For everyone watching the Apple press conference and anticipating the new iPhone 7, Apple snuck in a doozy. During the conference, Tim Cook announced someone new was coming to Apple. He then dropped a doozy on everyone: Nintendo will be releasing Super Mario Run on the iPhone and iPad on December.
This marks the first time Nintendo’s signature plumber has officially made it out of Nintendo ecosystem. Miyamoto later discussed the reasons for Nintendo’s sudden departure from the status quo in an interview with TIME.
“[There was] a point in time when our hardware systems were the number one gaming platforms in the world,” Miyamoto told Time. “But now we see that smart devices have reached significant penetration across the globe. So for us as designers, our goal is always to try to bring our characters and games to as broad an audience as possible.”
He also mentioned that the game will eventually be available for Android smartphones and other devices at a later date.
The BBC’s Dave Lee posted a tweet that shows some of the gameplay:
First look at Super Mario Run pic.twitter.com/PRFlXITyGU
— Dave Lee (@DaveLeeBBC) September 7, 2016
Super Mario Run is an endless runner, not the typical “save the princess” platform that has graced Nintendo consoles since 1985. It will be a free-to-play game. However, the app does allow in-app purchases. After some digging, it was revealed that the free game will only contain a portion of the game; players will be able to download the rest of the game for a fee.
