Famicom Dojo Podcast: 3DS Price Drop? We Called It

by Sean "TheOrange" Corse, filed in Famicom Dojo Podcast, Podcasts on Aug.05, 2011

Nintendo’s steep price cut of the 3DS may have taken some news outlets by surprise last week, but we called it way back during E3. When Sony introduced the PSVita at the same price point as Nintendo’s new handheld that was already struggling in sales, we knew a price cut could not be far behind. It looks like Nintendo agreed! SeanOrange and Vinnk discuss the 3DS Ambassador program, the wisdom of deciding not to release the GBA Virtual Console games to the general public, and whether or not these 20 free games will entice us (or anyone) to buy the system at $250 before the price cut goes into effect next Friday, August 12th.

(Listen to the episode after the jump)

Direct Link: Famicom Dojo Podcast 12: 3DS Price Drop? We Called It

Find out the details of the 3DS Ambassador Program program in our show notes:
http://famicomdojo.tv/podcast/12

Get a sweet discount on the Famicom Dojo Season 1 DVD if you use promo code “NOSHAME”!
http://famicomdojo.tv/store/fdojos1.php

Tags: 3ds, Nintendo, PSVita, Sony

I’m from Europe, bought alot, like a EU 3DS, a Famicom Dojo DVD without promo code, I have shame, didn’t find the code. and even imported a JAP-one. so Vink, if you wan’t one, drop me a message.
BumblebeeZ3

Woot, Atari ST mention!
Regarding eye shooting instead of Duckhunt, a Scanners video game?
I have yet to purchase a 3DS, as I am waiting for the Ace Attorney Layton crossover game to come out in America before getting one. I figure there might be a 3DS Advance/Lite by then.
Until then, I have plenty of games for my original DS.
Anonymous

Giant ship approaching: Wall of Text. �Get ready!

Looks like you guys got the “holiday sales battle!” prediction correct, too, at least in the US:�http://kotaku.com/5827643/playstation-vita-wont-launch-in-the-west-until-2012
Gotta agree with all the points raised (except maybe the Atari ST analogy). �Nintendo got greedy with their pricing and now they’ve taken drastic action in hopes to correct their sales figures. �Holiday season will be great for them since there won’t be any PSVita in the US and some of the first party titles that Nintendo announced back at E3 will be coming out.

As far as third parties are concerned, I see it as two camps: niche and shovelware. �As great as the niche games are, I would guess that they move a non-significant number of hardware units. �The other, shovelware, is going to be on as many platforms as possible, just by definition. �The latest terrible Disney game is gonna be on the DS and the 3DS, because it can be. �They’d still be putting out Gameboy Color games if the hardware was still sold.

And that’s the big sellers: first-party and shovelware. �I don’t see either of those going away, so I don’t see a lot of trouble for Nintendo.

Oh, I should mention that I’m a Nintendo Ambassador. �I’m gonna start putting that on my resume.

I bought a 3DS about a month ago, largely pushed by the E3 2011 announcements. �I’m a sucker for Animal Crossing, so that was really the impetus for the purchase. �(AC got me to buy a Wii, as well). �I like the “3D Classics” series so far, but I really didn’t get much enjoyment out of the Excitebike remake. �The physics felt a bit off from the NES version, but maybe my memory is just off. �I suck at both versions, so I guess they have that in common. �The next game in the series, Xevious, is a great remake. �Since the game is designed with two planes in mind, it’s a perfect choice to be remade. �Probably my favorite 3DS purchase so far. �The next game in the series is supposed to be one of the Twinbee games. �I’ll probably grab that, too.

I think the “you need to hold the 3DS at just the right angle” argument is overblown. �There’s a lot of truth to it, but, at the same time, I’ve found that you can move the 3DS around a bit and still get the full 3D effect. �It’s something that took a little time to adjust to (like, maybe an hour of Pilotwings Resort), but I rarely find myself getting out of focus. �Then again, I’m one of those guys who never got a headache from playing Mario’s Tennis on the VirtualBoy for hours at a time (although, neck cramps, yes).

I was bothered by a few levels in Pilotwings Resort where you need to aim and shoot at targets. �Some of the targets would just always be a double image. �I couldn’t for the life of me figure out what I was doing wrong. �A week or so later, while playing Xevious, I noticed the same double image effect. �What became obvious to me in Xevious, though, was that the double image only occurred on the plane that I wasn’t focusing on. �If I was focusing on the flying flipping panels, for example, then the tanks on the ground looked doubled. �It dawned on me that this is a natural occurrence. Sure enough, back in Pilotwings, if I stopped focusing on the plane so much and focused on the target instead, the “double target” went away.

I guess that was kind of a long way of explaining it, but it was really something that surprised me. �I expected a lot of goofy “popping out of the screen” type effects from the 3DS, but they’ve really kept is classy and added a depth (pun intended?) to the graphics that other handhelds don’t offer.

http://www.famicomdojo.tv/ Sean “TheOrange” Corse

It’s something that one doesn’t really realize until you hold a 3DS, but there are actually several points along the Z-axis (in and out) where the 3D effect works. �If it was just one spot, I think it would be a useless gimmick. �But actually having some choice in how far away you hold the system is pretty crucial, I think.

Anonymous

Giant ship approaching: Wall of Text. �Get ready!

Looks like you guys got the “holiday sales battle!” prediction correct, too, at least in the US:�http://kotaku.com/5827643/playstation-vita-wont-launch-in-the-west-until-2012
Gotta agree with all the points raised (except maybe the Atari ST analogy). �Nintendo got greedy with their pricing and now they’ve taken drastic action in hopes to correct their sales figures. �Holiday season will be great for them since there won’t be any PSVita in the US and some of the first party titles that Nintendo announced back at E3 will be coming out.

As far as third parties are concerned, I see it as two camps: niche and shovelware. �As great as the niche games are, I would guess that they move a non-significant number of hardware units. �The other, shovelware, is going to be on as many platforms as possible, just by definition. �The latest terrible Disney game is gonna be on the DS and the 3DS, because it can be. �They’d still be putting out Gameboy Color games if the hardware was still sold.

And that’s the big sellers: first-party and shovelware. �I don’t see either of those going away, so I don’t see a lot of trouble for Nintendo.

Oh, I should mention that I’m a Nintendo Ambassador. �I’m gonna start putting that on my resume.

I bought a 3DS about a month ago, largely pushed by the E3 2011 announcements. �I’m a sucker for Animal Crossing, so that was really the impetus for the purchase. �(AC got me to buy a Wii, as well). �I like the “3D Classics” series so far, but I really didn’t get much enjoyment out of the Excitebike remake. �The physics felt a bit off from the NES version, but maybe my memory is just off. �I suck at both versions, so I guess they have that in common. �The next game in the series, Xevious, is a great remake. �Since the game is designed with two planes in mind, it’s a perfect choice to be remade. �Probably my favorite 3DS purchase so far. �The next game in the series is supposed to be one of the Twinbee games. �I’ll probably grab that, too.

I think the “you need to hold the 3DS at just the right angle” argument is overblown. �There’s a lot of truth to it, but, at the same time, I’ve found that you can move the 3DS around a bit and still get the full 3D effect. �It’s something that took a little time to adjust to (like, maybe an hour of Pilotwings Resort), but I rarely find myself getting out of focus. �Then again, I’m one of those guys who never got a headache from playing Mario’s Tennis on the VirtualBoy for hours at a time (although, neck cramps, yes).

I was bothered by a few levels in Pilotwings Resort where you need to aim and shoot at targets. �Some of the targets would just always be a double image. �I couldn’t for the life of me figure out what I was doing wrong. �A week or so later, while playing Xevious, I noticed the same double image effect. �What became obvious to me in Xevious, though, was that the double image only occurred on the plane that I wasn’t focusing on. �If I was focusing on the flying flipping panels, for example, then the tanks on the ground looked doubled. �It dawned on me that this is a natural occurrence. Sure enough, back in Pilotwings, if I stopped focusing on the plane so much and focused on the target instead, the “double target” went away.

I guess that was kind of a long way of explaining it, but it was really something that surprised me. �I expected a lot of goofy “popping out of the screen” type effects from the 3DS, but they’ve really kept is classy and added a depth (pun intended?) to the graphics that other handhelds don’t offer.
http://zacshipley.com/ Zac Shipley

Pet peeve when talking about system costs: bringing up how much it costs to build a system.

The reason Nintendo charged as much as they did for the Wii (remember, $250 was more than previous Nintendo console launches) and the 3DS is very simple: research and development. �Thats the true cost of new technology. �When you send specs to a factory in Shenzhen, they’ll be able to build it cheap. �Its just another screen and another microprocessor. �But Nintendo spent no doubt tens of MILLIONS developing that screen.�

Take a quick look at the market: does ANYONE have a no-glasses 3D display on anything? �This means not only did Nintendo develop this screen, but they don’t benefit from other hardware manufacturers also building them and the costs coming down.

So yes, the parts might only cost Nintendo $120 US, but it will now take years for them to make an actual profit on the system. �This is the opposite of say, the Xbox where they spent very little on R&D by building essentially a PC in a black box that hooked up to a TV, but then ending up being tied to cost by those parts by having to buy drives, processors, hard drives, etc instead of making them on their own.

http://www.famicomdojo.tv/ Sean “TheOrange” Corse

True, but the reason we bring it up at all is that in order to increase units (and therefore games sold), they need to slash the price of the system since the demand clearly isn’t there. �And since there’s such a large space between the build cost and the current price, they have a lot of room to work with to make that happen. �If the system cost $200 to build, there’s no chance they’d be able to do this steep of a cut and hope to make any money back at all.

And that’s kind of what they’re up against: slash the price and make it up on volume and game licensing fees, because at this rate they have no hope of making back their full R&D costs. �Plus, there’s a competitor on the horizon — although UglyJoe points out the PSVita won’t launch here until 2012, so they have this holiday season to gather up some momentum.

BumblebeeZ3

From what I understand, unless things have changed, Nintendo doesn’t make money on third party games released for their systems, (which would help explain why the bulk of my DS library is ineligible for points/coins on the Nintendo site.) just on selling the development kit.

http://www.famicomdojo.tv/ Sean “TheOrange” Corse

Really? I thought the $5 price hike of 3rd party titles over 1st party DS games was due to licensing costs.

Barnaby Edwards

I see your point about R&D costs, but Nintendo isn’t the one making all the components that go into their hardware. Rather, they’ll research what manufacturers have got coming out and partner up with them. Sharp is the company making the 3DS screens (for awhile, Hitachi seemed to be another possible source according to speculation before it was confirmed) and Nintendo is just buying them wholesale. Similarly, they researched and partnered with other providers for things such as the accelerometers and tilt sensors in Wii Remotes.

They still come up with their own innovations of course. I recall an interview with the WiiFit dev team where they were talking with various bathroom scale companies on the design of the Balance Board before they came up with an idea on how they could do it better themselves. But where Nintendo really shines is in the application and implementation of their various technology.

Crade Lit

Yeah, I haven’t got a 3ds, my most honest reason is probably a�lot like Sean’s, I don’t take the bus and have no time for playing [edit: mobile] games.� Nintendo’s best games are still the classics and my�ds plays my FC collection just fine.� The new game library isn’t enticing enough, the vita looks pretty cool, and 170$ is above my impulse buy bar.� I think thats about it.
zppbonzo

About the DSi XL, at GameStop, the DSi XL and the 3DS cost exactly the same. $169.99.

http://www.famicomdojo.tv/ Sean “TheOrange” Corse

Probably why they dropped it down to that price point, then. �Nice!

Luke Beauchamp

I know this episode is a year old but since it says I can leave a comment at any time, I just wanted to point out this:

The reason why things would pop out of a 3D film like Avatar but they pop into the 3DS is because, say your looking at a close up of a characters face, it would be about two meters away. On the 3DS, that would be behind the screen if you hold it 50 centimetres away. In the cinema, you would sit several meters back, so the same 2 meter distant face should appear in front of the screen. I say should because the guys who make 3D films seem to have little idea of stereoscopic geometry. The 3D effect should be the same as it would be in real life but I think they tone it down so more people can watch it without their eyes bleeding. Most people could train themselves to see a more intense 3D effect if they watched gradually deeper 3D images over a few hours.
Both 3D films and games are doomed if they can’t work out proper real world geometry. I’ll admit, there would be some difficulties with film, such as different seating positions in the cinema and different TV sizes/viewing distances for the home release. However, since video games are rendered on the fly, they could be customised to your set up. I haven’t been able to try a 3D game on PS3 or 360 but on the PC, the default settings are always well below real world depth. I would speculate that it may be the same with consoles, even if they do let you input your screen size and viewing distance. I guess the 3DS has to have less than real world depth because otherwise the small screen would cause a keyhole effect so you would have trouble converging on it. People say 3D is a gimmick but it wouldn’t be if 3D films and games could more accurately reflect real world geometry.

Thus ends my long winded rant.

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