The Philippine Online Chronicles

The previous weekend saw the significant reduction on the price of the Nintendo 3DS due to Nintendo’s efforts to boost the sales of the handheld console which didn’t do quite during the first six months of its release. Previously, it sold for $249.99 and was sold locally for around P12,800 and interested gamers who have remained ambivalent about buying it might be finally convinced as it now sells for only $169.99 or around P9,000.

The price drop seemed a good move as the sales of the device reportedly went up by 5000% within just 3 days after its price reduction in Japan. according to Josh Holt of myona.com Currently, there is still no indication the 3DS sales in other markets such as the rest of Asia and the United States.

Due to the price cut, however, Nintendo also had to cut down on its expected net profits for the year by as much as 80 percent. Still, the company is reported to have never lost money on a full year basis and that it expects to meet its quota of selling 16-million devices this year.

This gives some cause for celebration to the executives at Nintendo, especially its president Satoru Iwata who earlier acknowledged that the price drop could have been ill-timed because they could have waited a few months for the holiday season. Earlier, Iwata, along with other of the company’s executives, opted for a pay-cut to show their sincerity and to fulfill their responsibility.

Iwata also apologized to customers who bought the Nintendo 3DS before the price-drop as they may feel betrayed by this move by the gaming company. To show its appreciation, Nintendo launched the Ambassador program for the early-adaptors, entitling them to receive 20 free downloadable games by the end of this year.

As seen on the Nintendo website, there will be a total of 10 NES Virtual Console games and 10 Game Boy Advance Virtual Console games to be made available.

From the NES games, five have been announced so far:

• Super Mario Bros.™

• Donkey Kong Jr.™

• Balloon Fight™

• Ice Climber™

• The Legend of Zelda™

As for the Game Boy Advance games, there are also five already announced:

• Yoshi's Island™: Super Mario™ Advance 3

• Mario Kart™: Super Circuit

• Metroid™ Fusion

• WarioWare™, Inc.: Mega Microgame$

• Mario vs. Donkey Kong™

Like many new consoles that start out on the market, there are various reasons why many gamers weren’t keen on picking up the Nintendo 3DS and one of the most compelling reason is that there are limited games available on the 3DS while there are still many great games available on older devices.

As reported by Martyn Williams on PC World: Nintendo said just one title, "The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D," sold well enough to be considered a "hit."

This is what Nintendo is aiming to address. By getting more people to buy a 3DS this early and in vastly increasing the number of people who own the device before more major titles come out, Nintendo hopes to convince both retailers and publishers to continue their support for the handheld device.

In short, with this price drop, Iwata and company hopes that the device continues to sell well in order to convince retailers to stock up on existing titles for the upcoming holiday season and for the long term, they also hope that a success in this endeavor convinces game developers to devote teams to the creation of new games for the handheld for the upcoming year onwards. One can only hope that the games eventually become much cheaper.

Meanwhile, the price drop has sent some observers worried about the inevitable death of the portable gaming device seeing as this could mean that they are now devalued in the market in the face of competition. By competition, it doesn’t just mean other entries in the portable gaming device market only. It also includes all-in-one devices, not primarily for gaming, such as smartphones that can have downloadable games as well.

Sure, it might be easy to scoff at the quality of games that are available at app stores for less than a dollar. Additionally, some classic games have been made available on apple devices and some developers have considered making exclusive games for mobile. Without a doubt though, having a certain number of these games on a mobile device is enough to keep boredom at bay for most casual gamers instead of just one game available in a handheld gaming device.

In fact, the situation seems pretty grim to devices purely concieved for gaming at times that Don Reisinger at Slashgear said that it might be time to admit that traditional gaming is in trouble and nowhere is that more evident than in the portable gaming market.

“Today’s gamers just aren’t as willing as they once were to buy a portable device with gaming as its main function. Consumers today want a single device that will allow them to play a game, then turn that off to text a friend, place a call, and then go back to gaming. The 3DS and the upcoming PlayStation Vita don’t offer that. And that alone puts their future in doubt,” Reisinger wrote.

While traditional gaming and, consequently, portable devices might be in trouble, it is still far too early to declare them dead. The mobile phones with their apps may have the lead currently, but there is still much that can be done by the hardware makers and game developers to stay afloat and perhaps, take back the lead.

Likewise, Eric Caoili at Tinycartridge (On the death of handheld gaming & the 3DS) agrees that it is foolish to assume that the N3DS, or Nintendo portables and other dedicated gaming handhelds in general, are dying based on the sales of the N3DS in the first few months since its launch seeing as portable devices is “a platform that’s stayed strong for over 30 years.”

“Well, what’s on the 3DS’s horizon? In the immediate future, we have intriguing ports like Bit.Trip Saga, Cave Story 3D, and Devil Survivor Overclocked. On the first-party side, there’s new entries for popular franchises like Mario Kart 7, Kid Icarus Uprising, and Luigi’s Mansion 2. Further out, there are curious original titles like Heroes of Ruin, Nano Assault, Theatrhythm Final Fantasy, and Rolling Western. And one must not leave out anticipated DS games, like Solatorobo: Red the Hunter, Aliens: Infestation, and Ni no Kuni (crosses fingers).

My point is the 3DS has a respectable slate of upcoming games† for those with the patience to wait for them. The DS game library (or any other platform’s catalog, including the App Store) wasn’t built in a day, or a year even,” Caoili wrote.

Given Nintendo’s gameplan and the response of its supporters, it really does seem much too early to declare this contender out for the count. In a few more months, gamers can expect to see more solid titles come up on the N3DS shelves and the folks at Nintendo are set on an outcome that will make everyone happy.

What about you, are you planning on getting one soon?

Photo from POC files. Some rights reserved.