Pikmin becomes a flower

Nintendo of America has announced that it has reached an agreement with S&G Flowers USA to make a so-called Pikmin flower available to gardeners and video game enthusiasts. The five-petaled white flower with a yellow center closely resembles the characters from Shigeru Miyamoto's GameCube game Pikmin and will be available for sale in April 2002.

"This extraordinary marketing initiative to consumers demonstrates that at the core of Nintendo is creativity," said Peter Main, executive vice president of sales and marketing at Nintendo of America. "We used a variety of innovative and unusual activities to build anticipation for the Nintendo GameCube. Naming a flower after a video game is just one more way Nintendo is seeding creative marketing."

Pikmin was released for the GameCube on December 3.