No Room for Nintendo in the Third Dimension

After Price Cuts & Peripherals, A Grim Outlook For Nintendo's 3-Dimensional Safari.

Despite having the benefit of a loyal fanbase and the currents of a 3D retro revival blowing at their back, Nintendo's latest handheld, the 3DS, is looking like it could be a total flop. It's been a difficult journey for legendary Japanese gaming giant — complaints of disorienting 3D graphics, a lackluster multiplayer component and the subsequent $50 price drop enacted shortly after launch signaled that Nintendo's expedition into the 3rd dimension might not be opening up any promising new dimensions of revenue at all.

But somehow the story just keeps getting worse. Now there's talk of an imminent hardware revision after a recent press conference revealed this ugly new slidey-thing that attaches a second analog stick to your system and many are wondering just what the hell Nintendo was trying to do with the 3DS in the first place.

It's a little sad to watch. Once the undisputed champion of video entertainment both at home and on-the-go, Nintendo is now beset on all sides by a rapidly growing smartphone gaming market and rival console manufacturers that have since picked up on most of the famously innovative company's best tricks. President Satoru Iwata flat-out refuses to release software for the smartphone market, claiming that mobile online marketplaces, filled with apps of varying quality and price, have cheapened the value of games. It's a position that has been fiercely contested within the company, with investors losing confidence in the sustainability of Nintendo's ambitious but dated business model.

Not wanting to sell out to competing platforms is fine. But where Nintendo seems to have really slipped up is in their bizarre, anachronistic development strategy that leaves hardware bereft of many features that have become standard everywhere else in the gaming industry. Social online multiplayer and a well-integrated online shop has been just one consistently missing ingredient in Nintendo's recent systems, requiring players to exchange 12-digit "friend codes" rather than give them a rich (if sometimes scary) social experience that rival consoles like Microsoft's Xbox have offered for years.

Nintendo is clearly committed to defending their reputation for classic games and "family" oriented entertainment. But the costs could outweigh the benefits, as the case may be with their upcoming tablet/TV console hybrid,Wii-U, if Nintendo continues to do so in a way that leaves even diehard fans feeling ripped off.

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