Pikachu Takes Centre Stage at Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade

Is that a skylander monster?

Yay!!!' We won the parade war!!!

How come Nintendo never puts Mario in the parade?

I misread Snowpoke as Slowpoke.

Pikachu and Thomas the tank engine in the same picture... Cool, but i don't like the Skylanders monster.

@Dipper723

probably because Pokemon is being released this Christmas and not Mario. An I hate to say it but kids would probably know Pikachu / Pokemon better than Mario.

Pretty excited to see the new Pikachu float. I usually only tune in exclusively for the Pikachu.

If I hadn't read this article I'd have never known, I've never bothered watching the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.

Thanksgiving....my favorite holiday! Can't wait! We always watch the parade as a family and my boys love Nintendo characters, especially Pikachu. Although they would go even crazier if it were Mario.

No Bayonetta balloon? "wink wink"

@ikki5 I said how come they NEVER put him in. Not in the eighties not in the nineties not ever.

I'm gonna go ahead and call it right now, Snowpoke is gonna be the new "Pikachu" of gen 7. It's also gonna be ice/electric.

Why is Snowpoke not a Slowpoke snowman? Missed opportunity there...

@ikki5 Pikachu is always in the parade (even if a new Pokemon game is not being released around the same time) and Mario is never in the parade (even if a Mario game is being released around that time.)

Someday Id like to take my kids to the parade - we're only an hour away by train - but I have to cook dinner for 15. Maybe Ill let my wife and parents take them this year.

For those who dont know this parade is the pace car for the Christmas shopping season, Santa is at the end on his sled w/ his giant bag of toys. Watch parade. Eat. Shop for 30 straight days. Literally millions of people attend and many million more watch on tv. Nintendo better have a SSBU / amiibo commercial during the broadcast.

http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2012/11/22/86th-annual-macys-thanksgiving-day-parade-steps-off-in-nyc/

A new balloon this year. Didn't the previous balloon not have its ears blown up last year?

@rjejr When I was a kid my parents took me since we used to live about an hour away, as well. As far as I can remember it was a blast! New Years Eve ball drop on the other hand... Not so much!

Nice to see Pikachu is rocking a new look this year. Surprised Sonic is not in the pic too.

I'm anyways too lazy to see it in person (crowd and train ride is quite the turn off), so there's a 90% chance I'll watch it on tv again.

Nice but i really want to see that slowpoke balloon, i bet it looks so adorable.

@2Sang the Volcanic thing is Erruptor from Skylanders if thats what you are ascing.

Sure it's not Snowpoké?

The balloon sounds pretty tall and wide, but 6 bikes doesn't seem very long for a balloon.

A house full of 15 ppl, turkey, filling/stuffing, pumpkin pie, cheesecake, green, & black olives, good times. Usually for courtesy my relatives' boyfriends have the tv for football games, esp. post-Thanksgiving dinner. Ugh... football. But not this year! My WU's 1st Thanksgiving, & Christmas! (Off-tv Gamepad Power, Baby!) Anyway, they sorta watch while the rest of the group frantically goes through fliers for Black Friday sales. I'm not a bf shopper for a variety of reasons, mainly the unnecessary violence all for what is usually a bait-&-switch pulled off by stores, despite said practice being illegal here in America, though the retailers generally do have 1 of said item, so they can technically not be lying.

Anyway, the parade does generally get put on for a little bit, each year. I've never been to a Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. But I do love to see my favorite floats, game themed, or not! I like the Paddington Bear, & Thomas floats. Good old childhood. I'm not a Pokemon fan, though I guess Pikachu is either majorly permission requested for licensed use, &/or Nintendo feels that the character is a good, or better representation of the co. than Mario is (@ least for the audience they suspect will be watching, &/or attending).

Sometimes I wonder if Nintendo really does not know how to advertise to an American audience. I don't see them advertising Ammibo, Smash, or WU during Thanksgiving Day Parade commercial breaks. I'd be amazed to a degree, if they did.

I never understood why Mario isn't in this.

@zeldagaymer93 @Dipper723

yeah and I gave a reasoning on why,

"And I hate to say it but kids would probably know Pikachu / Pokemon better than Mario."

Parades are for kids, so therefore they are going to give the most iconic thing that kids would recognize to advertise to them.

@ikki5 I don't know where you got the idea that Pokemon has been around since the 80s, but it hasn't. It came out 1996 in Japan and 1998 in the US. Also, Mario is very popular. Super Mario Bros sold 29 million copies in the US, and 3 & World sold over 12 million copies, and Mario Kart DS and Wii were very popular here. Mario wouldn't be Nintendo mascot if he wasn't popular.

@ikki5 Mario is just as recognizable to kids as Pikachu is. And the parade is not just for kids. I know so many adults (w/o children) that still watch it.

@Dipper723 I agree with you.

@midnafanboy reread the article. I thought it said slowpoke too, don't worry.

Still... Who the frick is snowpoke? Where is that from?

@zeldagaymer93 - I've never been to NY Eve to see the ball drop, banning my kids. Did see the Christmas tree lighting and almost got trampled to death by the flood of humanity, that was enough excitement for me.

That Thomas the Tank Engine balloon is giving me skyrim mod nightmares... shivers

@zeldagaymer93

Hm... doubt it, Mario is not really plastered on the handhelds like it is the for consoles and most kids tend to have the handhelds over owning a console and almost ever kid I have talked to that has a handheld, has or knows of pokemon more than any thing else. They may know of Mario but Pokemon is more of an Icon image for Nintendo than Mario is.