Nintendo 3DS sells out and hacked on Japan launch

Mike Bantick
Tuesday, 01 March 2011 08:40

Your IT - Entertainment

Nintendo's new hand-held gaming system, the 3DS sports a bigger screen that features 3D images without the need of special glasses.  The system launched in Japan yesterday and has already sold out and been hacked so that it will play pirated games.

It can sometimes be a tech company orchestration on day one of a new gaming system going on sale.  The public expects the hype of a new piece of hardware to generate such frenzy that consumers will buy all stock as soon as possible.

This has led to some companies managing a day-one 'out-of-stock' situation, just to keep the hype levels high, therefore making the new device even more desirable, increasing subsequent sales.

The Nintendo 3DS seems to have captured the tech-hearts of many around the globe, and yesterday went on sale in the Nintendo heartland of Japan.

Nintendo supplied 400,000 units for day one of the launch, with a further 1.1 million 3DS's due to be shipped at a time 'not too far off'.

On the launch day, some larger department stores reported queues of up to 750 people long, whilst other smaller stores had stock available, with no queues visible.  However people got hold of their 3DS, the official word was 'sold-out' at the end of day one.

Despite some debate over the cost of the 3DS itself (retailing for 25,000 yen in Japan) as well as an extra premium on 3D enabled software, it seems consumers are seeing enough of a difference between this new DS hand-held gaming system, and the capabilities of the increasing smart-phone market.

And then there are hacking opportunities - See PAGE 2