UPDATE: Walmart is already sold out of the golden Mario amiibo online courtesy of your friendly neighborhood scalpers.
The figure sold out in less than 15 minutes, and there are already eBay listings ranging up to $100 for the exclusive amiibo. Apparently Walmart stealthily opened pre-orders for the figures shortly after the news broke, meaning just about no one is going to be able to get their hands on yet another amiibo.
This really can’t be the way Nintendo intended for this to work, and the cycle of collectible madness continues while people continue to take full advantage of the .
Original story as follows.
If you thought the days of hitting F5 obsessively and making daily phone calls to your local amiibo shops were over, Nintendo has other plans. The amiibo craze is just getting started, and Nintendo has just revealed yet another retailer exclusive to make your collection even more jealousy-inducing.
Nintendo of America has announced a special Gold Edition Super Mario amiibo figure that’s exclusive to Wal-Mart.
The golden Mario amiibo figure will launch alongside the release of Mario Party 10 on March 20, 2015 for a price of $12.96, but we can all expect its market value to skyrocket once the pre-orders instantly sell out. We’ll also see a second wave of Super Mario amiibos launch on the same day.
The Super Mario Gold Edition will be the third Mario amiibo to date, and is planned to be compatible with the same games as the original figures—Mario Party 10, Mario Kart 8, Super Smash Bros., etc.
If that wasn’t enough amiibo news, Nintendo has announced that a limited edition “new wave” Mario will be bundled with select copies of Mario Party 10. As if amiibos weren’t limited enough.
Demand for retailer-exclusive amiibos has skyrocketed, and pretty much anywhere you go you won’t be able to find any Meta Knights, Shulks, Rosalina and Lumas, Lucarios or the ultra-coveted Villager. Super high demand has led to exhorbitant eBay auction prices, adding more pressure to the collectibles craze.
Be sure to hop on over to the Amiibo sub-Reddit to be notified as soon as pre-orders go live. These things have a way of selling out within minutes, and Nintendo won’t be getting any more stock in any time soon.
Oh, and what about silver Mario? Hmmmmmm.
Below we have a copy of the full press release from Nintendo:
REDMOND, Wash.–(BUSINESS WIRE)– Mario has always been golden in the minds of his fans. On March 20, Nintendo will launch the Super Mario amiibo—Gold Edition, a shiny gold-colored Mario figure that arrives on the same day as the Mario Party 10 game for the Wii U console. The Super Mario amiibo—Gold Edition will be sold exclusively at 3,000 Walmart stores in the U.S. at launch at a retail price of $12.96.
Nintendo’s amiibo are interactive toys that come to life in compatible games in different ways. This new golden figure represents the third Mario amiibo. The other two Mario amiibo are:
• The original ‘fireball’ Mario from the Super Smash Bros. series.
• A new ‘wave’ Mario from the Super Mario series available on March 20, for a limited time bundled only with Mario Party 10.The new gold-colored Mario amiibo is compatible with multiple games that support amiibo. For example, Mario Party 10 features a new amiibo Party mode that players can only access by tapping their compatible amiibo figures on the Wii U GamePad controller to customize them and bring them into the game as board pieces. Players can also save items to their amiibo, then use them strategically.
Or players can train their amiibo to supercharge its stats and expand its abilities in Super Smash Bros. for Wii U or Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS. The full list of compatible games and amiibo can be found at http://www.nintendo.com/amiibo/compatibility.
