A Year of the 3DS

So a year has almost passed since the Nintendo’s 3DS hit the market and what a year it has been. The transition between the Nintendo DS and the 3DS should have been a mere formality but the portable market that belonged almost entirely to Nintendo didn’t pick up the new console very quickly.

Even as support for mobile games has increased many people have still be keen and regular users of the dual screen handhelds that came before. The DS found life in four different iterations with numerous colours, options and features.

The software has ranged from predicable offerings of Mario and Zelda to DS exclusives like Brain Age and Pictocross. In fact the DS is one of the greatest success stories in video game history as more than 149 million units have been sold worldwide. The system itself is actually Nintendo’s best selling product ever and the second best selling system of all time.

When Nintendo unveiled the 3DS system at E3 2010 most people, myself included, presumed that the success would just transfer over. The 3Ds was shown with a powerful design and branding that followed the original DS in both design and ideas, the software also looked formidable. It then took Nintendo a further 6 months to release any solid information on launch dates, pricing and finalised software.

Despite Nintendo’s dominance in the handheld market the launch ideas seem troubling. The debut price for the console in the US was a full $80 more than any previous DS launch price and was particularly high when you put together the perspective software schedule for the opening few months. The strategy employed was strong but risky and in hindsight probably showed that Nintendo had a little too much pride in heir previous success that they almost didn’t think the 3DS had a chance of flopping. In all honesty it looked like Nintendo wasn’t really ready for the launch of the new system but they decided to go ahead with it anyway.

The biggest problem with the initial release was the lack of the eShop that so many people were excited about and also the quality of the release date games. In fact none of the release date games grabbed my attention and everything from Splinter Cell to Nintendogs seemed to be burdened by poor reviews. None of the games embraced the significant advancements on the last handheld and only enough some didn’t even utilised the USP’s. Oddly enough the built in games like Face Raiders seemed to be the most played software after initial release. The released versions of Street Fighter and PES were strong but were never going to be console sellers. Despite being the successor of an all-powerful handheld the 3DS looked set to crash dramatically.

In truth the first week of sales was good around the globe and many people picked up the system, overall Nintendo managed to sell 3.5 million systems by the end of March 2011. Nintendo however were not happy with the sales and had originally anticipated a goal of 4 million units sold within the first month. It unfortunately showed the state of things to come and outlined that the console needed something to change to keep it pushing strongly in the future – especially with Vita over the horizon.

As Spring rolled into Summer the cracks in Nintendo’s master plan started to rapidly show and even by May the eShop was still no-where to be seen and the big release on the cards, Ocarina of Time, was still weeks away too.

Quickly Nintendo noticed the issued and ran out a quick fire eShop to improve the user base; though not perfect the shop game us the option of purchasing retro games at a significant saving and was certainly welcomed. Though the eShop hasn’t been as useful as I’d first hoped the weekly updates that are now in place are interesting; especially when the market is going slowly.

The industry started to notice the problems and five months after release Nintendo revealed that performance was worse than ever imagined. After month one the 3DS could only manage a mere 3 million units worldwide for the following five.

It took Nintendo’s knowledge of the industry and again another big risk for the 3DS to start picking up sales again. Six months after the release the 3DS price reduction came into place and in most areas the console was reduced by over 30%. The world was beginning to be dark for Nintendo and the shockingly large price drop had many wondering what significance this might have on the whole company and not just their recent hardware release.

The reduction in price brought with it a stream of new game information and also the fantastic 3DS Ambassador program (which itself was a stroke of genius). All in all the second half of 2011 proved to be a very different fight indeed.

Problems did still plague the 3DS but nothing hit as hard as the initial release period. The system got an influx in electronic content online and had a few button changes along the way. The line up of quality games started appearing in stores with the like of Resident Evil and Pilotwings and then toward Christmas with the standard Mario Land and Mario Kart titles. Ultimately the software started selling more hardware and ultimately that was what matters.

Nintendo may have misread and mishandled the early months of the 3DS, but it has swiftly addressed some of the system's biggest shortcomings, most notably in the area of content. It proves that the hardworking people at Nintendo know what they are doing after all and surprised us all in completely the right way. If you’d have asked me a year ago I’d have probably expected the 3DS to have been pulled by now but in reality it’s stronger than ever.

The next 12 months sure are going to be exciting in the handheld camp with Sony’s Vita also trying to break into the usually loyal handheld market. The Monster Hunter series is also due for a release and we will no doubt here more as we approach the 2012 E3 conference. It’s an interesting time to by into the 3DS concepts and an even more interesting one if you’ve already invested.