Topic: Newscast Lite: Ambassador's Edition

[oksoda]

Three guys who paid $250 for their 3DS give their immediate reaction to the big news.

http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/newscast/27299

Well who saw THAT coming? Andy and Scott are joined by Japanese Correspondent Danny Bivens to talk about today's big news: the 3DS Price Drop and Ambassador's program with TWENTY free games in this lite-sized episode.

Saturday's upcoming episode, Newscast episode 63, was recorded before the big news this morning, so we wanted to be sure to give you our fresh take on the new 3DS price before you listened to the show this weekend and wondered if we just didn't care.

Agree with our assessment of the price drop?  Disagree?  Either way, send us an email at newscast@nintendoworldreport.com

[AV]

No Delay ! Wow. Listening now

[LinkXLove94]

Just finished listening to the podcast. it was awesome! it kinda does make me glad i bought my 3DS at launch now lol. cant wait to see what GBA games will be in store for the end of the year

[TJ Spyke]

I thought you guys usually record Thursday night, so why was the normal edition recorded a day early?

[NWR_DrewMG]

RFN records Thursday.  Newscast records Tuesday.

[TJ Spyke]

Ah, OK.

[alegoicoe]

Remember that the gamecube had a price cut after being six months in the market, so nintendo has done this before.

[Halbred]

GC got a price cut six months in? I don't remember that at all.

[TJ Spyke]

I posted this in another thread Zach:

Nintendo dropped the price of the GameCube to $149.99 on May 21, 2002 (http://www.gamespot.com/news/2866374/e3-2002-nintendo-announces-gamecube-price-drop). This was just after the PlayStation 2 and Xbox were dropped to $199.99, which may have cause Nintendo to drop their price sooner than planned

[Sundoulos]

I remember being a little disappointed in that because I was a sucker for buying the Gamecube and the PS2 at launch.  I had to work to get a PS2 even harder than I did to get my Wii at launch. 

[Sarail]

I will definitely be purchasing a 3DS at $170 now. Easy. Got my sights set mainly on Kid Icarus and RE: Revelations, and this new price point is fantastic. $250? Not worth it at all... especially since my eyes won't allow me to see 3D at all. All I wanted was a beefed up DS anyway. Now I'm set.

[Kytim89]

With the news of Nintendo dropping the price of the 3DS, what does this entail about the chances of Nintendo releasing the Operation Rainfall titles in north America? It appears to me that Nintendo's shareholders played a hand in the 3DS price being dropped due to record money loses, so those same shareholders might force Nintendo to release these titles in their biggest market in order to make up that money.

[Ceric]

With the news of Nintendo dropping the price of the 3DS, what does this entail about the chances of Nintendo releasing the Operation Rainfall titles in north America? It appears to me that Nintendo's shareholders played a hand in the 3DS price being dropped due to record money loses, so those same shareholders might force Nintendo to release these titles in their biggest market in order to make up that money.

I don't think it means anything.  Iwata also took a 50% pay cut among other things.  This is simply to appease the Japanese Stock holders.  Plain and simple with that move.  It is way to overly aggressive to be anything else.  Nintendo was given a choice by its board but, what I don't understand is why Nintendo even needs investors before now.

This should be interesting but, I think they really should have gone with a more moderate drop and a game price drop as well.  $40 here in the US for DS length games is well... Still not to great.  Its even more everywhere else...

[oksoda]

@kytim89

Yeah, but that's the gamble. While I don't know too much about what it actually costs Nintendo to release a game here in North America (though it does seem these games have already been translated into English, so that should cut down on cost), I really believe they have no faith in those games selling. I know Operation Rainfall bestowed a lot of attention on these games and increased the awareness of them, but how many people would truthfully buy these games if they came here? I can't say that I would. Of course, that can change depending on the quality of the games and how they resonate with the community here; my purchasing of these games isn't cemented one way or the other. As much as I hate to say it, though, especially considering what an admirable job the guys behind Operation Rainfall have done, I won't fault Nintendo of America for opting not to release those games here. I certainly don't think the games, if released in America, would in any way help Nintendo recoup losses from poor 3DS sales.

[fordrob]

If I factor in the $25 credit I got from pre-ordering my 3DS on Amazon (I seriously doubt there will be any pre-order bonuses this time), the $18 I saved on taxes (technically, I suppose I need to pay these next year at tax time), and the $10 case they gave me for free,  I got my launch day 3DS at a price much closer to the discounted price than first meets the eye...plus, I still get all the free games.
 
With regard to the idea that some people plan to purchase a 3DS early and price match later on, the fact that Amazon is offering a pre-order for the discounted unit leads me to believe that retailers will catch on to this very fast and have some sort of way to prevent it.  Odds are the retailers are paying less for the discounted units too and won't be willing to eat that cost difference.  It may even be SKU-related somehow and Nintendo just might ask for the higher priced units to be returned for repackaging.  Although I'm sure some people will get away with it, I imagine some sort of exclusion will apply to price matching when it comes to the 3DS over the next two weeks...maybe not...