Topic: Lost 3DS with digital purchases....any options?

I have three 3DS systems in the family (two 3DS XL and one 2DS).

My main 3DS with the most digital content (including my only copy of Animal Crossing) has gone missing for several weeks and I can't remember for the life of me where it may be.

This main console has the same NNID linked to it as my main Wii U console. The other 2 consoles I linked other NNID and paid the credit card fee to register a minor.

Has anyone dealt with this type of situation before? Is there anyway that Nintendo will give me my digital content back on one of my other 3DS systems? I am willing to wipe one and link my NNID associated with the purchases to get my content back.

I figured this was a better place to get a quick answer than dealing with Nintendo's telephone system.

Call Nintendo. That is all the advice I can give you

So sometimes the feel like helping and sometimes they don't?

OR

You have no clue whether they help or not?

I hear Nintendo is willing to help in these types of situations, make sure to have as much information as you can for the system. I don't see why they wouldn't help you.

Nintendo has a pretty good rep with customer service when you call them. As long as you're not completely lacking in information on your device and associated accounts it's a pretty good chance they'll help you out.

Calling Nintendo is really the only thing you can do as far as I know.

There's nothing we can do for you anyway. You have to call Nintendo regardless of "quick answers"

Sounds like I got my quick answers

Get as much info as possible and call and they will probably help me out.

So I have the box of my missing system so I should have the serial number. I will wipe the 2DS since it has no digital content and transfer the 3DS XL to the 2DS. Then I will have a fresh 3DS XL where I can call and explain the situation and hopefully get this taken care of. I googled this situation and found some info where people had to file a police report so hopefully that is not the case.

I will get all my ducks in a line before calling and report back with my customer service experience.

The only time you need a police report is if your 3DS was stolen. In your case I am not sure what they can do for a lost system but it wouldn't hurt calling them with as much information as you can give them to help them speed up any process. Out of curiosity does the other 3DS or 2DS have the lost 3DS as a friend if so you can see when the last time it was on and if that's the case then you will know if it was stolen.

I lost my original 3DS last year and nintendo wouldnt replace my digital content once I bought a new system. my brother was told the same also when he lost his machine.

unbelievable that nintendo can get away with this. just give us proper accounts already so we can easily recover are digital purchases.

Thanks kobashi,

that is what I am afraid of, that they won't do it unless I can prove the 3DS was stolen. I don't think it was, I simply can't find the dang thing (and it has my brand new smash cart in it too :-/

My 3ds was stolen about 2 yrs ago, I had a police report and everything, after numerous phone calls I got nothing back from them except the ambassador games, I ended up having to claim on insurance for the digital downloads, luckily I didn't have that many at the time maybe 7 or 8. I found them to be generally very unhelpful, I still had the box with the serial number, the purchase receipt and anything they asked for I had, they just weren't interested. (Nintendo UK)

So I was able to get my digital content back.

I am not sure if they required all this information but they asked and I provided

1) The serial number of the missing DS
2) The NNID
3) The club nintendo account associated
4) A list of games that were digitally on the system, not exhaustive but enough that it verified that I was the owner of the missing system
5) The serial number of the system I currently had

I had tried to do it myself first and formatted the 3DS and tried to link my NNID to it but it wouldn't let me since it was already linked to another system. After my phone call I got an email about 24 hours later that basically told me to do it again but this time the NNID was able to link to the system. It automatically associated my club nintendo and then let me redownload all my games again.

Since others had no luck I am guessing that saying your system was stolen may be the magic word for them to allow recovery.

Oh man. I lost my 3DS on Christmas Eve (and was also stolen because I know where I lost it and it wasn't there when I went back) and I'm getting my 'new' 3DS today (have to pick it up at the post office). Looking at these posts it looks like Nintendo doesn't always help people in getting their digital games back. Eek!! blaisedinsd, did you say your 3DS was lost or stolen? Maybe one of them's the 'magic' word to get them to help you.

This is why digital purchases are a huge risk until Nintendo actually update their account system.

YAY! I just got off the phone with Nintendo and he sent in request. I should get email in 5-7 bus days. He didn't ask me what games I had bought. Just the NNID username, the CN username, both serial numbers, and last 4 digits of my CC. I thought I'd have to wait hours since the New 3DS XL just came out but I got a rep in less than five minutes!! I'm happy. Now to wait for that email.

That's cool

Yeah they did ask if I knew the last 4 digits of the credit card but I didn't because I believe the card I had previously used was expired

I got reply back from Nintendo today!! All my games are back!!! I'm so happy! Now I have an issue! My old SD card has a bunch of games on it, but since they were linked to the stolen 3DS, they are totally unusable on the new one and I can't delete anything because they don't show up at all in Data Management!! How do I delete them? On the laptop it's showing a ton of files. I dunno what's what! I have no room at all to DL anything else! Help?