Hello Kitty Island Adventure journeys beyond Apple Arcade as PC and Switch versions announced

• Hello Kitty Island Adventure is broadening beyond Apple Arcade, launching on Nintendo Switch, PS4, PS5, and PC
• Hello Kitty Island Adventure is extending its reach as a number of games have pulled out of Apple Arcade

Apple Arcade exclusive Hello Kitty Island Adventure won’t be an exclusive much longer, as the title gets set to go cross-platform in 2025, expanding onto Nintendo Switch and PC.

The expansion was announced in the latest online Nintendo Direct presentation yesterday, June 18th, revealing that the title will be a "timed console exclusive" on Nintendo’s hardware before branching out even further onto PS4 and PS5.

Notably, the presentation didn’t acknowledge Hello Kitty Island Adventure’s existence on Apple Arcade, or the fact that the game first released in 2023.

Hello, new platforms

Hello Kitty Island Adventure tasks players with exploring an island to find materials and craft new items, solving ancient puzzles, and supporting Hello Kitty and friends on their mission to renovate an abandoned theme park.

Naturally, the game leverages Sanrio’s popular Hello Kitty brand, a globally recognisable IP from Japan. Apple Arcade landing Hello Kitty Island Adventure as an exclusive was a big win for the subscription service.

The move to pastures new suggests that Island Adventure hasn’t found the levels of success Sanrio and Subblink were hoping for such a high profile game and, as such, a rollout to other platforms delivers more opportunities for the brand to shine.

Without microtransactions or in-app purchases in the app, Sanrio has clearly determined those opportunities are most likely to bear fruit on console and PC, rather than a broadening to all iOS and Android owners. After all, free-to-play is king on mobile while premium, pay-upfront games are the norm on console. It’s therefore unsurprising to see a game without in-app purchases prioritising the latter.

Trendy Kitty

Hello Kitty Island Adventure isn’t the first Apple Arcade game to present itself elsewhere. The 2019 action platformer Fallen Knight actually left Apple Arcade entirely this January, but remains available to players on PC and Nintendo Switch.

Mad About Pandas’ Hitchhiker also started off as an Apple Arcade exclusive in 2021 but rolled out on PC and console only a month later; it left Apple Arcade this January too, evidently preferring to sell as units on other hardware than be part of a subscription service.

Farm it!, World of Demons, and Epic-owned Wonderbox have also been pulled from Apple Arcade this year, contributing to an increasing impression that subscriptions are losing the battle for video game dominance.