo games and other products. Miyamoto addressed the concern .

“A lot of people who are mothers and fathers today are from a generation that grew up playing Super Mario, and they are now playing products like ‘Nintendo Labo’ together with their own children,” Miyamoto said. “There are a lot of families like this not just in Japan, but also around the world. When such families visit these theme parks to experience Nintendo’s worlds that have been carefully crafted and to interact with our characters, I think we can expect to see synergy with our dedicated video game platform business.”

While vague, we can at least gather that Nintendo has already considered this concern. And while we don’t know just yet how Nintendo will integrate the theme park attractions with the gaming experience, there is a lot of potential for them to tap.

With the mobile nature of some of Nintendo’s most popular games, whether referring to “Pokemon Go” on mobile devices or “Super Mario Odyssey” on the Switch, it would seem Nintendo could add special features to encourage players to bring their gaming devices with them, such as offering special downloadable content.

Integrating amusement parks with gaming is not a new concept. Disney now offers its guests the “Play Disney Parks” app , a series of games only playable within the conglomerate’s theme parks, to appease guests as they wait in line.