Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon

At the beginning of the February Nintendo Direct, Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon received major announcements on its gameplay and new game-modes, marking the first Luigi-oriented game for the celebration. A Luigi's Mansion sequel was announced at E3 2011 tentatively titled Luigi's Mansion 2,^[23] and revealed the game and a 2012 holiday release date at E3 2012.^[24][25] The game was delayed to the first half of 2013 for an unspecified reason.^[26] In the February Direct, presented by Iwata, Miyamoto held a Poltergust machine from the Luigi's Mansion series. Iwata gave Miyamoto another Luigi cap, dubbed the two of them the "Luigi Brothers", and Miyamoto continued the announcement.^[27] The game was released on March 24 to coincide with the celebration.^[28][29] Iwata stated in an Iwata Asks interview with developer Next Level Games that Dark Moon will hopefully kick the Year of Luigi "off to a magnificent starting dash"–all attendees were also wearing Luigi caps.^[30][31] Miyamoto expressed appreciation in Next Level Game's work and its timing with the Year of Luigi, considering how a sequel to Luigi's Mansion was highly anticipated by fans.^[31]

In Dark Moon, Luigi is tasked by Professor E. Gadd to capture the ghosts invading the Evershade Valley complex, who have become hostile due to the effects of the Dark Moon crystal, which was shattered by King Boo. Luigi is equipped with the Poltergust 5000, a vacuum repurposed to capture ghosts, and Luigi captures ghosts occupying the mansions via mission-based levels. In a cooperative multiplayer game-mode, and players complete objectives on floors of the "ScareScraper" in a level-like fashion. Critical feedback for the game was positive, being praised for its worldbuilding and puzzle variety,^[32] Poltergust mechanics,^[33] and centralization on Luigi,^[34] and criticized for gameplay padding.^[35]

New Super Luigi U

Also featured in the Nintendo Direct was New Super Luigi U, downloadable content (DLC) for the 2012 Wii U game New Super Mario Bros. U. It originally served as an expansion pack that would be downloadable from the eShop at an unspecified date, and would include an additional 80 levels on top of the base game.^[36] The levels were designed to be much more difficult, so the time to complete them was made shorter so less experienced players would be encouraged to continue, according to producer Takashi Tezuka.^[37] At E3 2013, Nintendo announced that Mario would be completely omitted from New Super Luigi U and would be replaced by Nabbit, a now playable non-player character who originally appeared in New Super Mario Bros. U.^[38] In addition, Nintendo also announced that the expansion pass would be released as a separate physical purchase for a larger price and would be released the same time as its downloadable counterpart. The physical copy used a green box instead of the Wii U's traditional blue ones.^[39] Both retail variants were released July 13 and 26 in Japan and Europe respectively and August 25 in North America.

Gameplay of New Super Luigi U retains most aspects of New Super Mario Bros U. Instead of Mario, the player controls Luigi, who has a higher jump and less friction in the movement, but after completion the player can switch back to regular controlling.^[40][41] The new levels have a harder difficulty and a shorter time to complete them, and some are designed with Luigi-themed decoration.^[40][42] The game received generally positive reception, being praised for its level design and content size;^[43] critics also had mixed opinions on Luigi's handling,^[44] as well as its difficulty and the time allotted to complete levels.^[45]

Mario & Luigi: Dream Team

In the same Nintendo Direct, Nintendo announced the fourth installment in the Mario & Luigi series, Mario & Luigi: Dream Team, scheduled for a summer release. During the Direct, Iwata specified that the majority of the game would take place within Luigi's dream, where he "might not be as traditionally cowardly" to better centralize Luigi's role. The game released July 12 in Europe, the day after in Japan, and August 11 in North America.^[46] Alongside the release, a demo was made available on the Nintendo eShop.^[47] Due to the last entry in the series, Bowser's Inside Story, focusing primarily on Bowser instead of Mario and Luigi, series developer AlphaDream conceived ideas for another game focusing solely on Luigi. After conceptualizing the idea of "having a lot of Luigis on the screen that you could control and who would run around", they set Dream Team's setting within a dream to justify its inclusion. According to game director Akira Otani, AlphaDream used Luigi as the butt of gag jokes too often and wanted to equalize Luigi with Mario. In another Iwata Asks interview about Dream Team's development, Otani was surprised to see the Year of Luigi's announcement and was shocked Luigi was as old as he was, meaning AlphaDream's emphasis on Luigi was pure coincidence.^[48]

In Dream Team, Mario, Luigi, and Princess Peach are invited to vacation at Pi'illo island; when the trip goes awry and the three are put under threat, they investigate the island's central castle to investigate. When Luigi gets distracted and sleeps on a bed in the castle's artifact room, a "Dream Portal" opens up, and its hostile inhabitants kidnap Peach and wreak havoc on Pi'illo island. Mario sets out to retrieve the "Dream Stone" artifact to contain the inhabitants, which involves frequent use of Luigi's dreams to his advantage. Gameplay centralizes around Pi'illo island in an overworld fashion, with Luigi's dreams, the "Dream World", involving platforming elements.^[50] When Mario is in the Dream World, a sleeping Luigi can be physically interacted with to alter what happens in the Dream World; for example, making Luigi sneeze will create a gust of wind in the Dream World. Reception for Dream Team was positive, being praised for its writing,^[51] characters,^[52] and turn-based combat,^[53] and criticized for its plot length and use of backtracking.^[54] The game was also revered for its Dream World elements, especially the dynamic between the real-world Luigi and his more superior Dream World counterpart.^[55]

Dr. Luigi

The last full game is Dr. Luigi, which was announced via Nintendo Direct December 18 and released December 31 in North America and January 15 internationally the following year.^[56][57] The sixth entry in the Dr. Mario series, Dr. Luigi has four different modes: "Operation L", which uses L-shaped pills instead of traditional Dr. Mario pills; "Virus Buster", which uses the Wii U GamePad and stylus instead of standard button controls; multiplayer, which includes both local and online gameplay; and "Retro Remedy", which doesn't use any gimmicks and is rather unaltered Dr. Mario gameplay.^[58] Luigi replaces Mario, and stands on a pedestal that has a Year of Luigi theming. Critical reception was positive, being praised for the inventiveness of the Operation L gamemode and multiplayer features,^[59] and criticized for its lack of new content in comparison to the Dr. Mario predecessors,^[60] and some critics reevaluated the series as a whole to be non-inventive and too simple to hold interest.^[61]

Super Mario 3D World

If a player who purchased Super Mario 3D World also had data for New Super Luigi U saved on their Wii U, they were given access to Luigi Bros.;^{[lower-alpha 1]} Luigi Bros. was accessible via the title screen of 3D World and featured gameplay identical to that of Mario Bros. but used Luigi as the main character instead of Mario.^[62] Nintendo also placed multiple 8-bit depictions of Luigi in hidden locations throughout 3D World.^[63]