Early this morning, Nintendo President Satoru Iwata appeared in the latest Nintendo Direct wearing a Luigi hat. He says that the hat is in celebration of Luigi finally becoming a central character after being in the background for so long. As part of the celebration, Nintendo says 2013 will be the year of Luigi.

Kicking off the Year of Luigi will be Luigi’s Mansion: Dark Moon. Nintendo luminary Shigeru Miyamoto made his Nintendo Direct debut to talk about the single-player campaign in Nintendo Direct. He says that the game will be introducing a number of new elements.

The game will also be introducing a number of multiplayer modes. We’ve already seen one mode, but the game will also offer a number of competitive and cooperative modes.

Continuing the theme of Luigi games, Nintendo announced a new entry in the long running Mario & Luigi RPG series. This latest game has Mario entering the dreams of Luigi to combat the creatures of the dream world. Mario & Luigi: Dream Team will launch in summer 2013.

Luigi will also be joining Mario and the crew in a new Mario Golf title called Mario Golf: World Tour for the 3DS. It will be released in summer 2013.

Finally, Nintendo will be releasing DLC content for New Super Mario Bros. U called Super Luigi U. The DLC will transform all the levels in the game to exclusive Luigi levels that offer new challenges. Nintendo says it will be like a full retail game, and will be available later this year.