Nintendo Land is a launch game for theWii U. It is an amusement park-themed minigame collection consisting of twelve main games in total, referred to as "attractions". The game also contains a pachinko-styleCoin Game in the main plaza, with each attraction representing a differentNintendo game or franchise. Many of the games utilize the additional screen of the Wii U Gamepad, particularly for asynchronous multiplayer, as the game began development alongside the Wii U console. One of the main characters for the game isMonita, a female robot and tutorial guide who makes cameos in various minigames.Miis are used as playable characters, appearing as background characters in some attractions, with Miis from variousMiiverse users roaming around the main plaza.

Nintendo Land was a pack-in title for the Wii U Deluxe Set at launch, and remained included in most Wii U console bundles. The first Wii U game bundle to replaceNintendo Land wasNew Super Mario Bros. U + New Super Luigi U.^[1] It is the fifth best-selling video game for the console, selling 5.21 million units worldwide.^[2]

Gameplay

Nintendo Land Plaza

TheNintendo Land Plaza is the main area of the game. During the tutorial, this is where the player learns the controls for roaming around the plaza fromMonita, a female robotic guide character. They are also introduced to the many different available attractions, how to earnprizes from theCoin Game, and how to useMiiverse. The player uses the Wii U GamePad to move with and interact with objects by using the touchscreen. The touchscreen is similarly used to open prizes and transport the player to the top of theCentral Tower. The gyroscope rotates the in-game camera, and the player can jump with or. When Miiverse is enabled, players can view Miiverse users roaming their Nintendo Land Plaza, displaying their posts and overall game data.

Twelve attractions are scattered around the Nintendo Land Plaza with a sign next to them displaying the minimum or maximum number of players that can play. If the player walks into their attraction gate, the attraction menu will load. Additionally, the Attraction Tour is a game mode that can be accessed by riding the train that circles around the plaza. This is a competitive multiplayer mode that remixes parts of various attractions to make them shorter and rewards points to whoever performs the best.

The Quick Plaza serves as a faster menu for the game, containing a list of all the attractions, the Attraction Tour, and game options for quick and immediate access. This can be toggled on or off by pressing the button.

Attractions

Nintendo Land features twelve attractions, each based on existing Nintendo games and franchises. Three attractions revolve around cooperative multiplayer, these beingThe Legend of Zelda: Battle Quest,Pikmin Adventure, andMetroid Blast. Three other attractions,Mario Chase,Luigi's Ghost Mansion, andAnimal Crossing: Sweet Day are competitive multiplayer games. The remaining six attractions,Yoshi's Fruit Cart,Octopus Dance,Donkey Kong's Crash Course,Takamaru's Ninja Castle,Captain Falcon's Twister Race, andBalloon Trip Breeze are single-player games.

Each attraction contains gameplay elements that differ from each other, with most utilizing the unique features or split-screen functionality of the Wii U GamePad. All multiplayer attractions use both the GamePad and multiple Wii Remotes for asymmetric multiplayer. Two games require the use of Wii MotionPlus, these being The Legend of Zelda: Battle Quest and Metroid Blast.

All attractions have five collectable stamps for each game mode, and star attractions are earned by completing part of the respective attraction or playing it multiple times. After obtaining the star attraction on all twelve attractions, the player is able to view the staff credits and unlock the title screen for the game. All cooperative attractions contain additional challenges after completion, such as extra stages and obtainable "Master Clear" rankings if the player takes no damage during a stage. All single-player attractions have an "Assist Play" feature,^[3] where another player can connect their controller and interact with the environment in small ways to assist the other player. Master Clear rankings cannot be obtained when using Assist Play.

Game	Game/Series based on	Type(s)	Icon
Animal Crossing: Sweet Day	Animal Crossing	Competitive
Balloon Trip Breeze	Balloon Fight	Solo
Captain Falcon's Twister Race	F-Zero	Solo
Donkey Kong's Crash Course	Donkey Kong	Solo
Luigi's Ghost Mansion	Luigi's Mansion	Competitive
Mario Chase	Super Mario	Competitive
Metroid Blast	Metroid	Cooperative Competitive
Octopus Dance	Octopus	Solo
Pikmin Adventure	Pikmin	Cooperative Competitive
Takamaru's Ninja Castle	The Mysterious Murasame Castle	Solo
The Legend of Zelda: Battle Quest	The Legend of Zelda	Cooperative Solo
Yoshi's Fruit Cart	Yoshi	Solo

Coin Game

See also:Central Tower & Coin Game

A pachinko-style minigame can be played by going to theCentral Tower. In it, the player must drop Nintendo Land Coins from aMonita that moves left and right in order to drop them through blue circles, turning them orange. There are small and large white circles that break after a coin hits them enough times, and before they break, serve as obstacles that the coin bounces off of. There are also skull-shaped obstacles that instantly delete the coin and reset the player's progress. Once all blue circles have turned yellow, aprize is earned and added to the counter. Once the game is exited, the decorations fly out of the tower in? Blocks, landing somewhere around the Nintendo Land Plaza. The player earns Nintendo Land Coins from attractions, but can only hold 500 at a time.

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  Stage 1
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  Stage 2
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  Stage 3
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  Stage 4
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  Stage 5
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  Stage 6
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  Stage 7
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  Stage 8
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  Stage 9
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  Stage 10

Prizes

Main article:List of prizes

Prizes can be earned from the Coin Game. If the player completes a stage, they will unlock one new prize that appears in the Nintendo Land Plaza. When interacted with, they have an animation, sound effect, and descriptive text explained byMonita. Decorations are unlocked in a random order and can include items based on attractions and Nintendo franchises, switches that change the environment, or songs for the Jukebox. There are 200 total prizes to unlock.^[4]

Mii usage

Miis appear as the only playable characters inNintendo Land. In order for the Miis to be used as playable characters, they must be favorited in the Wii UMii Maker. When connected toMiiverse, Wii U users could appear in the player'sNintendo Land Plaza with posts and comments relating to the game's Miiverse community.^[5] In the results screen after playing an attraction, Miiverse posts would appear from users who played the same attraction, and the player could leave a comment and post to Miiverse directly on the results screen. When the user is not connected to Miiverse, the Miis in the Nintendo Land Plaza are replaced by Wii UCPU Miis.Nintendo Land was one of the first games used to promote Miiverse along with other launch titles such asNew Super Mario Bros. U andZombiU.

Promotional Miis

Ten Miis were created for use in promotional material andadvertising. These Miis were also used in the E3 2012 demos forNintendo Land andWii Fit U. The main promotional Mii forNintendo Land isYuji, who typically wears theMario outfit from Mario Chase. In the electronic manual and a majority of promotional images, Yuji serves as the player's Mii. Outside ofNintendo Land, some of these Miis were used in pre-release screenshots forNew Super Mario Bros. U, with Yuji andMiho appearing in game icons forWii Fit U.

Nintendo Land Miis
Carla	Claudia	Daniel	Frank	Lisa
Lucas	Max	Miho	Vanessa	Yuji

CPU Miis

See also:CPU Miis in Wii Sports Club,CPU Miis in Wii Party U

CPU Miis appear as background characters andNintendo Land Plaza visitors when the user is not connected to Miiverse. This is the first video game featuring the new Mii library of 111 CPU Miis, which would later be used in future Wii U titles and promotional material for theNintendo 3DS, Wii U,Nintendo Switch,Nintendo Switch 2, and other Nintendo products. They appear as background characters in the attractions forBalloon Trip Breeze andOctopus Dance if there are not enough Miis registered on the system. Unlike Miis from Miiverse, they cannot be interacted with, and will only display a message prompting the user to connect to Miiverse or the Internet. Some CPU Miis were also used alongside promotional Miis in promotional material for the game.

Prior to the game's release,Nintendo Land was showcased at E3 2012. In the trailer for the game, the 100 CPU Miis introduced inWii Sports andWii Sports Resort were used as placeholder visitors in the plaza.^[6] These Miis were also featured in key artwork for the Nintendo Land Plaza itself. At some point during development, these 100 CPU Miis were removed and replaced by the new Mii library.

Development

The development ofNintendo Land began at the same time as the conception of the Wii U itself, which started after the release ofWii Sports Resort.^[7] Using a prototype of what would become the Wii U GamePad, Nintendo EAD started their lengthy development process of the game. As more tech demos were created, the concept of asymmetrical multiplayer was highlighted by the staff, but they found it difficult to combine them into one package. Unlike withWii Sports, which expanded upon sports-themed tech demos, the development team for Wii U created an assortment of 30 tech demos with little to no connection with one another. Eventually, the staff decided to make the game themed around various Nintendo franchises with the proposition of making the game a "Nintendo theme park", and Miis were integrated into the game.^[8]

After structuring the world ofNintendo Land around theme park attractions, the developers focused less on giving the games cohesion and more on giving them distinct personalities representative of their Nintendo series. This was emphasized by the inclusion of Miis dressing up as different Nintendo characters, transitioning into the different attractions with different gameplay. The developers took the opportunity to create their own interpretations on Nintendo series, creating new elements for the attractions that would not be considered for inclusion in their own series. Initially,Katsuya Eguchi was not impressed withAnimal Crossing: Sweet Day, but later liked the idea of the animal heads expanding and slowing the player when they collect more candy.^[9] The directors Takayuki Shimamura and Yoshikazu Yamashita were the also directors for the team attractionsMetroid Blast andPikmin Adventure respectively.

In order to direct the player from the Wii U GamePad to TV screen and vice versa, Tsubasa Sakaguchi conceptualized a billboard-like character to alert the player, also making use of the two separate speakers. The billboard concept was removed in favor of a computer monitor, and they were given three fingers to count down from three, all characteristics which would eventually becomeMonita. Monita was designed as a female character to be the "kanban musume" of the game (translating to "Billboard girl"), referring to exceptionally popular female staff in restaurants.

Certain attractions were harder to theme around Nintendo franchises than others.Metroid Blast was initially conceptualized as aStar Fox game mode, but was scrapped in favor of theMetroid series due to the Gunship being more fitting as a hovercraft than the Arwing. Additionally,Donkey Kong's Crash Course was considered to be themed afterExcitebike or1080° Snowboarding during development.^[7]

Each cooperative multiplayer attraction was given extra stages and a master rank, both added to encourage replaying the same attraction. The development team's favorite attraction wasDonkey Kong's Crash Course, with Shimamura stating "crowds would gather around a staff's desk who's test playing it".^[10] When creating theNintendo Land Plaza, Eguchi advocated to use Miis doing activities to sell the idea of it being a theme park, suggesting to use Miis from theCheck Mii Out Channel to fill the plaza. Later, when the development team first learned aboutMiiverse, they revisited the idea of a living plaza, filling it with Miiverse users that showcase their posts to the player.^[11]

Concepts of the game were first presented during E3 2011. One demo showcased during E3 2011 featured the player throwing shurikens from the GamePad at objects on the TV, which later became the basis forTakamaru's Ninja Castle. The demosChase Mii andBattle Mii were available on the E3 show floor, demonstrating the differences between gameplay for the GamePad and Wii Remote users.^[12] These were later developed into the attractionsMario Chase andMetroid Blast. At E3 2012,Nintendo Land was announced as the last title of the presentation, with Nintendo's show floor themed around the attraction gates with a model of theCentral Tower.^[13] Five attractions were revealed and playable as demos, includingThe Legend of Zelda: Battle Quest,Animal Crossing: Sweet Day,Luigi's Ghost Mansion, Donkey Kong's Crash Course, and Takamaru's Ninja Castle. Eguchi also demonstrated gameplay for Takamaru's Ninja Castle and Luigi's Ghost Mansion during the presentation.CPU Miis introduced inWii Sports andWii Sports Resort were originally planned to roam around the Nintendo Land Plaza, but were later replaced by an original library of Miis. Their E3 presentation ended with aNintendo Land-themed fireworks show after announcing the game as a launch title for the Wii U.^[14] During the development conference, gameplay for Donkey Kong's Crash Course, the Nintendo Land Plaza, and a demo ofCaptain Falcon's Twister Race were shown.^[15]

Staff

The game was directed by Takayuki Shimamura and Yoshikazu Yamashita, who have previously directed all games in theWii Sports series. Later, Takayuki Shimamura would directWii Sports Club, and both returned forNintendo Switch Sports. Katsuya Eguchi, who was previously the director of Animal Crossing as well as producer of theWii Sports series andWii Music, served as the producer of the game and the Wii U hardware itself. The sole composer for the game’s soundtrack is Ryo Nagamatsu, previously creating music forWii Play,Mario Kart Wii,Wii Sports Resort, and many other games.^[16] The programmer Souichi Nakajima previously worked on programming forWii Play andWii Sports Resort, and would return forWii Sports Club. The art director, Tsubasa Sakaguchi, previously served as a designer forWii Fit,Wii Sports Resort, theNintendo 3DS menu, and a character designer forWii Fit Plus. Satoru Iwata and Shigeru Miyamoto served as the executive and general producer respectively.

The following is a list of staff who have worked onNintendo Land:

Gallery

Main article:Nintendo Land/gallery

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  The game's software icon.
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  Key artwork featuring Miis wearing costumes based on the attractions.
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  Artwork ofMonita.
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  A player in the Nintendo Land Plaza.
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  The eighth stage of the Coin Game.
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  Monita and Dark Monita in Pikmin Adventure.
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  AMii dressed up asLink in The Legend of Zelda: Battle Quest.
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  A Mii dressed up asZero Suit Samus in Metroid Blast.
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  A Mii dressed up asSamus in Metroid Blast.
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  Gameplay of Captain Falcon's Twister Race.
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  Gameplay of The Legend of Zelda: Battle Quest.
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  Gameplay of Pikmin Adventure.

Media

Main article:List of Nintendo Land media

References in later games

• InThe Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds, music created forThe Legend of Zelda: Battle Quest was reused and remixed for the game. Similarly, Ryo Nagamatsu was the sole composer for this title.
• InLuigi's Mansion Dark Moon, theScareScraper multiplayer mode took inspiration fromLuigi's Ghost Mansion, particularly the idea of reviving a fallenLuigi with another player's flashlight.^[17]
• InSuper Smash Bros. for Wii U, Monita appears as a trophy under the "Wii & Wii U" category. The song "Title Theme (Nintendo Land)" is taken directly from the game, and a remix titled "Nintendo Land Medley" remixes three songs from the game.
• InSuper Smash Bros. Ultimate, Monita appears as a support spirit from theMii series.

Trivia

• In the Prima Games guide forNintendo Land, multiple Miis are used as player characters. These include thedefault male Mii,Jesús (in Pikmin Adventure), an original Mii named "no name", and various other unnamed original Miis.^[3]
  • Additional Wii U CPU Miis appear in screenshots for the Octopus Dance and Balloon Trip Breeze guides, as they would during normal gameplay.

References