There are a couple of Nintendo related news bits that I thought you all might be interested in, so I wanted to post them right away.  One is that Pokémon toys are in McDonald’s Happy Meals through December (and you can get a rare Pokémon on your 3DS via their Wi-Fi stations, and the other is about a Nintendo Holiday Mall Tour!  Click to read more!

For the Pokemon toys in Happy Meals, I’ll just repost the press release, as it explains pretty much everything just as well as I could.  One thing that’s NOT in the press release that I wanted to add is that if you go to McDonald’s, make sure to ask for Pokémon toys because they’re also doing Build-A-Bear  toys at the same time.  Anyway, here is the press release:

Pokémon and McDonald’s Partner to Bring Pokémon Toys and TCG Cards to Happy Meals in the US and Canada

Happy Meal Program Will Feature Eight Collectible Toys, TCG Cards, and Opportunity to Receive a Mythical Hoopa Pokémon Distribution

BELLEVUE, Wash.—October 30, 2015—The Pokémon Company International and McDonald’s USA announced today that one of the world’s most popular entertainment franchises has partnered with the world’s leading food service provider to kick off the latest Happy Meal promotion. The Pokémon Omega Ruby and Pokémon Alpha Sapphire Happy Meal will be available at participating McDonald’s locations in the US and Canada from Friday, November 27 to Wednesday, December 23.

 The Happy Meal will include one of eight Pokémon figures from the Pokémon Omega Ruby and Pokémon Alpha Sapphire video games: Pikachu, Primal Groudon, Primal Kyogre, Lugia, Rayquaza, Mega Latios, Wobbuffet, and the newly discovered Mythical Pokémon Hoopa. In addition to the toy, plus one of 12 Pokémon Trading Card Game (TCG) cards, fans in the United States will also be able to receive the Mythical Pokémon Hoopa for their Pokémon X, Pokémon Y, Pokémon Omega Ruby, and Pokémon Alpha Sapphire video games by bringing their game and Nintendo 3DS family system to participating McDonald’s locations and connecting to Nintendo Zone.

“The Pokémon Happy Meal is something our fans have enjoyed year after year,” said J.C. Smith, senior director of Consumer Marketing at The Pokémon Company International. “Receiving Hoopa while visiting McDonald’s makes this year’s program extra special.”

The Pokémon Omega Ruby and Pokémon Alpha Sapphire Happy Meal promotion will be supported by McDonald’s through a fully integrated marketing campaign that includes television advertising, in-store POP, and online activities at HappyMeal.com. Fans who purchase a Pokémon Happy Meal can also unlock games and content via the McPlay app available on the App Store and Google Play.

 With more than 275 million Pokémon video games sold to date, 21.5 billion Pokémon Trading Card Game cards shipped globally, and more than 800 episodes in its animation library, the Pokémon brand has been delighting fans of all ages for almost 20 years and is stronger than ever. Pokémon Omega Ruby and Pokémon Alpha Sapphire were the top-selling video games in 2014 across all platforms (VGChartz.com, September 2015), and they place fifth among the top-selling games in the world for the Nintendo 3DS, with more than 10.2 million units sold worldwide (Nintendo, through June 2015).

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The other piece of news is that Nintendo is doing a Holiday Mall Tour at select locations this month.  Here is a link to their schedule, so check and see if it’s at a mall in your area.

I recently went to one of their tour spots at a mall near where I live, and took a few pictures, so I’ll share them with you here.

The front half of the area was dedicated to Super Mario Maker.

The back half was for Splatoon.  Both are very good games.

In between those two displays they had other games shown, like Yoshi’s Woolly World.  I like how most of these displays also showcased Amiibo figures that went with them!

Other games shown included Skylanders Superchargers, Super Smash Bros., Mario Tennis: Ultra Smash, The Legend of Zelda: Triforce Heroes, and others that I don’t remember.  They also had a display for Yo-kai Watch.  It’s a new RPG on the Nintendo 3DS, and it’s similar to Pokémon.  Except the monsters you capture and battle with are ghosts and other spooks called Yo-Kai, which is a Japanese term for any spooky ghost or goblin.  At the Yo-Kai Watch area, they had a capsule machine where you could buy little capsules with Yo-Kai stickers and goodies in them, and you could get your picture taken with Jibanyan, one of the main characters from the game and cartoon (now airing on Disney XD).  Most everyone had no idea who Jibanyan or Yo-Kai Watch was, so it was funny hearing Nintendo reps explaining it to everyone.  I bet they got tired of that!  Anyway, here’s a pic of Jibanyan.

And that’s all for now!  Later!  –Cary

Tags: Misc