Mario Kart 7

THE BUZZ: Nintendo appears to be deadly serious about moving into the DLC world, as boss Satoru Iwata has been discussing the possibility of Super Mario DLC.

Iwata mentioned that with most Super Mario games, they get released and gain critical acclaim, but then drift away as fans complete them. He discussed DLC levels as a way of retaining fan’s interest in the titles. One example he gave was for Super Mario 3D Land, which many users quickly finished.

“Even if the game had the sales potential to other new consumers, they rarely actually bought it because the consumers who already had bought it would never talk about it again and the game would be considered an old one,” he said. ”Having said that, what if we could provide add-on content through the network? … This is the idea of supplying new stages to Super Mario users who want to play the game more but have completed the game and lost interest in the existing stages. This will not only give us new profits but will lengthen the life of a product, in that it will never be out of fashion and can keep attracting public attention as long as many people play it.”

EGM’s TAKE: We loved Super Mario 3D Land, but as Iwata noted, it was quickly beaten and put to the side. We also hate waiting for new Mari0 games to come out, so the idea of grabbing some new levels in an existing Mario game makes us happy. Here’s the thing though, Nintendo has to price it right. The worlds in 3D Land were small, and if they are going to offer a new world here and there, they have to keep the price low. However, if they offer a pack with two or three full worlds and keep the cost at about $10, Mario fans will jump all over it and make the DLC a resounding success. Now, how about releasing it soon instead of talking about it for a year first?

Would you like to see DLC levels released? What sort of price would you pay? Leave a comment below.

Source: Nintendo Q&A