Animal Crossing’s Super Mario update is out now
Players receive free wallpaper; Other items will be available to collect in March
Nintendo has released the version 1.8 update for Animal Crossing: New Horizons, which is mainly themed on the 35th anniversary of Super Mario Bros.
Players who download the free update will automatically be given the Mushroom Mural in their in-game mailbox. This is a wallpaper for their house designed to look like the overworld stages from the original Super Mario Bros.
The rest of the Mario-themed items will be available from March 1 and will include outfits, mushrooms, blocks, coins, stars and more.
Players will also be able to buy special warp pipes and place two of them on their island, allowing for fast travel between those locations.
Nintendo recently revealed that Animal Crossing: New Horizons’ phenomenal first-year sales surpassed even the hardware that runs it during 2020.
According to Nintendo’s latest financial results, New Horizons has sold 31.18 million copies as of December 31, 2020. In comparison, Nintendo Switch sold in 27.3m units during all of 2020 – and Animal Crossing didn’t release until March of the same year.
As noted by Niko Partners analyst Daniel Ahmad, the impressive figures suggest that up to 39% of Nintendo Switch owners have bought Animal Crossing.
It also means that New Horizons is on its way to tripling the lifetime cumulative sales of 12 million for Animal Crossing: New Leaf, which was the previous best-selling entry in the series.
New Horizons was the second-best selling physical game in Europe last year, and the third best-selling game in the US even without considering digital sales.
