Five Reasons The 3DS Will Not Fail

THE PS VITA ISN’T LAUNCHING UNTIL 2012

Sony has largely been doing everything right with the Vita. Apparently, they have learnt from the PSP’s mistakes. So the Vita loos like it’ll be a lot more portable, have better battery life, has multiple methods of input including two analog sticks, motion controls, a touch screen and a touch pad, and is basically more flexible, looking like it will allow for all kinds of games, from proper ‘console on the go’ to ‘bite sized Angry Bird-esque fun’ The pricing seems to be perfect, the development costs are low, and on the whole, consumers and developers all seem to be excited about the system.

So it was high time Sony made a bad move with the Vita, and they did. When they announced that the Vita is not launching until 2012 anywhere except for Japan, that it will be missing the crucial holiday season worldwide, well, that was a very bad move. Although the reasoning behind this is probably sound- Sony want to make sure the Vita is ready for launch, that it has a good lineup, and anyway, the Japan earthquake probably messed their manufacturing plants up a bit- the issues with this delayed launch are numerous.

First, in the holiday frenzy, Sony misses a lot of potential sales. Moreover, the 3DS, at its attractive new price point, sells a lot, with software like Mario Kart driving hardware sales, and vice versa. Therefore, by the time the Vita launches, the 3DS has established what might be an insurmountable lead. Third party developers, when confronted wit the question of which handheld to allocate resources to, will be met with the simple question- develop for the handheld that has an established userbase of 8,9 million? Or one that just launched and has a userbase of maybe 2, 3 million? The answer will be simple, and this might cause third party support to shift.

In addition, think of it this way again. A customer walks into a Gamestop and sees a Vita priced for $249, and a 3DS for $169. The 3DS already has an established library and several games, including Super Mario, Kid Icarus and Mario Kart by the time the Vita launches. The Vita just has its launch lineup. Would the customer rather get the cheaper handheld with an established library, and possibly get a couple of games as well, or would he get just the Vita, and risk suffering all the pangs of being an early adopter?

The Vita not launching this holiday season seals the round in the 3DS’s favor. This doesn’t mean that the Vita will fail- it just means it can’t affect the 3DS as much as it could have.

IT’S NINTENDO, THEY KNOW THE HANDHELD MARKET

For a long while, it appeared the 3DS was defying Nintendo’s tried and tested philosophies of the handheld market, the very philosophies that had helped them retain dominance in the handheld market for over two decades. Nintendo handhelds are always cheap, use off the shelf readily available technology, emphasize long battery life, and input methods conducive to all kind of gameplay. The 3DS, with its extortionately high price of $249, its focus on relatively newer technology and packing a punch in its graphics (even if it did rely on the 3D gimmick for that), and its poor battery life seemed to defy all of that.

A lot of those problems remain, and will remain (although as the Vita has demonstrated, the 3DS isn’t all that technologically savvy, and well, the 3DS has had a price drop). The only edict that the 3DS does not seem to meet currently is the battery life (3.5-5 hours is not good by any measure), but apart from that, the hardware itself is finally up to Nintendo’s standards.

More than hardware, however, Nintendo simply seems to get what kind of software a handheld should have. From the original Tetris to Pokemon, from the various handheld Zelda games to Brain Age, Mario Kart, Advance Wars and Nintendogs, Nintendo software is always tailor made for handhelds, and this is something Sony simply cannot understand. Sure, the PSP had stuff like LocoRoco and Patapon, but didn’t they more or less pale in comparison to something like a Pokemon game, or Mario Kart?

Expect the 3DS to play host to lots of quality handheld games. And while the Vita is also getting a push from Sony for bite sized software, sheer experience is on Nintendo’s side, which means their software is bound to be better. This would be another reason why the 3DS is bound to do well in the handheld market.

POKEMON

Okay, so here at GamingBolt, we have a bit of a love affair with Pokemon, but that’s with good reason. The Pokemon franchise is fifteen years old, and in those fifteen years, it has consistently delivered one quality game after the other, displaying a standard of quality that literally no other franchise has exhibited. Mario has had his share of bad games (Super Mario Sunshine). Zelda had Zelda II. Metroid had Other M. Final Fantasy has had more bad games than good ones. But Pokemon consistently delivers, and as such, it is the premier handheld franchise.

No other game franchise in history has moved as many units as Pokemon has. The success of the Gameboy, Gameboy Color and Gameboy Advance can be attributed to Pokemon. The reason that the 3DS is still being outsold 3:1 by the DS can be attributed to the latest Pokemon games, the excellent Pokemon Black and White. Pokemon is pretty much synonymous with handheld gaming, more synonymous than Mario is with console gaming. To date, it has sold in excess of 210 million units. Therefore, it is a great asset to have, and Nintendo has it exclusive to its handheld systems.

The simple release of a 3DS exclusive Pokemon Grey, or even Pokemon Ruby/Sapphire remakes- and neither of these two scenarios would be presenting us with new games, mind you, just rereleases and remakes respectively- would send 3DS sales rocketing into the stratosphere. An all new Pokemon game would cause riots. That is simply what the series does.

And this is basically the biggest reason why the 3DS cannot fail. Even if the new Pokemon game takes two years to release, and the 3DS is dead in the water by then, the release will spark a flurry of interest. It might single handedly resurrect the 3DS, just as the original Pokemon rescued the original Gameboy over two years after it had died.

Pokemon is possibly Nintendo’s biggest franchise. If Nintendo uses it right, the 3DS will be a massive success, at least on par with the Gameboy Advance.