NINTENDO 3DS

That definitely covers most of it but also, if you've got any affection at all for pokemon or animal crossing, X/Y and New Leaf are both near perfect renditions of their respective series.

Picross 3D 2 came out in Japan late last year so there's a decent chance that'll get a western release at some point too, if you're tempted to actually spend money on pokemon picross it's probably worth waiting for that instead.

pokemon x|y definitely near the top of my list as well, gonna pass on the remakes tho bc i have played them (altho i guess if you've played one you've played em all)

Yeah I've got a similar no remakes rule with pokemon.

the 3D Picross games didn't seem to me as good as the 2D ones

I love them (or at least, the one I've been able to play so far), the logic's maybe a little simpler but they're really pleasingly tactile, I just really enjoy rotating the block and chipping away at it until you've got a recognisable little object left. Picross 3D is to sculpture as Rock Band is to music. Think I placed the original first in my P+C ballot the year it came out.

BTW if anyone's thinking about picking up Fire Emblem Fates, I gotta repeat what I've been hearing around since I bought it: pick up Birthright. You can buy the other paths as DLC, and Birthright is the easiest/most straightforward path. I'm playing Conquest now, it's tough, and I know I'll get pretty bored when I go back and do Birthright second because it's more remedial.

instead of throwing my N3DS out the window, i just bit the bullet and got some of these for my thumb http://i.imgur.com/UzddGs7.jpg

nub no longer slips but my girlfriend makes fun of me so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

like your thumb doesn't stay in plae on the analog stick? have u tried gluing a lil sand on there? (i haven't, but i reckon it would work)

my hands get a little sweaty when im playing and the nub doesn't grip at all.. didn't think of the sand thing, was thinking about sandpaper and some others, but i decided on the baby condoms, might try one of those rubber thimbles for a less disposable solution

Four words: RHYTHM HEAVEN MEGAMIX 3DS

(also: Monster Hunter Generations - good localized title for the new 3DS MH. My MH friends playing the JP version say it's possibly the freshest MH yet)

super excited about MHX, thought that there was no way it was coming over. Also Dragon Quest 7 in the summer! That Metroid game still looks shitty tho.

I bought a 3DS grip and while I feel somewhat silly playing what appears to be a batarang in public it's worth it simply because of how much more comfortable the system is to hold & use with a grip in the mix. make sure you get one that will fit your system; not all grips are created equal

+1 for Rhythm Heaven Compilation; people on SA who imported it said there's a story you have to slog through, but I have faith that they'll do the localization proud. also stoked for SNES VC games to be released, particularly Earthbound and LTTP which I believe I get for cheaper since I had already bought both on Wii U? who knows. the idea of having to continue to buy these old ROMs is infuriating and insulting but I will keep doing it if only to signal to Nintendo that they should definitely keep cranking out ports like this; we might even get Mario RPG.

in other news, HNNNNNG: http://www.polygon.com/2016/3/3/11158320/super-famicom-nintendo-3ds-limited-edition

I'm perfectly happy with my New XL, but every time I see those colored XYBA buttons I get a burning urge to get one of those. that's a piece of consumer electronics with hellacious visual appeal. apparently the non-XL is only available as part of bundles so I'd have to get ANOTHER 3DS and go through the whole system transfer rigamarole. but damn some of these faceplates look nice as fuck; I really like the one made of wood (even if it costs $50 - although at least that's not as bad as the glow-in-the-dark Boo one which goes for $200ish).

Yeah part of the reason I went for the n3ds non-xl was those colored buttons. It's just too good a look.

More hardware-locked virtual console is a bit eeeh, but also yes, I will buy those SNES games for my n3DS. I hope / think the NX will be a shift in terms of logical account sharing across systems and also cross-buy handheld/console.

requiring the New 3DS for those SNES roms is suuuuuuuch bullshit.

Yeah I've seen a bunch of people trying to convince themselves that it's justified because the emulation needs the extra CPU, but when the first gen 3DS was handling GBA emulation just fine that's clearly bollocks.

i had a 3dsxl but downsized to a new 3ds when they came out pretty much solely for the snes-style buttons like a total fuckin' dork

never regretted it tho

To be fair the first gen was running the GBA games natively the same way they run DS games natively, they boot up in a different mode. Emulation is a lot more CPU intensive. The lack of crossbuy is however utterly laughable in 2016, and the pricing of these games is crazy. £8.99 for a 20+ year old ROM?!?

nintendo's cross-buy policy is insane

You'd probably pay more for the carts on ebay to be fair... after a few shitty years i wouldn't blame them for not glutting the market
with ultra cheap fantastic older games that will fill up peoples consoles in place of newer premium ones that they have more reason to sell

To be fair the first gen was running the GBA games natively the same way they run DS games natively, they boot up in a different mode.

Couldn't they just do that for the SNES games too though? I mean even if that locks out your streetpasses while you're playing or whatever. I'm sure people with older hardware would rather put up with that than feel they're being encouraged to buy a whole new machine just to play pilotwings in 2016.

No, the 3DS contains a DS chipset which incorporates a GBA chipset, so when GBA games are played they are run natively using a GBA hardware chip. There is no SNES hardware chip in the 3DS so they can't be run natively, they would need to be emulated by the 3DS CPU. Presumably the OG 3DS CPU is not powerful enough to run SNES emulation.

Pocket Card Jockey is legit, one of those perfect "just one more" portable games.
It's a solitaire horse racing hybrid, where you race horses around a track by playing games of simplified solitaire to a time limit. Yes really.
If you lose too many races your horse gets sent to the farm and you try again with a different horse. Horses at the farm can be paired off to breed the next generation of horses, inheriting characteristics of their parents.
The presentation is simple but cute, reminds me of the Rhythm Heaven games in its flat cartooniness.
Oh yeh and it's made by the Pokemon people, there's a lengthy free demo available. Try it!

Every single time I leave my 3DS alone for more than 5 mins, the next time I pick it back up my bf has slid the 3d and volume sliders up to max :(

nothing worse as a 32 year old than opening my 3DS on a bus having left the volume up and the Donkey Kong theme then making a loud monkey noise for all to hear

the volume and 3d sliders seem to go up pretty much every time i put down the machine, i think it's just really easy to slide them when holding it closed? i've gotten good at checking both before opening it at this point

agreed re: Pocket Card Jockey; I've been getting absolutely destroyed ever since I had to give up the horse I got for the first race, but it's still incredibly compelling. also they let you name the horses, meaning I can finally attempt to restage the 1974 Kentucky Derby.

BTW there's a current Humble Bundle with 3DS/Wii U games in it for anyone interested:
https://www.humblebundle.com/friends-of-nintendo-3ds-wiiu
In for Rhythm Thief

Pocket Card Jockey is something

i just realized yesterday when i friend told me, but earthbound is out on this now. i am going to finally beat earthbound this time. (i borrowed the cart twice in my life, and never finished it...)

I got excited when that came out, then realised you need a 'New' 3DS system to play the SNES VC games.

whole bunch of 3ds news worth bringing up:

- stoked for the imminent release of the DQ7 remake (even though it apparently requires you to go through an eight-step process every time you want to save), but nowhere near as stoked as I am for Natsume's port of River City Tokyo Rumble. naturally that one isn't available for preorder for some unfathomable reason, though.

- played a whole bunch of the crossword puzzle game on a train ride up to SF recently; it really is quite excellent, even though its handwriting recognition is kind of questionable at times (although then again so is my handwriting).

- I also plan on picking up Rhythm Heaven Megamix (which apparently has been out for months and I just never realized it) and Picross 3DS in the very near future.

- I guess the real big news is the recent expansions to the Streetpass games, which I am beginning to love all-encompassingly. the new games are all pretty great, as is the ability to get more puzzle pieces from StreetPass folks and bank up to 100 StreetPass instances at a time. I really ought to start taking my 3DS with me whenever I go out walking around the neighborhood if only to rack up connections.

also super stoked for DQ7 which hopefully turns up in the post tomorrow.Have been playing 3D Outrun quite a bit as it was on sale last week, a perfect pick up and play game and the 3D really enhances the game imo.

streets of rage 2 for £2 this week = SO GOOD

God, this is even more depressing than the Vita thread

Man, I am totally being suckered into buying River City: Tokyo Rumble now for that stupid keychain. If I can find it in stock anywhere...

um, is that a River City Ransom redo?

Full blown sequel as I've heard :)

man i bought a first gen 3ds and quit playing as it hurt my delicate little hands but that might make me bust it back out

The lack of hand comfort is one of the excuses I give myself for barely having touched the system

Never had any comfort issues, can play for hours at a time. Maybe I've got weird hands tho.
DQ7 is a total treat if you like old school JRPGs, love the way you visit an island in the past, solve a problem and then visit it in the present to see how it changed - not all happy endings either.

1st gen system is very boxy and has sharp edges, they promptly rounded off and made it more grabbable for the update

Even the XL I have still feels like you're grasping a slippery cigarette case

physical copies of River City Tokyo Rumble sold out in less than an hour, although it appears that fart-huffing ebay flippers bought a statistically significant number of copies. luckily I managed to get my order in during that brief window (although they're pressing a second run, complete w/ the Kunio keychain that came with initial copies); it showed up today so I haven't gotten to sink my teeth into it yet. unfortunately no co-op mode, though.

in other news, a game I've been playing a bunch lately is Gotta Protectors:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rHv0TbTUG4s

Tokyo Rumble is the shit, it's basically a Yakuza game drenched in 8/16-bit charm. hopefully the demand is sufficient to convince Natsume to bring other Kunio games stateside; there's already a 3DS collection in Japan compiling basically everything as well as romhack translations of a few titles (although not the basketball game, unfortunately) that they could use as a reference:

http://nintendoeverything.com/kunio-kun-nekketsu-complete-famicom-compilation-coming-to-3ds/

thanks for making my decision easier! i can' tell from the list, but i hope the samurai version is in that comp

I hadn't even heard of the samurai Kunio, but from what I understand the collection is pretty comprehensive so if it came out on NES it should be on there

ok i checked and it IS on there. man i hope this comes out here

to the great surprise of nobody, Kirby: Planet Robobot is pretty great. I'm only a couple of worlds in, but so far it's at least as good as Triple Deluxe (which also rules).

From a few years back: http://www.usgamer.net/articles/the-emergent-heartbreak-of-tomodachi-life#

I played through the demo for Miitopia (the Tomodachi Life RPG) in one sitting; that game appears to be extremely my shit.