The Nintendo 3DS

I've been looking at the eShop a bunch recently because of the closing announcement.

One thing I kind of forgot about was the Nintendo Badge Arcane & Themes.

I have the Majora's Mask 3DS, so I bought the matching theme and played a bunch of Badge Arcade for the icons.

Around 2016/17 I was playing that pretty much everyday to get specific icons. Specifically I wanted the Twilight Princess HD item icons so that my folders could have Zelda icons.

It's kind of annoying you had to pay for them, but it's also a shame they never bought something like that to Switch. Especially since you get different background music too!

There aren't too many I'd interested in. But I did pick up the Latias/Latios theme, which I can pair with a load of Pokemon icons I already have.

Shame Nintendo obviously knew it would be popular and bundled it with another theme for 1.5 the cost of the others.

Edited by 32ndfreeze on Mar 2nd 2022 at 7:00:04 AM

"But if that happened, Melia might actually be happy. We can't have that." - Handsome Rob

In general I don't understand why they never brought themes to the Switch. Like, not even just different color options. Maybe the concept didn't make that much money for them?

I've always gotten the impression they purposefully wanted to keep the UI very basic and clean.

I wish they'd keep it as the default and add the ability to swap between the current UI and a version using themes/folders/organizing icons.

I feel like that would be the best of both worlds. That way people who just want to play games can keep the current UI, while anyone who wants to customize it a bit more can toggle it on.

---

I went on a bit of a 3DS buying spree tonight.

I've been figuring out everything I want to get physically ever since the eshop announcement went out. I had been slowly picking up titles over time. Last year I picked up copies of Kid Icarus Uprising & Fire Emblem Echoes. But I suspect this is going to cause game prices to steadily rise, especially once May comes.

I ordered a copy of Federation Force, which I put off getting for ages. Also copies of Pokemon Rumble World & Pokemon Art Academy which I got for pretty cheap and let me almost complete all the Pokemon titles. Rumble World was especially cheap I found it for half the going rate on eBay on the EB Games website.

The most expensive game I got was a UK copy of Luigi's Mansion 1. I would have preferred an AU version. But the cheapest I could see for it secondhand was 150 AUD. While a brand new UK version was only 60 AUD, pretty much the original retail price.

This did cut my list of remaining games I want physically down quite a bit. All I have left is Hey! Pikmin, Luigi's Mansion 2, Yoshi's Woolly World & Ultra Sun.

I do want a bunch of Atlus stuff too.

But all of those games are 150+ each, and I'm pretty sure I could get all my remaining list for around that price. So I'll be waiting for another Atlus sale to pick them up cheap, or passing on them if that doesn't happen.

"But if that happened, Melia might actually be happy. We can't have that." - Handsome Rob

I think the thing I want most is DQ 8 Journey of the Cursed King, but it's going to have to be the digital version because I simply can't justify the current price for it.

Yeah, that game gets about Twilight Princess on Game Cube levels of expensive.

Least for me I have the OG PS 2 version.

You know, I have to wonder why Pit is obsessed with this site. It’s gonna ruin his life!

,: You'd think it'd be easy enough to just rework the 3DS version of DQ8 for Switch by now.

Alas.

Edited by TargetmasterJoe on Mar 2nd 2022 at 11:34:01 AM

There's not even any reasonable way for me to get the other 3ds re-releases. I lucked into seeing Sentinel of the Starry Skies in a Gamestop some years ago and getting, since my "strategy" is seeing what looks interesting in the store while I'm there, but when I deliberately go looking it's when everything has jacked up in resale price to ridiculous levels.

Huh. Turns out that the 3DS is getting a new exclusive game: Fragrant Story. It's even getting a physical release (though it seems that orders outside of the US and Canada aren't a sure thing).

Switch FC code: SW-4420-1809-1805

With the cutdown of the 3DS eshop, I think I might just homebrew up one more of my handhelds.

Probably will do my New 3DS XL that seems to have an insecure cartridge slot, I can swap the micro SD card out for a 32GB one and fill it with digitally installed dumps of my cartridges or something.

The three finest things in life are to splat your enemies, drive them from their turf, and hear their lamentations as their rank falls!

Really wishing I'd grabbed a spare New 3DS when they were selling cheaply now for that purpose. Even secondhand ones cost close to the original retail price now.

---

Now that its April I should probably start buying up some Virtual Console games I want soon.

At this point I doubt there will be any last minute sales, and after May 23rd I think the chance will drop to near zero. It's a shame, but there haven't even been any discounted eShop cards since the announcement in February.

I might wait until the start of May just in case I can save a little on eShop credit.

"But if that happened, Melia might actually be happy. We can't have that." - Handsome Rob

32Gb is a lot of room for my SD card, I managed to digitally install a almost a dozen of my cartridges into it via the magic of homebrew "Install the game from the cartridge" and still have about half the disk space left. Biggest was Stella Glow, which takes up like 1.4 Gb.

The three finest things in life are to splat your enemies, drive them from their turf, and hear their lamentations as their rank falls!

Grab Strange Journey Redux, Devil Survivor Overclocked and Record Breaker, and Fire Emblem Echos. Great stories and tactical gameplay experiences.

"No will to break."

I personally think Echoes plays like garbage. It's still using NES era maps, has a ton of bullshit other than that, and the menuing just feels bad. Worst FE game I've ever played. Story's also kind of problematic due to all the low-key misogyny and nothing special besides.

Speaking of SD cards, I probably need to get a huge one for my 2DS I have yet to transfer data to so I can stuff it with games.

Edited by Karxrida on Apr 13th 2022 at 10:27:20 AM

If a tree falls in the forest and nobody remembers it, who else will you have ice cream with?

I liked Echoes :V

I got the cart for it too.

The three finest things in life are to splat your enemies, drive them from their turf, and hear their lamentations as their rank falls!

I did too. Bought the special edition and own the amiibo.

Only upon reflection did I realize that all it has going for it is presentation. And it still stumbles at points there — the crit animations and associated cut-in portraits suck.

Edited by Karxrida on Apr 13th 2022 at 10:34:34 AM

If a tree falls in the forest and nobody remembers it, who else will you have ice cream with?

...I hope you mean the crit portraits specifically and not the character art in general.

Trans rights are human rights.

Oh no, the art is great. Absolutely meant the crit portraits.

Like the 3DS games had their crit portraits go downhill after Awakening, but the Fates ones at least don't look ludicrously out of place since they're just the headshot. Full body only works when you're doing something like Fire Emblem Heroes and putting them in battle stances, not taking the key art and just slapping it on there regardless of the original pose (e.g. Mae stretching).

Edited by Karxrida on Apr 13th 2022 at 10:36:33 AM

If a tree falls in the forest and nobody remembers it, who else will you have ice cream with?

In better news, Sonic 3 Complete boots up fine in Retroarch on the 3DS :V

It's funny having S3 Complete sitting next to digitally installed copies of Sonic Mega Collection and Generations

Minecraft on the 3DS takes surprisingly little space for the core game, the digitally installed copy off my cart takes up a paltry 400ish Mb. The save files are massive though.

(played it before on the Nu 3DS, it works fine but sacrifices a lot of performance versus the Java edition running full-tilt on a desktop. Still much better than trying to fumble with touchscreen only controls on a smartphone).

Edited by AceOfScarabs on Apr 14th 2022 at 1:45:42 AM

The three finest things in life are to splat your enemies, drive them from their turf, and hear their lamentations as their rank falls!

This morning, I bought a digital copy of Devil Survivor for 3DS, with maybe an hour before an EShop sale ended. It might be my last digital purchase on this console. Maybe it's time to let the system sail into history. After all, I bought my last digital Vita game a year ago.

I bought my first 3DS after the console's price decreased. Over the last nine or ten years, it's been a mostly positive experience. Though there was always something keeping me from considering it my favorite system. Region lock. The flimsy right hinge which fell apart on my first 3DS. The circle pad that's falling apart on my second system. Only a couple of open world games and computer RPGs. Few Gameboy or Game Gear titles on Virtual Console.

Edited by dorkatlarge on Apr 17th 2022 at 7:17:25 AM

Was that sale only in the US?

I hope so because I was waiting for that to pop up here in Australia, and I'll be quite annoyed if I missed it.

Edited by 32ndfreeze on Apr 17th 2022 at 10:43:20 PM

"But if that happened, Melia might actually be happy. We can't have that." - Handsome Rob

I bought my first 3DS about two weeks before the price drop was announced

I noticed last year that the circle pad on my New (non-XL) version that I got back around 2017 is starting to get cracked and little chipped around the rim so bought a New 2DS XL and still have it in its box just in case my other one craps out since that would be a loss of ~15 years' worth of library.

I sure wish I'd thought to have done that pre-pandemic though, because it cost more than my Switch Lite did

My Megaman and MegaTen liveblogs

I keep thinking I ought to get my old one repaired. The hinge broke on it and I don't even know if I have the charging cable anymore. I did get a new one after that, which is the one I'm using now, but it'd be nice if I could get my gold Zelda themed one up and working again.

I got mine a little while after the price drop.

I got a Black regular 3DS for a pretty good deal alongside 3D Land. I really bought it because of the upcoming exclusive 3DS features for Black & White 2 though.

I later upgraded to an XL, I got one of these Yoshi themed ones because I missed the deadline to preorder the Zelda one by less than a day. For weeks I was waiting until my exams were over to make the order as a treat. But they sold out on the same day I went to make the order.

Getting the Yoshi one was pretty much entirely because I knew a limited edition would have greater resale potential later on if they brought out a new one I wanted more. Which did work out since I later sold it for the Majora's Mask New 3DS XL, which I still use.

I kind of regret selling that Yoshi one though, even though it meant I only spent about $25 on the console upgrade. The full matte finish was extremely nice to hold in my hands, and in my opinion the regular 3DS XL feels a bit better than the New XL to hold. The backplate on New X Ls feels a bit flimsy to me with it being designed to come off.

Edited by 32ndfreeze on Apr 18th 2022 at 2:24:05 AM

"But if that happened, Melia might actually be happy. We can't have that." - Handsome Rob

I have one of those hingeless "Axe Blade" 2DS variants that I bought on a lark, I've homebrewed it already and have been using it as, ah, a Virtual Console museum by stuffing it full of VC injects of classic games (with translation patches in many cases). Also managed to get the English patch of SRW W running on it (I have the original Japanese hard cartridge copy of that game, so eh).

It has a Sleep Mode toggle instead of a hinge switch, and the shoulder bumpers are nice and broad. Screen's not as big as the XL models, but it's amazingly crisp when running SNES games natively (Small text aside, Lufia II looks beautiful running on the 2DS).

One of things I want to do is see if the SNES VC injects can run the Super Metrod Zelda Combo randomizer on it natively (In hypothesis, it should work - Super Metroid and Link to the Past both work beautifully on SNES VC on the 3DS natively, and both games use different parts of the SNES memory when running in combo, plus I've seen racers on Youtube playing SMZ on Wii or Wii U VC via homebrew injects already).

The three finest things in life are to splat your enemies, drive them from their turf, and hear their lamentations as their rank falls!

I got a red Pokémon X and Y-themed 3DS XL about a month before those games came out. It served me well for a few years until the hinges came loose and the whole thing fell apart on me. I tried to fix it myself, but completely failed at it and ended up with a pile of parts. By that point, the New Nintendo 3DS XL had recently released, so I bought myself one with some birthday money. Still needed to get my old 3DS shipped off to someone on eBay to fix so I could transfer my data, but after that, I gave it to a kid at my church. I kinda irrationally miss the darn thing.