Download Sales Continue to Increase to New Highs for Nintendo

If only they'd have given us a hard drive in the Wii U, then I'd have actually downloaded games for it.

As it stands though, I've spent loads of money on the 3DS eShop over the years. Mostly on sales as I still think their pricing is way too high.

Digital only for me. If they start having better sales a bit more frequently I'd be buying lots more I think.

Wait, really? The StreetPass Mii Plaza DLC is in 5th? Granted, I live in an area where nobody ever streetpasses, but I didn't know it was that big in other regions.

If hey give a decent harddrive in the next console, they'll probably see even better numbers. Not many people want to pay and extra $50-$100 for a bigger drive... even more so when they could buy the others systems for that price with the better space and the support.

@ikki5
I think if they would have done that the price would have been $125 higher.

For a long time I didn't need an external harddrive because Nintendo isn't in this "We need 2 GB day one patches" frenzy yet.

Shop * Pay * Download * Play

eShop is amazing, the layout on both devices and the features: great.

I don't download much from Nintendo’s eShop because firstly I prefer physical copies of my games, secondly I really hate the shop designs they use though to be fair neither Sony or Microsoft have a good one either, and finally Nintendo really overcharges for their games in the UK with really very little in terms of actual sales.

@Moon not only didn't they include an internal hard drive, using an external one requires TWO usb ports. the gamecube adapter also requires two because of the same lack of power provided. that's all slots gone.

Suckers

@Moon Buy an external hard drive,problem solved

@Jamotello how many USB slots do you need?

@sandman89 i'd say one more for the usb lan adater, and one more for the wii pro controller. the need for two slots for the external drive however is more of an issue because y-cables aren't readily available here and none of the new external drives available have them.

Ninteodo's new business model - 1 game, 40 amiibo for it, and $100 worth of DLC.

@Jamotello I'm with you man. I had to go online to get a Y-cable. no local retailer has one. Even the mom and pop electronic stores didn't have em. I went looking for a week before i gave up and bought it off amazon.

I would go fully digital only if Nintendo introduced a family account that allowed sharing games between family members. Digital downloads suck in that regard.

eShop is a lot better than it was at the beggining. It has been improved and now I like to use it, more than half o my games are digital and may are indies. Nintendo, you must evolve!!!

I don't get why people complain that Nintendo games are expensive even when going to VC. I just don't get it at all......

@sandman89 he doesn't need to buy one ... when he bought the system for 350$ at launch like me ... 8GB/32GB is a shame !!!! ... new generation starts 500gb min

In the UK Nintendo's digital prices for retail games are too high and they do not have the excellent sales that PSN does to mitigate it. It do not buy much digitally from Nintendo where as I do buy a fair amount for PlayStation platforms.

I like the eshop for Indies, but if there's a physical version I buy that because it is easily 25% cheaper. No way will I be increasing my eshop purchases as long as physical still exists.

Edit: The above still stands even though the new reward system seems to offer no points for physical purchases. Still not going to purchase a £40 digital game to get some points whilst I can buy a £30 game. The rewards will not be as valuable as the original discount.

@Moon
I only agree with you there on digital versions of retail releases, I just don't value it the same (the digital versions should be around 10% cheaper, they could be more than that but they should at least be that).

But I think digital only games are fairly priced, we cannot and should not compare them to mobile priced games, because they offer different experiences and have different treatment.

Just like digital purchases are also increasing for PlayStation and Xbox this is great for the console makers, the only disappointing part is for me as a collector I think it means we're getting very near the end of physical releases for games. Looking at the numbers and the trends, even Nintendo is going to really embrace digital and when that happens it's all over.

@Tisteg80 Unless you count launch day for the Wii U console itself

I've only had my Wii U for about half a year and half of its space is already full (mainly due to the Humble Bundle and redownloading applicable Wii VC games to the Wii U). All of my retail games are physical as I don't have the space to download (plus I got them used for a lot cheaper than eShop prices). The eShop has gotten better since the days of the Wii Shop Channel (sales, not needing to buy currency in ten dollar chunks, et cetera), but it's not perfect either.

I prefer hard copies of most games simply because when I know I'm done with it, I can simply resell it. Unless I get a game heavily discounted digitally, the lack of ability to resell it and buy more new titles is a major reason I won't go all-digital. There are plenty of titles I keep, but any I know I won't want to play again, I'm happy to throw on eBay and get more new games to support publishers/developers. I only have a few digital-only retail titles: Pikmin 3 (got free with MK8), Monster Hunter 3U (got it for $30 in late-2013, I think?), Wii Fit U (got it free for having a balance board and buying a Fit Meter), and Splatoon, because I knew I'd only want to play it for the online component, so only having a digital copy wouldn't make a great deal of difference, since once digital support for it is dropped, I won't much care anymore.

@peeks I would say 1t min

I also prefer the physical copy of a game, because I don't collect games, once played I will move on to a new game and just occasionally I will keep a game that I feel has some replay value.

Nintendo also suggest that we use a hard drive and not a memory card or stick to store DLC. But they cannot recommend one and like most smartphones things don't always work as well unless the content is on the original devices internal memory.

Yet in their wisdom Nintendo built the Wii U with 8 GB memory.

@rjejr you forgot to mention the amiibo are exclusive to 10 different stores scattered around 3 continents and the dlc is voted for over the course of a year so you never know what the content/cost will be until you have the game

I gotta say that the Eahop has really come a long way. Although a little bit on the expensive side we have been getting much better quality game than they get in the Apple Market and Android markets. Even the game which are offered on all 3 markets feel like better quality mainly because of better controls with a real gamepad. When Digital Downloads first started I was never going to download a game....no Way! Well. About 200 downloads later I'm really happy with what I have in regards to diversity to titles. I have a little bit of everything. I still have my eye on you Nintendo! These games that come from the android market that are double in price on the Eshop is a bad deal. I won't download those until they go on sale. Also if a game is retail I will buy the retail cartridge over the Eshop release 100% of the time. If they would consider a price drop on retail digital games , like 15 dollars less I might consider buying retail digital. But I still like getting some cartridges. Indie games though I'm willing to download if there is no cartridge release.

@Gamer83 I hope your wrong. But I don't think you are. All digital is coming, and it's coming quickly now. If NX is all digital I will more than likely pass on it unless it's something so freaking good I just have to have it. I love my 3DS and I'm so back logged with RPG's that I still have years of play available on the 3ds. I also want to get the NEW 3DS

@ULTRA-64 "amiibo are exclusive"

Yeah, that's going to be a problem. We own about 100 Skylanders and 40 Disney Infinity characters, and there are always store exclusives, but they are usually limited to "skins" - Target does "nitro" for Skylanders, TRU does "legendary", some of the DI guys, like Boba Fett have been limited store exclusives, but we always seem to find what we want as long as we don't care about the skins, and we don't. But the US amiibo situation is really bad in that regard. EU seems to have it a bit better from what I read on here. Cards should solve most of that for locked DLC. I can't imagine there not being cards for a Pokemon game just like Animal Crossing cards.

I refuse to buy digitally. Once their servers go down, you'll be SOL if you need to redownload your games.

That's what I love about the 3ds. The memory card I have is quite large and most of my library is on that card. I WISH the Wii U had a bigger amount of memory. 32 gigs is a joke. I love Nintendo but that was a joke. 300-500 gigs woulda been better. Oh well, anyway, I hope the NX COMPLETELY changes the game for Nintendo when it comes out as far as how memory is used.

I still prefer retail but there are enough indies and sales that now I pick up an eshop card every payday. So mission accomplished?

Probably some skewed figures too because some publishers are forcing us to buy digital whether we want to or not, like Capcom and the Phoenix Wright games, or even Nintendo themselves with Fatal Frame in the US. It's not as straightforward as just assuming people are actually starting to prefer digital.

@Tisteg80 Lego City basically filled up a Wii U if downloaded... that game was a game just outside of the launch window. People who wanted to download needed an external the day the Wii U came out.

While I do download a ton of games across all 3 consoles, I NEVER buy digital what I can buy at retail. The ONLY exception would be a time like yesterday for example on the 360 I bought digital copies of crysis 2&3 for $4 each and need for speed most wanted also for $4! THAT you can't beat even used at GameStop!! Otherwise digital only for me is classics and indies you just can't get on disc!

@joey302 Those weekly ~5€ Xbox 360 AAA and Xbox One indie games sales are big reason why i see VC games too expensive in Nintendo eshop. Another problem with eshop is high pricing for older 3DS/Wii U games in europe and almost everyweek eshop sales are usually only for indie games and mobile game ports. Pricing for new games in eshop is pretty good.

They should've divided the download sales by the install base. That'd give a more interesting result.

@Windy
All digital will definitely happen but I don't think NX will go that route. I think we're looking more 5-10 years down the road before that happens, but the push towards all-digital will definitely start happening over the next few years.If I had to guess, NX will allow for both digital and physical but Nintendo, like Sony and MS have, will slowly start the push towards all-digital by making sure that's the only way to get certain games. It won't prevent me from buying consoles and it does have its conveniences but as a collector it's also a little saddening, it's like how there's basically zero magazines now. Sure, the internet is the best way to get info but I enjoyed looking forward to a new issue of PSM, Nintendo Power, EGM, GamePro or Next Generation arriving in the mail each month. Now, I only get two mags.

@DarkJamD while I do agree that pricing is too high on some vc classics I'm an exception to the rule cause I'm a retro guy and will not scoff at a chance to download a great classic on a modern console. MY problem with Nintendo is the classics don't come quick enough!! The drip feed of one a week still goes on and the Wii is laughing at its younger brother sitting pretty with 400+ vc classics available to the Wii u's 200+
It's insane and whatever NOA is smoking they better quit soon as the customers continue to leave them in droves!! Smh!!

@callmeking17 Many disc versions nowadays would be hardly playable anyway if the servers went down and you needed to reinstall. I like downloaded copies because I hate swapping discs in and out, but there are definitely some plusses to getting games on disc.

I finally broke down and bought a 2 tb hard drive. I used to only buy physical copy s of everything because I collect but starting to love how easy it is to just turn on my wii u and pick a game instead of having to put in a new disc.

@Gamer83 I hope your right. Look what happened when Microsoft was going to go all digital with XboxOne. People absolutely freaked out at their E3 presentation. There are so many collectors in this world. Im really not one but I have a few games I will never sell.

@Tisteg80 And why is that? I bought a 500GB HD for my PS3 for like 44 bucks, Therefore, Nintendo can get the same HD for 20-25 dollars.

From now on, consoles should come with either 32GB (or even 64GB) of flash for people not connecting to the internet or 500GB-1TB HD.

@Moon They package a decent 32 gb to start you off, but my advice is just to drop a hundred or so and grab a 2 tb seagate. I did it a year ago, at time of writing I have roughly 200 gb or so taken on the wii U with 1800 to go. Totally worth it, lets you enjoy the sales a lot more without worrying about storage.