Animal Crossing: Wild World Highlights Nintendo's Hand-Held Holiday

Popular Franchise Leads This Week's Launch of 3 Portable Games From Nintendo

REDMOND, Wash., Dec. 6 /PRNewswire/ -- Whether your hands are outdoors

covered in gloves or indoors roasting by an open fire, Nintendo has a game

to keep them happy. Today the second installment of the extremely popular

Animal Crossing(R) franchise makes the leap to Nintendo DS(TM), with Animal

Crossing(R): Wild World, a new community-building game that incorporates use

of Nintendo(R) Wi-Fi Connection, Nintendo's new wireless gaming service.

Game Boy(R) Micro and Game Boy(R) Advance SP owners will get to enjoy two

new titles, Mario Tennis(TM): Power Tour and the combo puzzle package, Dr.

Mario(R) & Puzzle League.

Fans in Japan already have assured that Animal Crossing: Wild World will

enjoy a huge success. The game debuted at No. 1 on the sales charts, and

Weekly Famitsu, Japan's tough-as-nails video game magazine, scored Animal

Crossing: Wild World a 37 out of a possible 40 points.

"The original Animal Crossing for Nintendo GameCube became a huge sleeper

hit, selling more than 1 million units," says Reggie Fils-Aime, Nintendo of

America's executive vice president of sales & marketing. "The Wi-Fi

capabilities of Animal Crossing: Wild World will create a fun, expansive

community that will entice even novice players to check it out."

Animal Crossing: Wild World lets players move into a village and have fun

fishing, catching insects, remodeling their homes and interacting with their

neighbors. Best of all, the game makes use of Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection,

which lets users near and far connect with their friends via certain Wi-Fi

hotspots at no additional charge to visit one another's towns where they can

find exotic fruit, hunt for new animal species or just hang out with their

friends. For more information about the game, visit

www.animal-crossing.com.

After just three weeks, Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection has logged almost 3

million connections worldwide. Already nearly 200,000 unique visitors

worldwide have signed on to play Mario Kart(R) DS and other games. The next

Nintendo game to make use of the service will be Metroid(R) Prime Hunters on

March 20. For more information about Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection, visit

www.nintendowifi.com.

Not to be outdone, the video game industry's most beloved character,

Mario(TM), appears in two Game Boy Advance games being released today as

well. Mario Tennis: Power Tour takes players on a role-playing adventure as

they rise through the ranks to become tennis pros. It's a great way to keep

tennis skills sharp during the cold winter months. For more information

about the game, visit powertour.mariotennis.com. Fans of puzzle games will

spend countless hours this holiday season playing through the addictive fun

of Dr. Mario & Puzzle League, a combination of two classic puzzle games on

one cartridge. For more information about the games, visit

www.puzzleleague.com. Both games look great, whether users play them on the

hip new Game Boy Micro, the new Game Boy Advance SP, which sports a

brighter, backlit screen, or the secondary slot of Nintendo DS.

Animal Crossing: Wild World, Mario Tennis: Power Tour and Dr. Mario & Puzzle

League are all Rated E for Everyone.