You'd Better Get a Bigger Micro-SDHC Card for Xenoblade Chronicles 3D

Compared to the Wii version which was about 8 gigs, this is a huge difference in size.

I am absolutely downloading this as I have a 32GB. I've been going all digital and I love it-- all my games right when I want them.

Buying the game card of course. I have 120k blocks left on my card and MH4 is the biggest title I have on it.

@CrazyMetroid

Textures are all lower resolution, which will save a lot of space.

A bigger card you say? I will need a bigger 3DS

You made me think it was going to be in the 10GB area with the title. That's still around one tenth-ish of a 32GB card, even less so if you got a 64GB card to work in there....

I was planning on downloading this as I did just upgrade but if I keep dl'ing games that big I'll be in a 128 gig far too soon. I may just go retail even if I have 233,000 blocks left on my 64 gig.

Oh and Resident Evil Revelation and Bravely Default aren't quite that big. Unless KI:U is that big then it is the biggest game on the system. BD is around 26,000 and RE:R about 24,000.

1) Gosh, that's big...

2) I'll be getting a bigger SD Card [32GB], anyways.

3) I buy physical copies.

getting my copy the physical way. I never played the original so this way I can trade it in if I don't like it. I doubt that will happen but you never know, so I'd rather be on the safe side.

I'll just get a physical copy then

I'm getting a physical copy. As nice as it is to have all your games ready to go at system startup, I prefer to save my SD card space for the digital-only games.

The 2GB that came with my 3DS has only just started to get get near full (bought it not too long after launch), and even then, I have two demos that are about 1.5k blocks or more that'll be removed in due time. The 4 GB that comes with N3DS will probably last me until the next handheld.

@Mus1cLov3r LOL! Thank you for that! to quote the end of an old Johnny Carson skit, "what are the three main responses to this article..."

Well there goes my hopes of a special xenoblade new 3ds bundle ... 😐

Better add that official 512GB SDXC support sometime soon, Nintendo, because if this is what we can expect, we'll probably be using them anyway.

@Platypus101 You're welcome? O.0

this is why I just buy the game cards, can play on any 3DS (in this case it'll be any New 3DS) and it leaves more than enough rune for the other shovelware you buy... though it does kind of baffle me that the only true incentive to buy the New 3DS involves you spending even more money (after buying the charger) to buy the bigger SD card for those who only buy digital.

I already own the Wii version, so I'll be skipping this game, but I'm still really glad that I got a 32GB card ready for when I buy my New 3DS in a couple days.

Oh yeah, and

4) I use up most of my space with music.

Get physicall or get nothing?
They can give us 8 GB card in new 3ds or this is not even a joke.
There is no problem to buy bigger card but still left some confusion.

I cant wait any longer

im so in love with this game its not even funny

That's about the same as Bravely Default's download size.

There are too many negatives to buying digitally.

No doubt about it, this is the biggest 3DS game to date.

@SanderEvers That's exactly what I was going to say.

I always buy boxes with carts inside, when the option presents itself.

I only buy digital for games like MK7, SSB and Luigi's Mansion. Games with online play are worth keeping on the 3DS.

RPGs are better on cartridge, once completed you rarely want to keep it on the system.

Buying physical version anyway. BTW, Is there anything pre loaded on 4GB mSD that comes with the N3DS? (NA version)

@CrazyMetroid I'd say they had to downgrade some of the textures and sound quality, likely to reduce the cost of the cartridge. It's still rather amazing how they shrunk a dual-layer disc onto a tiny cartridge. Remember the N64 and how its bulkier cartridges could barely reach 64MB max? Fascinating how technology marches on.

holy..
this might be awhile for me get then i thought.
edit: actually might go with cart version instead, but man thats huge.

Imagine downloading this at midnight. You might be able to get the physical copy sooner.

@VrginX I don't think that the sd card has anything on it out of the box. I think when you start the setup process with the sd card in the N3DS it puts the system files onto it.

@Spoony_Tech
Is there a lot of steps to get a 3DS to use a larger than 32GB card?

That's it? I was expecting this to be the first 3DS game to require a card bigger than 4 GB. Compared to the orignal, which was apparently 6 GB or so, 3.6 GB is not much.

Just looking at some recent Nintendo games, 3 to 4 GB is not too much for an extensive open-world RPG. For reference, Bravely Default, Metal Gear Solid 3D, Super Mario Galaxy Resident Evil: Revelations, and Pikmin 3 were all in this range.

Fire Emblem: Awakening, Super Mario 3D World, Kid Icarus: Uprising, Wind Waker HD, Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate, NSMBU, Pokemon X/Y, Shin Megami Tensei 4, Twilight Princess, and Theatrhythm: Curtain Call are all less than half the size of this 3DSmake.

@SetupDisk It's not that hard at all. Here's a very good list I used perfectly.

http://lofi-gaming.org.uk/blog/2013/10/25/updated-how-to-upgrade-your-3ds-sd-card-to-64gb-and-beyond/

I'm passing on this game, with MH4U, XCX, Zelda U, and the other games I'm getting this year I'll be quite busy playing all of them.
Xenoblade Chronicles X being nearly 23GB in size is ridiculously big(if it's avaliable on the eShop good luck to those that are buying it digitially).
MH4U is probably going to be the only title I'll have digitally. Can't stand waiting for half and hour to an hour downloading a game. Having digital titles at your disposal is very convenient but call me old fashion since I'd rather swap out the physical cards. VC titles I'll get as they only take a minute or two to download due to their small size.

The original release remains my favourite game of the last generation. Would like to buy this just to own it but I fear if I wait for a price drop it may go out of stock first.

Either way, definitely will go physical. Tends to be cheaper and I just like having something tangible in my hands. Kinda feels like it's got value (even though it's the data inside that's the real value).

That and shelves of games gives me more satisfaction than a hard drive.

Nothing my 32GB can't handle. Ive got a ton of games on there already want still have around 150k blocks open.

I would love to download it, but my 32GB SD-card is full..............
why couldnt it support 64GB? (Btw, I have tried to format it to FAT 32 a.s.o, but there are certain data that wont be transfered and I dont know why......)

Until New 3DS had itself a portable hard drive, I ain't downloading no retail titles on it. For now I'll go with the physical copy.

@Slionr Check my link a few posts up. Do exactly like it says. If that doesn't work then ask a question in his comments. It so happen my wasn't working either and it was my sd card that sucked. Got a new one and it works perfectly.

I'm getting a cartridge so it doesn't matter to me. Part of the gaming experience is having physical boxes on my shelf I look at and hold. Amazon had a 32GB Sandisk micro SD card with an adapter for $12 during their Black Friday sale and I couldn't pass that up. I'm going to pick up a New 3DS XL as soon as my housemate pays me for his half of the bills. If I can find one that is.

@Spoony_Tech
64gb card huh... I was under the impression the 3DS wouldn't recognize anything above 32gb? Can you confirm otherwise? Cause if so I'm gonna say screw this 32gb I just bought and go grab a 64gb, heck even a 128gb. Well, maybe not that large. I'd never fill it in a million years

EDIT: Oops, just saw the link you posted. Never mind

I was under the impression that this game was going to be a digital-only release for the New 3DS. Everyone seems to anticipate getting the hard copy version (I have hard copies of some games and digital versions of others, so I could go either way), so I assume I was wrong about that? Will Nintendo make enough physical versions for everyone in the west who wants one? The limited release of the Wii game was part of the reason so few played it the first time around.

@JaxonH Just to clarify I have just over 30 gigs used up on my 64 gig and still have 233,000 blocks left. That's about another 30 gigs or so. It works great and I'm glad I got stuck into getting a new 64 gig as this one was really fast.

Oh and if you go Amazon stick with SanDisk or Samsung. I went with the cheaper Fox and it didn't work. Piece of junk at least for what I needed it to do.

Oh and I picked up my New 64gig from Radio Shack. They have a sale right now and it cost 40$ but with the added speed it was totally worth it to have day one instead of waiting for shipping.

I'm determined to make this post as long as possible lol. One last thing, I figured by the time I fill this 64 gig up the 128 gigs will come down in price so definitely stick with that. 35$ to 40$ right now for 64 gigs and about no less then 100$ for a 128gig.

@earthboundlink I believe they will allow more retailers to sell it this time around as before it was a GameStop exclusive here in the States. I believe they did that because they were stupid in thinking not that many people wanted it. But like always and as of late I would highly recommend pre-ordering it as it might be hard to find. Why release more copies then systems that can play it and right now that sits at about 200,000 in NA. I think most retailers will only get a few copies because of this. We may see 20,000 copies only so plan ahead.

I don't have a N3DS XL, and I already have Xenoblade Chronicles on the Wii. That's two strikes against my not caring about the file size.

@Spoony_Tech Thanks for the heads up. I don't usually do pre-orders, so I might just bite the bullet and get a bigger micro SD and do the download version.

I definitely want to play this, since I missed it on Wii the first time around, and I'm down for a good Nintendo-made JRPG. Haven't played one of those in a while. Indeed, there actually aren't very many of them.

@CrazyMetroid Wii version was about 5GB, most of the second layer was empty. Heck, it WAS single layer in Japan.

Was a little short on Friday to buy a 32GB microSD card, but I one up next month. I will be picking this up off of the eShop not as soon as it comes out. Going to wait for my birthday which is April 24th.

@Spoony_Tech i dont think they were that stupid

JRPG games without FF or Pokemon in its name arent that popular here on the west.

I dont think anybody expected this game to have such a following

@Spoony_Tech I actually tried that, but maybe I should ask ;O might be my card, wouldnt be suprised
Thanks though!^^

I have a 64gb card so I'm good. So excited for this.

when upgrading,The transfer process when going through the pc was only a 30 minute or less ..and I was switching from a 32sd to 32micro SD... really painless..I'm going with the physical. On wiiu I prefer digital . But I have butt loads of space with a 1 tb hard drive..

I buy physical. I don't trust Nintendo's digital systems for the big AAA games. Who knows where their eShop will be in 5-10 years. If I own the game physically I can keep playing it on my console without having to worry about the future ownership.

@Spoony_Tech
Great stuff, thanks!

I don't care. I prefer to have actual games disc/cart over download on full retail games. I have plenty of download, but I also have 3 3ds' now and it's nice that anyone can use the games. 2 kids and myself, I picked up my new 3ds last fri along with Mh4 and mm.

I honestly don't know why you'd want to wait for something this huge to download.

...I saw 22GB and thought that was it, lol.

Article incredibly misleading. You don't have to download the whole game, just get the cart. I'm sure the save file isn't that big.

Kid Icarus: Uprising = 12,904 blocks
Resident Evil: Revelaitons = 25,793
Donkey Kong Country: Returns = 17,665

What are the other big games?

@jjmesa16 that's exactly what I was going to say.

@No-longer-postin Bravely Default and Monster Hunter 4U is 21,000

@Spoony_Tech Thanks for posting the 64GB info for everybody. I'm using a 64GB sd card right now (luckily it's a micro so I can use it with New 3Ds XL) and it isn't even close to full so.

I wish Nintendo would say that you can use a 64GB sd card as FAT32 but I'm guessing they won't because it requires extra software to do the reformatting.

Anyone know if you can use a 128GB sd card for the 3DS (reformatting it to FAT32 of course)?

128gb works on the old 3DS, format it like you would the 64gb.

For me, neither the 64, nor 128 worked in my =NEW= 3DS
I had to go out and get a 32...

I even formatted them properly...

@jjmesa16 As long as it's formatted right you can use any size you want. Problem is they really don't make them bigger then 128 gigs atm. Not micro anyways. You can find a couple but I'm not paying 300$.

@No-longer-postin I'm sticking with SanDisk as I went from a 32 gig sdhc to a 64 gig no problem. My other 64 gig wouldn't work.

Well I definitely won't be downloading, because who in their right mind downloads retail games. Especially games that will undoubtedly be worth 2x as much in a few short years. ESPECIALLY given Nintendo's beyond archaic account system. But then again, some people just like simple convenience and don't mind paying more for less...

@McGruber

I don't really think a person's state of mind has anything to do with downloading a game. More for less? You have the game, you play it. The end. If someone is even interested in trying to sell something they wouldn't be downloading. Some people like to not have to deal with cartridges, and really couldn't care less about having a physical copy.

Yeah, i can finally start using my 64gb memory card. Smash Bros. took up the rest of my 32 gb.

Will have a 32gb in from day one as need to when transferring my existing 3ds. Will also be downloading xenoblade on day one. Both formats

That's not too bad. Reading the article I thought it'd be 5 Gb or something

Bundle please?

@Spoony_Tech There's no way I would buy a 128GB card. I was just wondering if you could format it.

Btw the Sandisk Ultra is $99 at Best Buy! I'm still not getting it.

Only 3.6 GB? The original Wii game is 7.9 GB. I guess that's the result of all those compressed textures. I sure do hope they don't compress the audio or cut the Japanese voice track.

Buying physical anyways.

@jjmesa16 If I had gift card or something I would so get one. That's about 1,000,000 blocks!

@sweetiepiejonus

Didn't Nintendo say the New 3DS only goes up to 32gb cards?

A lot of people are seriously downplaying this. This is one of, if not THE biggest 3DS games in terms of file size. Most Vita games don't even reach 3.6 gigs, even on the more powerful hardware. Uncharted Golden Abyss, which pushed the Vita to its limits and is still the most visually impressive game for the system, was about 3.3 GB. And meanwhile everyone is just like, "Meh, I was expecting at least twice as much." Honestly, this is a huge game. Sure, the title of the article is sort of exaggerating a bit, but IT'S A BIG GAME nonetheless.

How big is MH4 on the 3DS to download ?

@Quorthon

Yeah but that's without a workaround. You just have to reformat it. It only takes a minute and works perfectly.

I have about 60,000 blocks open on my 32 gb sd card so I should be okay with this. I'm also gonna download the new Fire Emblem at some point so I hope I don't end up using up all of my space before the end of the system's life!

Looks like we don't have a choice! Man that is a large file size for a 3DS game.

@danielsahr528 Yeah I will buy certain games digitally if that's the only way they're available but for retail, I go physical. If I lose a few eShop titles down the road because they're not available to redownload at least I'd still have the AAA retail titles to play and those are the most important to me.

@No-longer-postin : New Style Boutique (aka Style Savvy: Trendsetters) was about 13,000 blocks.

@nacho_chicken It is not half the size. The Japanese Wii release of Xenoblade barely fits on a single layer DVD (which this one is a bit smaller than but not by a great deal). To have both Japanese and English audio the western releases are a dual layer disc.

Of course pre-order download sizes have been terribly wrong in the past (remember 2.1 GB SSB 3DS yet it was only 1.2 GB when the game came out?)

Pointless title. If you are still using a 4GB card then obviously you aren't a digital consumer.

@TerrapinJess as opposed to restricted access if they're on carts?

@martinskrtel37 haha no, what I am saying is that I don't have to worry about bringing my game case with all my carts in it when I go out. All my games are with me at all times. It sucks not being able to have the option to trade in in the future but the trade-off for me is worth it. I am still mad however that kingdom hearts 3D is not available for download! Pros and cons to both!

If this was the vita we were talking about it would suck but micro sd cards are fairly inexpensive these days so it shouldn't be a problem

Won't be downloading this. Hard copy all the way!

For Wii U I just have a 32gb USB stick I had lying around like a permanent blue tongue sticking out of my black Wii U, & that's still not really enough for Xenoblade X so prolly gettin that on disc. For 3DS I had a 32gb SDHC card in my old 3DS XL so to do system transfer to New 3DS I got a (really fast Samsung 90mb/s) 32gb micro-SDHC card, so, gamestop didn't need my old card for trade-in so I have that lying around doing nothing productive, so, I can just stick that into the Wii U for another 32gb, I think it has a port for it not sure, I'm not at home so can't check now, but if it can I'm sure there are a lot of ppl out there that can do the same if they knew.

Just get physical....problem solved.

@TerrapinJess I've been going all physical and I love it-- all my games right when I want them.

And if I don't want them anymore (because some of them suck) I can sell them.

I truly pity anyone who goes all digital. There's no advantages, just disadvantages. You're literally screwing yourself over.

@snoox I may be wrong but I'm pretty sure the SD card slot on Wii U is only for Wii mode.

@ReigningSemtex Yeah, Sony failed miserably with the Vita. All it would have taken is micro SD cards instead of the $100 for 32GB exclusive nonsense they did and people probably would have bought the Vita and it wouldn't be dead today.

I have a 1.5tb drive connected my white Wii U, I aint skeered.

Still deciding on which "New" 3DS I want.. toss up between Fire Emblem, Monster Hunter and Majora's Mask..... no matter what though, I'm pretty sure I'll be fine if I stick a 64gb microsd card in it (already have a 32gb micro sd card on hand, but why not go bigger)

i hope nintendo is releasing this on the wiiu virtual console cause i really want to play this game but i don't want to buy a new console for one game casue i already own a 3ds 2011 model

@Slionr I've heard reports from several youtuber's that a 64GB microSD card will work fine in the new 3DS.

@nacho_chicken I've heard that the Japanese voice track is gone in this version, replaced by an English track.

@Spoony_Tech Just thought I'd let you know that Sandisk just released a 200GB microsd card. It costs a measly $400.

@jjmesa16 Quick, where do I get one lol. NOT!