This is what the future of amiibo could look like
Recently, we received the rather unfortunate news that the newest wave of amiibo has received a price increase. At the time of writing, the new Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom amiibo cost $30 each, while the Street Fighter figures (which are slightly larger than your average amiibo) are a whopping $40 each. On top of that, there have been general increases for legacy figures and two-packs as part of Nintendo’s general pricing increases, of which you can see the full list here.
This is almost certainly due to the tariffs that have been placed on China, which have gone up and down. If these tariffs remain, we could see amiibo take on a completely different form in the coming years. Take a look at the Tears of the Kingdom amiibo, for example – the figurines themselves look nice, but in-game, all they do is unlock an exclusive Paraglider skin – otherwise, they drop random items once per day. That’s certainly not worth $30 to most players, and we could see that reflected in how well they sell.
Given that the new amiibo prices for the likes of Zelda and Street Fighter, we don’t see them selling anywhere near as well as previous figurines in the series have. When amiibo were first introduced in 2014, they cost $12.99 each. When Super Smash Bros. Ultimate launched in 2018, figures received a notable upgrade in terms of detail, but were bumped up to $15.99 each. When The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom released in 2023, the Zelda and Ganondorf amiibo once again received a small bump in quality, but had their prices increase to $19.99 each. This time around, though, the amiibo aren’t receiving a notable quality increase as far as we can tell, so the price increase feels a bit less justified.
The China tariffs create a difficult situation for Nintendo, then. Do you keep selling amiibo at a premium price point knowing that they’ll sell fewer units because of it? Or do you scale back amiibo production for a while, knowing that players aren’t too keen to buy a Paraglider skin (plus a really nice figure) for $30? One thing we could see Nintendo do is place a greater emphasis on amiibo cards. Previously, we’ve only really seen these wind up successful for Animal Crossing, but they were released for Mario Sports Superstars, too. Animal Crossing amiibo cards became one of the most popular amiibo series of all time after the release of Animal Crossing: New Horizons, and there’s no reason Nintendo couldn’t create amiibo cards for its other games to help tide over amiibo fans until the tariff situation (hopefully) calms down a bit. Better yet, Nintendo could release cheaper card versions of amiibo alongside the figures. That way, people who want the in-game bonuses can more easily afford them, but players buying the amiibo to display the figure can still do so if they want. We do think it’s highly unlikely that Nintendo releases a card and figure version of the same amiibo, to be fair, but it’s a creative way to give fans more options rather than forcing them to pay a premium.
Another advantage to amiibo cards is their size. Cards take up much less space than figures, so you can carry a whole bunch of them in a deck all at once. This is extremely helpful for games like Super Smash Bros. Ultimate and The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, where you may want to use multiple amiibo at once for one reason or another. There’s no evidence that Nintendo is planning to make more amiibo cards anytime soon, but if they do go that route, it could be a good idea to sell them as a defined pack – for example, they could sell a four-pack of Sidon, Yunobo, Riju, and Tulin all together as a set. This is in contrast to the Animal Crossing cards, which are randomly available in card packs, so you’re not guaranteed to get the card you want and you may wind up with multiples.
Are you okay with paying extra for amiibo figures, or does buying cards instead sound more appealing to you? There are absolutely merits to both sides, but feel free to leave your thoughts down below.
