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Second Coming of the DS Lite
DS News writes "Gamespot has posted news that the release of the Enamel Navy and Ice Blue has been just as much a sell-out success as the White DS Lite event a week ago. From the article: 'Following last week's launch of the Crystal While DS Lite, Nintendo Co, Ltd. shipped its Ice Blue and Enamel Navy models today in Japan. Considering that the handheld has already made one debut, the industry wasn't expecting the same high turnout for these new models. But contrary to conventional wisdom, the machine's second launch drew even more demand than the first.'" As with the White launch, Kotaku has a man on the ground with impressions from the Japanese launch day.
Given the popularity of the DS and PSP in Japan (check the hardware sales, they're both on top), and also how Japanese gamers go ga-ga over new colors and such with hardware, I think we'll see some interesting things in the future. Now if they'd only start selling the Lite in the US!
My interpretation of the huge interest in the DS Lite is that the claims about how the size of the Xbox and Xbox 360 are a major factor in the horrible sales of those systems in Japan are true. If people really go this crazy over a smaller version of an old system - twice - then size really must be critical over there. I guess it might not be a question of xenophobia after all...
Try out fish, the friendly interactive shell.
IGN has a much better write up, with better photos: http://ds.ign.com/articles/695/695157p1.html
To my knowledge, Japanese people are techno-nuts (more so for the young adult/teen age group.) You hear about all kinds of crazy (and cool) doo-dads from Japan selling like hotcakes. Cell phones that play entire movies, sunglasses that play movies, the 64DD...
But I digress. Because those who live within the cities of Japan do not have nearly the reliance on automobiles (and, hence, gas) that we do in America, they tend to have more cash to throw around (especially the age group mentioned earlier.) So, while they do pay more for housing, they aren't as frugal about getting the latest and greatest, especially if all their friends have it now.
Apple has proven, both here and there, that sexy sells. Nintendo has taken this concept to heart to try and enhance its image; we've all seen images of the I-could-be-a-monolith black Revolution console. Small form factor, sleek, and now with the option to be put on its side. They reproduced this with the DS Lite- even if you already have a DS, it's now the old DS, and you aren't cool if you don't have the new DS. This would explain the massive turnout, even when the original DS sold so many.
Which is not to say that it won't sell like hotcakes once it hits stateside. You will, however, have a lot less people who are looking to replace their old DS for the new one. While image is a big factor in our society, it focuses more on fashion and status than technology and intelligence, so the DS Lite isn't going to be as big of a deal. (Though I suppose some female gamers might pick one up to compliment their purse or something.
Of course, this is just how I understand things. Feel free to jump in with a counter-point.
The DS has consistently been a runaway hit for a really long time in Japan-- it's been the best-selling video game system there for many months. It is no surprise at all the DS Lite has done well, and only a tiny surprise it has done this well.
The question is, how will the DS Lite do when it is released in America? The DS is popular here, but not that popular, there are fewer DS games here than in Japan and the games have been less successful. Will Nintendo find a way to make the DS Lite catch on in some kind of special way with the American public, or will it just sell extra briskly for two weeks after which point retailers will go back to forgetting the DS exists so they can try to push more overpriced UMD movies?
...Considering that the handheld has already made one debut, the industry wasn't expecting the same high turnout for these new models. But contrary to conventional wisdom, the machine's second launch drew even more demand than the first...
Why is it a big surprise? There were thousands of people left without one last week, and even lik-sang couldn't get any for export to the US. A big line up for the blue DS Lites is not surprising at all for me. I don't consider myself an insider by any stretch of the imagination, but even I knew this one was coming.
AirSpeak - http://itunes.com/apps/AirSpeak
I'd probably be more interested in this whole shebang if I didn't JUST get a bloody normal DS a month or two ago. And even that was stalling for a better deal. "Hey, I want to get hold of a DS and Mario Kart DS", I said to a friend. "Well, wait a month or two, they're releasing a package deal with the system and the game", he tells me.
My question is, is there going to be any sort of trade-in deal? That might be kind of tricky, of course, given each DS seems to have an ID on it which WFC games and friend codes are bound to (the specific game and the specific console are treated as a single "unit", the instructions say). But I know I'm not dropping another however-many dollars on another iteration of a console I JUST got done buying a bit ago.
Demanding constant attention will only lead to attention.
There really is a good reason Japan has such a thing for smaller products, and it's a relatively simple one: they don't have much room to put things...
The average-size American apartment is the average-size family residence in Japan. Japan is a small country with a LOT of people, and there isn't room for everyone to have houses, so most people live in skyscraper-tall apartment buildings. A family of three or four living in a relatively small apartment? You can see why the size of the things they buy might matter.
So the size of the Xbox's to them is ridculous, and it really doesn't surprise me a whole lot how much they reject that (of course it has just as much to do with the fact it's American). On the other hand, look at something like the Revolution. OMG, talk about Japan's dream console. That design alone I think is going to make the Revolution sell millions.
So really, size DOES matter in Japan, a lot more than many people think...
See, this is my biggest problem with the way consoles are going. Although Nintendo is the worst for this, they are by no means the only ones, and it is spilling over into other industries. I remember the days when a new product announcement would come months ahead of time, and the old units were heavily discounted. Now everything from Gameboys to iPods seem to be announced the week before they hit shelves, and the old units only drop in price when those new ones arrive, leaving people who bought them earlier high and dry. This is not even mentioning how bad I feel for people who know very little about this stuff because immoral or incompetent sales people at big box chains ussually neglect to tell them about these new models even when they know about them, and brush aside the new models with excuses in order to push out old stock.
I like to kill your couch. HE DIED HARD! MOO.
How much ($ per title) are DS games in your corner of the world folks?
When the GBA SP came out EB Games had a deal for an old GBA + 2 games got you 40 or 50 bucks off the SP. Not sure if that is the kind of deal you are looking for. Doesn't sound like a great deal to me, but to someone else, maybe.
OK, despite winning a Nintendo DS (non-lite) at a conference last month, and finding it quite fun, I am in no way a gamer.
I have to ask though, is the release of this unit with no change other than the colour of the plastic case really noteworthy or even interesting?
Three Squirrels
"My question is, is there going to be any sort of trade-in deal? That might be kind of tricky, of course, given each DS seems to have an ID on it which WFC games and friend codes are bound to (the specific game and the specific console are treated as a single "unit", the instructions say). But I know I'm not dropping another however-many dollars on another iteration of a console I JUST got done buying a bit ago. "
Places like GameStop will let you trade in your DS for store credit. You could then put it towards a DS-lite.
Honestly, though, I'm not sure there's any real big reason to upgrade. I mean, I personally want to because I want the better screens, but I'm not sure I want to dump $50+ on it. The original DS is still a fine piece of hardware.
You could do what I did, though: When the GBA SP came out, I had the original GBA and I wasn't keen on having both in the house. So what I did was I bought the SP, then gave the GBA to my mom with a couple of games I knew she'd like. I know it sounds like a silly rationalization, but it sure made my mom's day.
P.S. for Slashdot coders: It's really annoying when I reply to a post and I get an error saying that the subject line is too long even though I didn't modify it.
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
There's always a whiner out there that complains that he's not getting the latest and greatest thing because he bought it one/five/ten/thirty/ninety days before the announcement of something new.
Boo hoo.
The REASON they don't tell you in advance is *because* they want to sell the existing product before they start putting the new stuff on the market. Do you think it makes sense for them to cannibalize the existing market? Does the existence of the DS Lite make the original DS any worse of a product than it was without the DS Lite out there? No. You're just annoyed because you had bad luck. This is the same mentality, IMHO, that leads to people getting judgments of hundreds of millions of dollars because they slipped on a puddle outside a grocery store. Nobody owes you anything and your existing DS works perfectly fine. Personally, I like the button layout of the original better. I wish the sound problem didn't exist, but hey - I'm happy with it.
In Japan, the original DS sold out nationwide right around Christmas and never had any significant shipments after that. You basically had a 2-3 month span where it was really hard to find a DS. I don't think anyone got cheated there. If you had to have one for Christmas, you got one. If not, you're getting the better one.
When Nintendo announced the Japanese release of the DS Lite about a month ago, they also announced that the US would be getting it in late spring. Even if the DS Lite comes out in early May like rumored, that's still 3 months notice. Considering all games will work on both systems, I think that's pretty reasonable.
> How much ($ per title) are DS games in your corner of the world folks?
DS Games are free in Soviet Amerika, but you have to line up for days to get them, comrade.
You can get them in any color you want, so long as they're Bush Red.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Your WFC games should also have the option of transferring your friend code to a new DS. =)
But hey, I mean, the DS has been out for almost 2 years now. The redesign has come a little earlier than the redesign of any other Nintendo handheld, but every Nintendo handheld (except the Game Boy Colour), has had a redesign in its lifetime to make it smaller, brighter, longer lasting. I would have guessed it would come out about 6 months to a year later than it did... but it's here anyway. I am thinking that Nintendo pushed it out the door early because of the PSP people saying how ugly the DS was. They wanted to fix that, before the DS got too entrenched.
And besides, the DS in Japan is just insane. You can sell a used DS to a store for more than it cost when it was brand new, and they will resell it for about double what it originally cost. Nintendo is obviously trying to increase production even further by making a second model.
Yes, darn evil companies that dare to create updated versions of what they are selling. Especially car manufacturers! My God, they are the evilest of the evilestest. Car companies are probably run by Satan himself, that's how evil they are for updating their product lines!
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