Five Days with the 3DS

"I want to get a 3DS for Ocarina of time " She says, as she smiled at me. My current girlfriend is a hardcore Zelda fan. That's just one of the things that has impressed me about her. It was only later on that i realized that she had been playing Ocarina hardcore for years and had scoured all of hyrule and it's outer provinces for every single secret, but I'm getting ahead of myself. This is about her interest in getting a 3DS, and how it ultimately brought me back out of my gaming slump.





So our story starts about two weeks before Christmas. I had been completely stumped about what to get her for christmas, and to be honest I really wanted to know what in the world she was getting me, because according to what i heard form other people and how she vaguely described it, it sounded like she was giving me the holy grail. I on the other hand wanted to play the thoughtful route; Get her a scanner like she had always wanted, so she could post her artwork online like she has always wanted. However, after talking to other females about that, I realized that might be considered too practical and not really something to get someone for Christmas (really it's the thought that counts, but still). We had both promised that we were going to keep our gifts simple and below fifty dollars, but once she stated that her goal was to get a 3DS to play Ocarina and Kingdom Hearts, and a nook tablet for her bibliophile needs, I knew that I should get her either. Granted, I took the cheap route and got her a 3DS used from Gamers (That way I could keep the cost low enough so she wouldn't yell at me ).

I took the 3DS home, and began my long task of configuring it to her liking. I knew about all the Zelda anniversary swag, and downloaded the free Four Sword Adventures game,as well as Pokedex 3D if she were to ever get Black or White. It took a bit more time Creating her default Mii (which i seem to be really good at), updated her system to the latest update, and set up her internet. After spending so much time fiddling around with the darn thing, I quickly began to realize that I wanted one for myself as well.

Christmas Eve came, and I finally revealed my present ( played it smartly). I got her a sailor moon tee from hot topic and placed a copy of samurai warrior chronicles - a series she's also very much into - underneath it (I like to refer to this as the "triple bait and switch"). she was happy because she wanted the shirt, but was disappointed that i got her the 3DS game, because she had no handheld to play it on. "well" I told her, as I slipped behind her. "I guess, you could always play it on this.." I slipped the shiny blue handheld out of my pocket and handed it to her. She smiled and said "ah you got a DS?" as i chuckled to myself a bit. A quick lean and whisper into her ear did the trick. "babe" I said, "it's yours". She squealed in delight as i showed her everything i downloaded, which came in digitized wrapped packages. one of Nintendo's brilliant ideas that worked clearly to my advantage. In the days that followed, she bought Ocarina of time 3D, Kingdom hearts, Recoded, and  Lego Batman. I on the other hand took the money my family gave me for Christmas, and decided that I wanted to get one of my own so we can play together. So technically I told you that story to tell you this one.

 The following is a recount of how my first week went.

DAY ONE

The day before my birthday I realized that I was going to get a 3DS, so I had cashed the money order I received from my folks, and headed into the electronics department with girlfriend and roomate in tow. My Roomate, Rye who had wanted to get a DS himself, decided that now was as good a time as any to get one. He wound up getting a red one, while i got a cobalt black one. We spent at least an hour in the parking lot of our apartment complex fiddling around with the settings and adjusting them to our liking. Used the camera option to create my mi, and it looks nothing like me. I decided to keep it as my default, anyway. S&Gs i guess.

Afterwards, I spent a half hour on the phone with my gf, trying to walk her through internet connection to her router. I went through the browser, bookmarking my local haunts. GoNintendo, Digg, and all the places where i search for news to usually blog about. This is a nifty little device. Downloaded Four Swords while I played a little skyward Sword to pass the time. Took out the AR cards and fiddled with them for a bit, and while the games were entertaining. I didn't really see much interest in it. In the end, the cards have been sitting on my bedroom television ever since.

Later that night I took it to work with me and was building the pedometer so i can stockpile coins and possibly street pass a few people, hopefully some customers in the store so i can build up my plaza.


DAY TWO

Spent my birthday with good friends, and a certain loved one. We spotpassed eachother and played a bit of find mii, which i actually enjoy playing. Once she found my NES, SNES and 64 it was all over. Woke up later and found that i got some video updates on the 3DS video service channel (Really sucks that there seems to be no flash on the handheld so Youtube vids are out, but I figure that's to keep security up and keep the Mario flash games away). Had two more friend over that night and showed them the handheld's capabilities. One of my friends pointed out that they couldn't handle the 3D for too long. It's a similar conversation I had with one of he clerks at gamers, and pretty much settled on the notion that turning the slider down will fix that. I was aware of the 3D being jarring after a while, and that was just one of the many draws to the system so i usually keep the slider at varying degrees depending on how much i want. It's actually really good that this was included at the discretion of the consumer.

DAY THREE

Taking up another late night, i decided to try the connectivity feature between the Wii and the 3DS using the download play feature. I played the Rhythm Heaven, and Sonic Color demos, and actually enjoyed playing both. I spent a few days looking over games that i might be interested in like Rhythm Thief and the Emperor's treasure, and of course Kid Icarus. I really needed to get a copy of Starfox 64 as well.

Had to go to the next town over to help Rye move the rest of his things ino the apartment. By the end of all, we wound up stopping at McDonalds for a mocha frap, and i had wound up trying out the Nintendo zone feature. Downloaded a few 3D images and checked out the trivia feature for Mario Kart 7.

Later that night I came across the Neo Gaf list of QR codes for Miis and found a crapton of awesome.

DAY FOUR

Now that he's finally moved in I had a chance to check out some of the DS games that i missed out on. I played a bit of Professor Layton and the Curious Villiage, and liked it despite some of the puzzles being completely out of my league at my current level of experience. between that and playing Lost magic, which I thought was just a lession on pain and suffering, I had now tasted what it was like to play DS games, and I definitely wanted more.


DAY FIVE

I find myself now spending a lot more time in Electronics looking over DS games that I would potentially play. Interested in Dragon QUest IX, Thor, and a couple titles in the e shop. made my first pass through Find Mii, and got the regal crown. I rather be wearing samus' helmet, though.

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It's been approximately three weeks since and I've been busy. Bought the latest issue of Nintendo Power and found all sorts of DSiware and Virtual Console games to play. I bought a points card and have since bought two VC games - Mario Land 2: Six golden coins, Link's Awakening DX, and the Castlevania-ish Soul of Darkness. Will review them at a later time. I also managed to register my 3DS and a few games with club Nintendo and got Majora's Mask for Wii and The first Kirby's Adventure from the eshop. Just this last week I've bought the Legend of Starfy, which is a bit simple for a platformer, but pretty entertaining. By the time of this post I also purchased Disgaea and Legend of Kage 2, Kage 2 is awesome, and very much an entertaining platformer. I'm eagerly awaiting starting Disgaea since this will be the first time i've ever laid hands on the series.

To be honest, I knew that purchasing the system right off the bat was going to be a bad idea, Mostly, because of the lack of games at the start. Though, I really wanted BlazBlue and Street Fighter, I knew the games everyone else wanted were Nintendo's main series. As things are right now with the holiday season now ending, there are a metric tonne of things that I'm interested in getting. A lot of those things are just in the DSiware store alone. At this point I know that I have a lot of games to catch up on, and I want to just jump into this thing with both feet.