Months before I finally went to Japan I planned on getting a 3DS LL there. You know, the big one. I’m not that much of a gamer but I do enjoy to play some “weird” Japanese videogames from time to time. Especially the Persona and Yakuza series. These are probably the only games I play, at all. I always had a liking towards handhelds and with all these awesome Japanese exclusive 3DS games out there I just wanted to have one of these devices. Maybe you think why I didn’t just purchase the thing in Europe and imported some games only. Unfortunately it’s not that simpe because Nintendo thought it would be a good idea to region lock the damn thing. Thus you can only play european games on a european system and vice versa with a Japanese one.
On our second day in Tokyo I pressured my girlfriend to go and buy a 3DS with me. If I want something, it’s urgent. We went to the big Tsutaya bookstore right at the Shibuya crossing. There they sell videogames in the basement and this was the location where I finally bought my white 3DS LL. The thing has a nice little feature called SpotPass. When you activate it, you can communicate with other people who are carrying their 3DS around with them. And there are lots and lots of 3Ds owners walking around in Tokyo. When you first start the thing you can create yourself a little Mii character which gets transferred along with the game you are currently playing to all the people you meet with a 3DS in their pockets. And there were two games which nearly everyone seemed to play: The ultra addictive Animal Crossing and the also ultra addictive Monster Hunter. I don’t know how many girls I had seen, walking around with their 3DS playing the new Animal Crossing game, working their virtual butts off just to pay the in-game debt for their new home. Yeah, sounds a bit crazy, right?
Seems like fun, I thought and bought both these games, hoping my Japanese would profit while playing them. Not that great of an idea, I noticed later on. Animal Crossing with all this cutesy stuff going on is just not my type of game. I feel rather silly collecting apples and shells to sell them to the local virtual store for some easy money. I much rather like to go hunting, collecting some berries, beetles and bearskins on my dangerous quests. Sounds better, I think.
The new game of the franchise will be released in late September in Japan and I’m currently thinking about getting my pre-order in early this time. Even if the game looks rather shitty on the 3DS and without a second stick to move the camera around it’s rather clumsy. Fuck it, I just want to play Monster Hunter 4 on release say. Or at least have it shipped on release day.
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