Gadgetory

despite being a little over seven years old Nintendo is continuing to heavily push the 3ds family of systems ever since we've got a revision back in 2017 with the new 2d s XL we haven't seen more and more new colors and limited run specialization systems like this one right here the Animal Crossing 2d s XL which just came out in Europe and Japan for fans of the system and for the series this is a cool little collectible system right here but it raises the question that you know seven years having been out and with a new very successful system out a year ago the Nintendo switch you have to start to wonder why is Nintendo still pushing these released back in 2011 the original 3ds was Nintendo's newest entry and they're very successful line of handheld systems and was based very heavily on its predecessor the original DS it had the same clamshell design and much of the same button layout as the esses but there was a few major things that really set it apart first it of course had much more powerful hardware enabling it to have way better visuals than the DSP capable of it had the addition of a circle pad alongside the d-pad which gave kind of an analog stick format that would work with the clamshell design and offer a little more control than previous systems had and of course the namesake was the addition of glasses-free stereoscopic 3d which was kind of the main gimmick and at least thought to be the selling point of the system it wasn't the initial release of the 3ds was one of Nintendo's worst launches at least until the Wii U happened a few years later mainly due to the fact that while 3d was kind of a cool idea it wasn't enough to justify two people spending two hundred and fifty dollars on a brand new handheld which at first glance looked very similar to a system that was already out as a result of this Nintendo had to take some pretty heavy measures to try and correct course very quickly resulting in a price cut very early on its lifecycle bringing it down to $170 and rewarding people who've adopted it early by giving away some free GBA and and 16 o GBA and SNES nes okay these price cuts along with finally getting some huge hits on the system as well as some revisions later like the larger more comfortable Excel and the much cheaper to D s led to the system finally think it's tried in 2013 and 2014 was hitting some crazy peak sales and if ur since then it's been slowly falling off which is natural as the system's lifespan goes on as time went on Nintendo has done a few little things to try and keep giving more and more life to the system like I said we had those first two revisions with the excel in the two TS and later on that you've introduced the new 3ds and 3ds XL which featured more powerful hardware that would support a few more games that were just a little too intense for the original line to handle as the floors eventually led to last year's revision the 2d s XL now well Nintendo turned things around at the 3d s was doing a lot better they did run into a new problem which is probably one of the most infamous things they've done now the Wii U the Wii U was the biggest flop in Nintendo history which has thankfully already been addressed and fixed with the release of the switch which is a huge success one of the most successful console in years but it's been so successful that it kind of brings up the question of since it is a handheld and portable of sorts why does Nintendo need to keep releasing 3d asses and what's interesting about that logic and thought is that if you look at the sales of the 3ds since the switch came out the first full years the switch had 3ds sales were barely impacted at all they did go down a little bit but not nearly as much as you might think and a large reason for that is this guy right here the new 2d S when it was first announced last year and released after the switch it was met with a lot of confusion because Nintendo's having this initial success with a brand new system and something they should be focusing on but at the same time they go oh by the way we also have the fifth version of this handheld that's been out for six years now and most of you already own one but here it is again and so there's a lot of skepticism about why they would do that and whether or not it was a good idea and time has actually shown that yeah it kind of actually was the right call because yes while the two DSL is the sixth version of a system and they'd already sold really well there's a couple things that were just right about its timing because this was kind of the fine-tuned combination of all the things that were good about their other versions the new 3ds a new 3d excel were the nicest versions of the line but they were pretty expensive especially when compared to the switch I mean you have this new system for $300 why not to spend the extra little money to get the new hot thing and at the same time they did have the original 2d s but that guy had a lot of problems going on because it was a great cheap option to get for kids but it had the smaller screens it didn't have the clamshell design and while it was arguably the most comfortable of the 3ds designs it was also the ugliest so not exactly a great selling point for a lot of people so the new 2d s excel was a way of bringing that all together you're getting the clamshell design you're getting the comfort and the larger screens of the new 3ds but at the same time you're getting the cheaper lower price point by removing the 3d that honestly this point everyone knew no one was using this made the new 2d s excel a great entry point to a large library of fantastic games and while the switch was doing really well an important thing to specify about how well it was doing was that it was bringing a lot of people back into gaming and so when you had the successful system you go hey we had this other one that does all these awesome games if you already played one Zelda and you want to get more grab one of these for half the price and complete library not only that but anyone who already owned an older version of 3ds was now much more tempted to actually upgrade to the new design because it was so much more affordable and still featured the benefits of greater comfort and larger screens but the one thing that's really been topping all of this off and this comes back to this guy right here is that Nintendo has really been hitting the mark when it comes to special edition designs this isn't to say that innocent Oh hasn't done good special editions before but when you look at the whole 3ds line and what kind of limited editions they've done there's been some hits there's been some misses its overall been fine but ever since the 2d s excel has come out they've just been on complete fire when it comes to color choices themes execution just all the different details they've been working on they were making cooler and cooler looking systems and they've only been growing even more look I love the Polka ball - yes I love the Highland shield one that just came out but the animal crossing one has been getting even more little attention to detail because I'm not a huge fan of Animal Crossing but this is an awesome looking little system and one new thing they've done with this they haven't done with the others is even on the back part of the system they've added more little customization bits where this is matching the theme of animal crossing which is awesome for anyone who's a fan of the franchise this combination of the switch bringing in new fans the 2d SXL being the most refined system and all these awesome special editions has made the 2d s still sell really well this last year regardless the fact there hasn't really been any games it's just people wanting to buy cool-looking systems or tapping into this giant library they've never had before so yeah Nintendo still making these DS's and you might kind of wonder why but it's been working