Nintendo has ended production of the New Nintendo 3DS in Japan, which is a huge first step in what will be a very slow, and very gradual phasing out of one of the best (and best-selling) handhelds of all time. This, according to a notice on its official Japanese website (via Gematsu). The New Nintendo 3DS is the smaller model (not the XL) which has an entire line of face-plates that you can purchase and swap out.
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Don’t worry, though. You’ll still be able to get your 3DS fix; there’s no need to rush out to the nearest store in fear of missing out on the the 3DS’s incredible catalog. Nintendo is continuing to produce the New Nintendo 3DS XL, the New Nintendo 2DS XL (its newest model), and the New Nintendo 2DS. As you can see, the XL models have been more popular with most consumers, especially in the West, and now the only truly compact 3DS solution you’ll have at your disposal is the Nintendo 2DS, which doesn’t fold up. That’s not to say that the XL models won’t fit in your pocket — they will — but they are more bulky and heavier than the standard New Nintendo 3DS, which I would say is the perfect size.
So what does this mean for you, and what does it mean for Nintendo?
What this means for you.
If you already own a New Nintendo 3DS, hold on to that sucker. When Nintendo eventually phases these out in North America as well, they’re going to become extremely valuable. No doubt as I write this article, and with every breath you take, scalpers and collectors around the world are hearing about this and the price of third-party sellers’ New Nintendo 3DSes is about to start climbing.
Last holiday season you couldn’t find the New Nintendo 3DS anywhere. It was one of the hottest items, and even though the base system has been around since 2011, it sold better in 2016 than it did in 2015. Demand for this handheld has stayed strong, and now it’s about to go through the roof.
This is especially true because the New Nintendo 3DS, unlike its XL counterpart, has an enormous line of custom face-plates that you can buy and swap out at-will. The market for these face-plates is already red hot, with rare face-plates showing up online for over a hundred dollars when they typically cost $10-20 at retail.
If you plan on ever owning a New Nintendo 3DS, which I highly recommend because it’s a perfectly sized handheld with a world-class library of games, I suggest you find one now. But what about Nintendo? What’s its next move?
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What this means for Nintendo.
When the Nintendo Switch was originally announced and we finally saw that the system was a handheld / home console hybrid, there were whispers about the death of the 3DS. Surely the Switch was meant to be a replacement, right? Apparently not. Nintendo boldly claimed that it would be fully supporting the 3DS until at least 2018, and so far we’ve seen that Nintendo wasn’t bluffing.
Miitopia, Metroid: Samus Returns, Hey! Pikmin, Sushi Striker, Ever Oasis… There have been many recent releases and recent announcements to keep 3DS owners happy, and I’d wager that we’ll even see some newer games going into Q2 of 2018.
That being said, the 3DS is clearly, eventually, on the way out. That’s common sense, right? The system is going on six years old now, and Nintendo’s latest console doubles as a handheld. I’d be shocked if we didn’t see a smaller, cheaper Nintendo Switch some time in the next two years, and with that, the Nintendo 3DS will officially be obsolete. It will always have an incredible library of games worth playing, but Nintendo is beginning to move on. Phasing out this individual model in Japan is only the beginning, and it won’t be the end. Nintendo is looking forward.
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