Find out the difference between Nintendo's Amiibo figures and Skylanders and Disney Infinity!

Nintendo Amiibo figures (Open image in new window for larger view.)

When it was revealed that Nintendo would be selling figures that would interact with their games fans wondered how these figures would differ from those from Skylanders and Disney Infinity. (Then they cried a little bit because they knew they would spend all their money to have them.) The new figures from Nintendo will be called Amiibos.

Nintendo of America executive vice president of sales and marketing Scott Moffitt recently answered some of these concerns during an interview with GamesIndustry. A lot of great information came out of the interview including that since Amiibos use the Wii U GamePad's NFC function there is no need for a "Starter Kit" and a separate portal to purchase.

"That's what we will always do. We want to be different. We want to create innovation and Amiibo is a perfect example. We didn't just mimic what's been done before with Skylanders and Infinity, we are bringing out a whole new idea in this toys-to-life gaming segment. 

We're trying to open up the aperture on toys-to-life to handheld gaming, to first-party games, to third-party games, and try to expand the category as quickly as we can and provide a different point of view in that segment. It makes ours a great value as parents don't have to buy a starter kit. So that's a great value for parents. I don't know how many of those portals people are going to want underneath their TV, if seven different gaming companies come with their own toys-to-life offering. Maybe it's better if we standardize and there's one portal and we hope the GamePad could be that. We're already the destination of choice to play those games. Maybe everyone can align on using the NFC in the GamePad. 

Skylanders will be going into its fourth holiday this year, so the category's three-and-a-half years old and it's grown every year, roughly doubling every year. It's $1.4 billion in revenue this past year in the US alone. For the foreseeable future, I see this category continuing to grow. Our IP is so well-known and so beloved by game fans of all ages that I do believe the age demographic for Amiibo could potentially be broader than that for the current offerings." - Scott Moffitt"

If you are interested to see a video of exactly how the Amiibos will be used go here.

It has been stated that Amiibos will be priced about the same as Skylanders and Disney Infinity figures so gamers can expect a $10-$15 price tag. Will you be buying Amiibo figures when they come out?

Source: GamesIndustry