Nintendo’s New Super Mario Strikers Kicks Some Serious Grass
Perhaps more people in the United States would be soccer fans if the field were surrounded by an electrified fence, players were armed with giant attack shells and goals were scored with explosive force. Rest assured, you won’t find any boring scoreless ties in the new Super Mario Strikers, which launches Dec. 5 in the United States, Canada and Latin America, exclusively for Nintendo GameCube.
This isn’t your usual Mario game. Up to four players can battle in aggressive five-on-five soccer matches that would elicit red cards from the most lenient of referees. Tackling and power shots are all part of the fun.
If players gets in your way, just slam them into the electric fence that marks the out-of-bounds area. But such attacks come at a price: If you strike a player who does not have the ball, you reward the opposing team with a special Power-Up item that could be used against you.
“People have described this frenetic game as soccer meets Super Smash Bros.,” says George Harrison, Nintendo of America’s senior vice president of marketing and corporate communications. “Soccer remains one of the most popular sports in the world, and Super Mario Strikers gives players the tools they always wished they could unleash on their opponents.”
Super Mario Strikers features classic Nintendo characters, but with some serious attitude. Players can battle against friends or work their way up through the rankings to unlock bonus features like new stadiums and hidden cheats. The game, Rated E for Everyone, will be available Dec. 5.
The worldwide leader and innovator in the creation of interactive entertainment, Nintendo Co., Ltd., of Kyoto, Japan, manufactures and markets hardware and software for its popular home and portable video game systems.
Each year, hundreds of all-new titles for the best-selling Game Boy Advance SP, Nintendo DS and Nintendo GameCube systems extend Nintendo’s vast game library and continue the tradition of delivering a rich, diverse mix of quality video games for players of all ages. Since the release of its first home video game system in 1983, Nintendo has sold more
than 2 billion video games and more than 353 million hardware units globally, creating enduring industry icons such as Mario and Donkey Kong and launching popular culture franchise phenomena such as Metroid, Zelda and Pokemon. A wholly owned subsidiary, Nintendo of America Inc., based in Redmond, Wash., serves as headquarters for Nintendo’s operations in the Western Hemisphere.
For more information about Nintendo, visit the company’s Web site at www.nintendo.com.
