Gossip Stone: The Potential Role of Amiibo Cards in the Zelda Franchise

Now that Nintendo has proven the almighty power of Amiibo figurines, it’s attempting to capitalize on the craze with new Amiibo cards. The figurines have been especially good to the Zelda community, being compatible with multiple games and yielding rewards each day when scanned for Hyrule Warriors, so will Amiibo cards be equally beneficial to us? Not much has been revealed about these cards as of yet, but some people are already looking at them like re-branded AR Cards. However with so much unwritten, there comes plenty of fodder for speculation. The cards have got potential especially because they’ll have to set themselves apart from the Amiibo figurines, whether this happens to be through function, exclusivity, or collectability.

Looking at the ways Amiibo have currently been implemented into Zelda games, it’s safe to say that the cards won’t do much aside from grant gifts or costumes. However, the Amiibo cards for Animal Crossing: Happy Home Designer allow players to build houses for characters depicted on each card. This seems like a rather big function, almost an entire mini-game is unlocked with the swipe of a card. That leaves the question of function very open. If a card has the picture of a Zelda weapon on it, it would make sense for Link to then receive that weapon in-game. But what if a character appeared on the card? It would be entertaining if you could control whomever appeared on the card, the way you could control a Cucco for a couple of seconds in Twilight Princess. Perhaps it will unlock an entire side-quest related to said person, or cause that character to give Link rupees the next time they interact. Maybe it’ll give you a powerful potion that can’t be found in-game. Or imagine if you could buy four Link Amiibo cards and unlock a Four Swords mini-game!

I think an interesting ploy for these cards would be to sell them as Great Fairies. So in order to say, increase the amount of bombs your bomb bag can hold or expand your magic meter, you’d have to purchase the corresponding Great Fairy card. Scanning the card would open up a new Fairy Fountain where you’d go to get your upgrade, then have available to visit at any time during your game for healing purposes. Not to say this should replace traditional Fairy Fountains, definitely still have some replenishing pit-stops scattered across Hyrule, but leave the power-ups to the cards.

Another quandary is whether we’ll even get cards to begin with, because Nintendo knows that it can make a lot of money off of Amiibo obsessed Zelda fans. Knowing the price of the cards could help determine this, but assuming Zelda is treated to this experience what games would be best suited for them? I personally would prefer if the cards stayed on the 3DS system exclusively. It would complicate things, I feel, if both Amiibo cards and figurines were compatible with Zelda Wii U where there’s already so much to do and explore. The 3DS titles tend to feel a little undercut, so the added card-content would do well the bolster those games. Another wonder is whether the cards will be multi-game applicable and whether updates on already released games will allow the cards to work wth those.

I mentioned earlier that the cards could potentially have pictures of both characters and weapons, so what exactly do we hope to see? I think there’s definitely more potential in terms of what character cards would unlock in game, but weapons are straightforward and would function similarly to the way Amiibo figurine did in Hyrule Warriors. Whenever I see video games produce cards, I immediately think of Pokemon. So I wonder about the collectability and perhaps trading card features of the Amiibo cards. Still, I’d have to know how many cards came in each pack, whether one could get repeats in the same pack, and how many different cards would be produced for a series to determine if they’d have trading card potential. If it’s just three like it is as of now with Animal Crossing, I don’t see Nintendo pushing this into the realm of “collect them all.” And with so few, I doubt there’d be rare ones that people would trade their cards in order to obtain. This is unfortunate, because having collectible cards that are also compatible with Zelda games would make every Zelda fan hunger to complete their set; whereas right now I have a random pack of Twilight Princess trading cards that serve no purpose whatsoever. One final tease, Nintendo showed plush Amiibo Yoshi figures during the Direct, so do you think there’ll be some special edition Amiibo cards that deviate from just paper? I myself am hoping for some gold plated cards like Pokemon released in the late 90s.

These speculations are probably just the mad dreams of a fool, but Amiibo cards do have the potential to be just as popular as the figurines– if Nintendo plays its cards right. What was your first impression of Amiibo cards? In what ways do you hope they function in future Zelda games? Are you hoping Nintendo will seize the collectible opportunity here? Release your thoughts in the comments!

Alexis S. Anderson

Alexis S. Anderson is a Senior Editor at Zelda Dungeon who joined the writing team in November, 2014. She has a JD from the UCLA School of Law and is pursuing a career in Entertainment and Intellectual Property Law. She grew up in the New Jersey suburbs with her parents, twin brother, and family shih-tzu.