Nintendo has officially announced that a Shovel Knight amiibo is indeed on its way. This comes as no surprise since rumors were running rampant early yesterday about this coming to fruition after the UK retailer, Game, inadvertently tweeted out a pre-order announcement. Here’s the new intel: the little blue collectible will be compatible with both the Wii U and Nintendo 3DS versions of Shovel Knight. The NFC enabled figure will unlock customizable gear and exclusive challenge stages on both versions. If that’s not enough to get your blood pumping, a new co-op mode that allows a friend join your campaign will also be unlocked using this sweet model. Unfortunately, the co-op feature is exclusive to the Wii U version. No release date has been hinted at thus far, but you can expect this bad boy to hit some time during holiday 2015. We will keep you posted.

The announcement came in the form of a video that features the Game Grumps trying to dig a hole inside their headquarters. Take a gander at the full video above. Be warned, there’s plenty of excitement-filled shrieking going on in the video.

The shocking part of this news is that Nintendo is not manufacturing this product, but instead, just licensing it. Yacht Club Games will both produce and sell it, making this the first third-party amiibo. Who saw that coming? Despite this strange bit of news, the packaging will still share the same quality and look of the other first-party amiibo figures to avoid any confusion.

If you have yet to play this masterfully crafted platformer, I recommend you go play it now. It’s available on pretty much every current-gen platform, though, you might want to look into the Wii U and/or 3DS versions considering the nifty new features that have been announced exclusively for Nintendo platforms. There’s also going to be a physical release this October, if you’re still not down with going digital.

Will you be adding Shovel Knight to your amiibo collection? What other third-party developers would you like to take this same approach? Let us know in the comments below. I can’t wait to have my blue bomber and blue shoveler amiibo figures displayed right next to each other.

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HT: Gameinformer, Nintendo, Yacht Club Games 

Image credit: Nintendo