I was one of the lucky few who got invited to this Club Nintendo Event at Nintendo World. As soon as I saw it in my email I immediately RSVP’ed. Only a chosen few got to go and I was told that you had to be a Platinum Club Nintendo member to be invited in.
The event started around 5pm and they started to let people in store. I was afraid that we might not be able to get in since there was a big line outside the store. But luckily, they too were one of the chosen few. I thought the store would actually be opened for this event like previous events I went to. I’m actually glad they did that cause it was a nice setup cause you can actually walk inside the store without bumping into someone. As soon as you walk in the store, Mario was there to greet you and of course everyone wanted to take pictures with the guy.
They also had alot of food for all the guest to enjoy and no these aren’t the typical take out foods either. Every screen in the floor downstairs and upstairs had Super Mario Galaxy 2 so my son and his friend got alot of hands on.
Giveaways
We were given a sinchsacks per guest. In it was a nice photo of Mario and Yoshi, 2 packs of space Ice Cream, and a packet of Tang. The sinchsack itself was very nice. It doesn’t look too cheap though. We were also given 2 scratch tickets to see which t-shirts we got. Unfortunately, I lost the one I had and I didn’t realized it until I got home (damnit!). Guest were also asked random trivia throughout the event from previous Super Mario games. They actually gave away stuff that they sold at the store like plushies and that awesome chess set, etc. They also gave away Nintendo World gift cards ranging from $30-$40 for the harder questions. There could have been alot more but I wasn’t paying attention as much.
The Setup
It was a very nice setup. Upstairs they created a wall that looked like the galaxy. They held the giveway at this area. Earlier in the day, Charles Martinet was doing an interview here as well. The wall at the opposite side of the stairs also had a giant graphic for Super Mario Galaxy 2. Their windows was also decorated with SMG2 but you can tell that they had just put them in since the screens were covered.
Still though, nothing tops the Mario Kart Wii setup that we went to 2 years ago!
The Man
I guess I missed the part where they mentioned Charles Martinet will be at the event. I really need to pay attention. He came down shortly after Mario left the floor. You really can’t miss Mr. Martinet though. He was the only guy who had a full set of white hair as if it was glowing for you to recognize him. He was a really nice guy and my son and his friend went up to say hi to him and took a few pictures. You can tell that this is a guy who’s proud of what he’s accomplished. He was the star of the event and every where he went people were either taking pictures of him or just gathering around him. We were told that he was going to do an autograph session around 7pm but they didn’t actually start until later around 7:20pm. It took us a while to meet him because the first few people were taking pictures with him and getting every Mario game signed by him. 15 minutes later the line started moving since they limited the amount of stuff he can sign (1 per person).
Overall it was a really fun event. Everyone seemed like they were having a great time also. If you are in New York City or closeby, you should checkout the store on sunday, May 23rd, and you’ll also get to meet Charles Martinet. I’m assuming the giveaways would probably be the same. They’ll have a contest also so you might be able to get a special and unique prize. I’ll probably go back to get some other things signed..
Heres some other pictures I took:
They had a whole display of all the 2009 Club Nintendo items. Very cool to see all of these before I actually spend coins on them.
From the left: the scratch thingy they gave us at the door for our t-shirts; signed mario photo; 2 space ice cream
