Mario's Power Up Bands a worrying trend at Super Nintendo World theme park

It's a Mario power up band: Wearable tech is changing theme parks. Photo / Supplied

Mario fans will be jumping for joy at the news that the Nintendo games franchise is getting a theme park.

In six months the Super Nintendo World theme park will be open to visitors, inviting them to play their favourite virtual games in physical space.

During a press conference at the Universal park, it was revealed that one of the experiences will be based on Super Mario's Mushroom Kingdom.

Built at the Universal Studios Japan in Osaka, the entertainment company promised an "experience that blends the physical world with the world of the video game."

Part of this will be achieved through the use of wearable tech. "Power Up Bands" – wristband computers – will allow visitors to collect digital coins and compete with other visitors, just like the games.

Colourful Power Up Bands will blend virtual and physical fun. Photo / Supplied

Competitions and challenges will be scattered throughout the park in order for visitors to level up and redeem points for collectable items.

The ranking system and virtual currency is designed to make the "entire experience feel like competing for a high score in a video game" said a spokesperson for the park.

"There are all kinds of ways to earn coins throughout the entire land, and guests can keep score, compete against each other and celebrate together when they win."

Mario and Co: The announcement of Super Nintendo World at Universal Studios Japan. Photo / Supplied

The bands – which are themed with characters from the Nintendo computer games – can link to a smartphone app to track and share scores, further blending virtual and physical fun.

Tech entertainment company Nintendo is far from the first to use wearable tech to entice people into their parks.

Last year Disneyland was dubbed the "happiest surveillance state on earth" by a Bloomberg report into the parks wearable Magic Bands.

Magic band: Disney pioneered theme park tech. Photo / Supplied

Offering incentives such as playable games and cue jumps in exchange for location and spending data, the RFID technology came under fire for Disneyland visitors' lack of awareness into the bands' wide-reaching data agreement.

Nintendo and Universal's data policies for the Power Up Bands have not yet been released, but there are no plans to use Nintendo's bands for payments.

The current Universal Privacy Policy says it already collects visitors' Biometric Identifiers such as "facial scans or fingerprints" at some of "our theme parks, studios or our offices". The theme park was contacted for comment if the bands will feed into the parks existing network for Identification and Transactional data collection.

The bands will be available for purchase at the parks, though no price has been released.
Disney's magic bands retail at around $22 - $45.

Three more Nintendo parks in the Universal Studios in Orlando, Hollywood and Singapore are also primed to open. However, there is no opening schedule tied to these parks.