Yesterday, Nintendo announced that the North American markets would finally receive the new and improved (Revamped) Nintendo 3DS and that it would hit the stores on February 13th, 2015. Great, fantastic, we’re only getting it a few months after japan vs an entire year so I can appreciate that. However something didn’t sit right, something was amiss.
Oh yeah, that’s right… there’s no damned AC adapter bundled with the unit. Sure not having a game is typical, but no AC adapter? I really hope that everyone who picks this thing up reads the box or if they picked it up at a Gamestop that the sales person lets them know that an adapter is needed. Otherwise there’s going to be a lot of pissed off people.
Kinda of bizarre and unheard of in this day and age, right? Yeah I thought so as did a few other sites, including IGN who reached out to Nintendo for an official response to the omission of the adapter.
Nintendo’s response to the matter?
Nintendo responded to our request for comment on why it was decided to leave the charger out of the box. According to Nintendo, it was a measure designed to save costs for consumers who may already own a 3DS or DSi system. According to Nintendo, “New Nintendo 3DS XL uses the same AC adapter as any Nintendo 3DS or Nintendo DSi system. Rather than raise cost of New Nintendo 3DS XL by charging consumers for a component they may already own, we are giving them the option to only buy if they need an AC adapter.”
Well it seems very “political correct” but in my eyes it screams “cheap”. Think about for a moment and let’s play devil’s advocate. There are two situations where this thought process is ass backwards and if you really think about it there are actually more than two. But for this example we’ll leave it to two.
- You don’t already own a Nintendo 3DS and are now forced to buy an adapter for your unit. I hope that you some more money set aside for the additional $9 (YMMV) you’ll have to spend for the adapter. That is if they didn’t sell out of them.
- You are going to trade in your existing 3DS, in which you have to include your adapter that you already own, other wise you won’t be able to trade it in or if they do let you trade it in without, you’ll be out of some money.
In either situation you lose out and have to shell out some money, so I can’t understand Nintendo’s thought process here at all. Sure this may be common for our fellow gamers and technology lovers on the other side of the world but this is unheard of in the North American market. C’mon Nintendo, you’re no stranger to this. You know darn well that different markets have different strategies and while I feel this is clearly a bone-head decision, it won’t stop any of those new 3ds’s from flying off the shelves. I’m proof of this as I was able to snag a Majora’s Mask edition of the system.
TLDR; It was a silly decision, it’s not a deal breaker, the Majora’s Mask version selling out is an example. Pick it up if you want one, get an adapter and have fun.
Still it doesn’t make the decision to not include the adapter any sillier in my book. What about you? We’d like to know.
Sources: IGN
