NSMBDLC...Hah?

[SyracuvatTenlii]

A few days ago, New Super Mario Brothers 2 was released for the Nintendo 3DS. I've played NSMB for the DS, so it follows that I've basically already played this game, but here's something for you: What if I wanted it again? In the end, I'd probably be enticed to purchase the new release for the 3DS, because I personally am a very...progressive, let's call it...gamer. While graphics don't necessarily make the game for me, the little shing sparkle sparkle of a new title usually grabs my attention.

At the time I'm writing this, I probably wouldn't be able to convince my parents to let me drive to the nearest Gamestop and pick up a new copy, but now apparently I don't even have to.

New Super Mario Brothers 2 is the first complete Nintendo release that can actually be downloaded in its entirety. There are some benefits to doing this, like having the option to play it with another game in it, and also no cartridge to maintain, and wouldn't THAT have been convenient for my Pokemon Diamond cart...
You can furthermore, if I'm not mistaken, delete the game from your 3DS without worry of it disappearing forever if you want to conserve space. When you want to play it again, just take another x amount of time to redownload it, and you've got yourself a game. With the memory being stored on an SD card, you don't even have to worry about needing to start it all over. Not to mention the added benefits. Nintendo is encouraging gamers further to download the game rather than purchase a hard copy by offering extra rewards on Club Nintendo for it.

So, what are the cons? The risks? ...Um...I have no idea, honestly. I've heard people complaining that this is a bad idea, but I don't see one. Nintendo probably wouldn't have gone through with an idea like THIS without having assurance for it. Every problem I can think of with downloading this game is refuted by some sort of assurance that I know Nintendo provides. We download games on Steam without a problem, so why would this be?

Well...that's the question: Are there potential issues with Nintendo offering to sell their games through downloads? Do they look like they might sometime completely switch to downloadable games and make physical copies a thing of the past? Does this affect what Nintendo will be like in 5 years?

[Shade]

One issue is that not everyone can get games from the Nintendo Store. If they got rid of physical copies altogether, that would leave those of us without access to broadband out of luck. Remember what happened with the PSP Go. It flopped for a reason.

From the latest poll, only 70% of Americans have access to high-speed internet. Going completely to games that can only be obtained through a digital store would give the other 30% no way to get the games for the game system. Maybe when an interplanetary high-speed network is established, but right now going all digital may be convenient, but it would also cut too much into their profits.

[NismoZ]

Personally I've never liked the idea of full downloadable games on consoles, because with them, storage is such a hassle. However with the 3DS, it sounds like it'd work pretty damn well. Since a game is, like, a few hundred megabytes each, you can store several of them on one SD card, and then when it's full you just buy another one. It works as a sort of condensed game library, really.

[ThePokeMan]

I've always had one full-on issue with this idea: and that's storage. I don't care if you can delete the game to save space, the 2 GB SD card you get with a 3DS can't really put up well with a full, 1st party, cartridge-based game. In my opinion, it's really quite convenient that Nintendo chose one of their lightest 3DS titles to be fully downloadable, as I've heard that it's quite a small game. If you wanted to get a bigger, more full game (such as Kid Icarus: Uprising), that would take up an immense amount of space on your SD card, possibly more than double what NSMB2 would. Deleting the game on your SD card to save space is a decent idea, but it has a fatal flaw. If I get the urge to play a game that I've deleted, going onto the eShop and waiting a half-hour for it to download on my modest Internet connection is a major turnoff. I also have one final problem with this. The main audience of Nintendo games are children and teenagers. Most of that population don't really have a credit card to wave around and get eShop points on in their house, so the only way to get points is to go to the electronics section of a store and buy a points card there. Now, to my knowledge, these games retail for the same price as they do in the stores. So, why, while you're at the store getting a card, wouldn't you cut that portion out of the process and simply buy the game on a cartridge?

That's my mini-rant/opinion on the matter.

[Ditto616]

From a marketing standpoint, it's a pretty good idea. Although I'm sure that the carts are cheap and easy to produce, it still cuts down on production costs. I don't believe that Nintendo will switch to purely digital anytime soon, but I wouldn't be surprised if they offered more incentives to push toward it. I doubt that they'll go this route with the Wii U for full games, but I don't think I'd be too surprised to see it happen.

[Cat333Pokémon]

I certainly find it acceptable that Nintendo has moved forward into offering its games for digital download. It saves manufacturing costs on producing cartridges, and many people do prefer downloading to going to the store. Of course, there are those of us (like me) who strongly prefer physical copies because they retain value and are less restrictive than DRM-locked downloaded content.




Now, when I first saw the thread title, I thought you were referring to the downloadable level packs. While it may seem to most of you that this is quite a new field for Nintendo to be entering and as controversial as other companies offering map packs for their video games, Nintendo actually has provided purchasable content for a long time. A primary example is this:


For some time, Nintendo had a device known as the e-Reader that allowed you to scan cards and introduce new content to various video games, or in some cases, mini-games playable on the e-Reader itself. It was billed as an accessory designed for this purpose, but in practice, the device flopped in the United States. It didn't even get a release in Europe, while it thrived in Japan for a little while longer.

The cards that I posted above represent the complete American set of e-Reader cards for Super Mario Advance 4: Super Mario Bros. 3, comprising two pack-in cards, five Wal-Mart exclusive cards, and two booster packs (containing the same cards in each series-marked package, so no worries about duplicates). (To this date, the Wal-Mart cards are quite rare.) In Japan, there were additional booster sets not released in America. There were three types of cards: item cards, level cards, and demo cards. The item cards added the scanned item to your inventory (as many times as you wanted) or adjusted the game world, and the demo cards played short game movies showing tips and tricks, similar to the demo videos in New Super Mario Bros. Wii. Then there were the level cards, which allowed you to download a complete, playable level to your game's "World-e." This all happened in 2004, before DLC became popular.

Why did it flop, though? Well, it was very expensive. It required owning two Game Boy Advance systems (GBA, GBA SP, GB Micro, or GB Player), a Game Link Cable (special one required for GB Micro), an e-Reader, a copy of SMA4: SMB3, and the necessary cards. That's nearly $300 of hardware! Assuming you already have one GBA and SMA4: SMB3 and wish to obtain the "DLC," you would need to spend about $160 more to install it. It worked best when you had a friend with a GBA, but the e-Reader itself retailed for $40 dollars, a steep price for a card scanner with limited use.

So yeah, consider yourselves lucky that you only have to pay a few dollars for downloadable levels in New SMB 2. It was much more expensive before.

Also, if anyone has any Japanese SMA4 e-Reader cards they're willing to part with, please drop me a PM.

[Arceus is Epic]

I think that the idea as a whole is a great idea, so long as they make a cartridge/disc release as well. This way, the people without internet access can get it in cartridge form while people with internet can get either/both.

[Quadcentruo]

Having the option of purchasing the full game via download is rather convenient in case you lack the extra time to drive out to a store, but when a game is download-only, it becomes a bit tedious to purchase, especially for people like me who don't have their own credit card or any sort of way to purchase things over the internet easily. There's also the people with little-to-no wi-fi access which makes it that much harder for people to obtain a game if it's download-only.

With today's technology not being easily available everywhere, downloading a full game should be another option available rather than the only way to obtain a game. Maybe in the future, where people having wi-fi access at that time is more common than people having cell phones at this time, having games be download-only might not be a completely bad idea... as long as we don't make machines do literally everything that isn't breathing or keeping vital signs stable on normal days for us.