That's pretty crappy if the people who opt for a digital copy have to wait that much longer after the game's released to get it.
I know the regular Thursday eShop update is usually in the early hours of the morning here but I was hoping that it might be a bit different for a retail download on a Friday.

Of course I'm in NA but from what I can tell 3rd parties haven't got the midnight treatment like Nintendo gives the first party games. I've had to wait till the normal shop updates on any day the game is suppose to release. My main reason for this post though is I've heard the file size is Hugh and almost 14k With my experience at downloads that for me anyways is over a two hour download. Castlevaina was an hour and 25mins for me and I know people that were waiting even longer then that to get it and it was somewhere in the 11k range!

I guess the worst case scenario is that it goes up in the early hours of Saturday morning, takes a couple of hours to download and I would have it by somewhere between 3-5am... that'd give me a good 5-7 hours to get started before I head into the city to play with friends.

I sure hope that its available at midnight. The average time for downloading WiiU games have been around 6 to 8 hours for me, with the install time only being around 20 minutes or so. It would be great to get the game downloading while I'm off sleeping.

@RoryLee This game might be the exception but somehow I doubt it. I'm pretty sure I won't be playing it till around 2pm eastern time!

Heh, I have a way to avoid all that. Retail.

When it comes to retail games, they're up at midnight. I've bought a few digitally before, so yeah. (Paper Mario and NSMB2) I think they're uploaded into the eShop last Thursday, and you just can't access the download until the 19th hits.

Good to know.
Hopefully it'll be like that with the European eShop this week so I'll be able to download it Friday afternoon rather than waiting till Saturday.

Like I said in an earlier post that's first party only. Castlevaina and Etrian Odyssey didn't hit till next day at noon. Trust me I was up at midnight and they didn't show!

Sorry to ask this question if it has been asked and answered before, but has there been any info on if the NA version will be able to play online? Or will I only be able to play online with the Wii U version?

At this time I don't think they said anything about it happening over here yet. In Japan and I think Europe but I don't think they have even announced the cpp for the Xl over here yet!

It doesn't really matter though because I believe you're getting both versions and you can't play both online at the same time anyways.

Yeah I am getting both versions it just that until the off tv game play patch comes out in April I will probably be playing this game mostly on my 3DS, due to the fact that my Wii U is hooked up to the main tv, along with the Xbox, Blu Ray player, satellite etc. Yeah you can see where the problem will be.

@Tasuki At least it's not a long wait till the patch.
So glad they're adding off TV play to the Wii U version, it was really necessary.

Oh, I guess its up to the developers/publishers themselves...?

I could imagine trying to play this on the original 3DS would be a painful torture on the eyes and hands.

@Erica_Hartmann I'm not sure if they have a choice or not. I'm sure they could request that it happens. As big as a release as Monster Hunter is though I wouldn't be totally surprised to see it hit at midnight. I'm still checking either way.

I've watched someone play the Japanese game on a regular 3DS before... it actually looks quite fine.

Yeah but you haven't tried it for a extended period of time mate check-out 6:00 of video comparison.

@MadAussieBloke I just watched it and I don't see what the problem is with playing for extended period of times.
Is it the whole digging into your hands thing?
Because if so, I've played many games on my 3DS for extended periods of time without issues, and if you're playing Monster Hunter without a Circle Pad Pro then you're doing it wrong.

Yeah you're right mate... Probably wouldn't be playing for very long because the battery will die after 20 minutes