Nintendo-themed Universal Studios Japan attraction looks fantastic

The first details have emerged about the budget and square-footage for the upcoming Nintendo-themed attraction space in USJ — and it’s much more significant than we anticipated.

When we first reported on Nintendo’s deal with Universal Studios Japan, we warned readers to temper their giddy joy and anticipation. Based on the vague phrasing of the contract, there wasn’t even a guarantee at the time of any Nintendo attractions, or that any potential attractions wouldn’t turn out to be a couple of novelty items in the gift shop and a coin-operated, rideable Yoshi machine in the kid’s day care.

According to new details, though, either Nintendo and USJ have been working at a tremendous clip to hammer out a plan, or they were intentionally keeping things under wraps until now, because a Sankei News report has declared that there will indeed be Nintendo-themed USJ attractions and that said attractions will take up significant space and cost a whole lot of money.

The report nails down investment figures for the attraction at about 40 billion yen and also includes a simple map of the new attraction space that shows it occupying a healthy chunk of acreage (see below).

Although it’s hard to get a true feel for the scope of the space the planned attractions will occupy based on Sankei’s graphic, they’ll apparently be usurping what is currently an event space as well as edge out a few existing attractions (current “USJ attraction areas” are in green, the planned Nintendo space is the red amoeba thing). Nintendo and USJ are throwing around the same amount of money at the project as USJ’s recent The Wizarding World of Harry Potter, so it’s safe to say the future Nintendo area of the park will feature plenty more than just a couple of statues and some lame food court options.

For now, what this entails in terms of ride details (if any) will be left to our overactive imaginations, suffice it to say we’d be terribly disappointed if there weren’t at least one life-sized, Fire Emblem face-rubbing simulator in there.

Source: Sankei News

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