I see no reason not to buy a physical copy

I'll be getting the physical copy for two reasons.

1. I normally get physical copies of games.

2. While I have plenty of space, I don't want to use up block space if I don't have to.

Digital. Cartridges are dumb.

Digital because I don't want to have to put the cartridge in every time I want to pop into my town for five minutes. It's what ultimately killed the DS version for me.

Digital for this game only.

Physical, as it currently stands Nintendo's digital rights method is baffling, I'd rather risk losing my cart than losing everything on my 3DS if it's stolen/broken.

If they ever got with the program and went to an account based system then I'd b all over digital.

Physical.

Fuck Nintendo's hardware DRM.

Digital, but I'm not especially happy about it. It's the game that I'll play often enough for 10 minutes here and there that it would become annoying to keep carrying the cartridge around. But Nintendo's inane wallet system means its going to cost me a lot more then walking into a store.

How much more?

Well Amazon ask for £28.00 - however that is the UK price. I'm in Channel Islands so I don't pay VAT, so my price is £23.33 for a physical copy.

Buying it from the estore is £34.99, and as Nintendo refuse to take off the VAT, nor refund it; that is a genuine £34.99. (I should point out that Nintendo aren't alone in that none of Nintendo, Sony, Microsoft or Apple take off VAT - so that's a nice little 20% extra that they receive for themselves with every purchase from a C.I. resident.)

Quite a bit more, but the last handheld version has lasted me since 2006, so that extra tenner will pay for itself in not having to carry around the cartridge if the next version takes as long to come out. Hush now, it's how I'm justifying this purchase to myself.

Ok, I'm paying more for digital and it is my choice to do so. But what really, really winds me up is this -

Now you try buying a game for £35 when the you can only pay in multiples of £10. It's insane, it is incredibly annoying and even Professor Layton would through his hands up in frustration. So my £35 game is going to require an upfront payment of £40. Sure, the rest of my money will sit as a balance towards a future purchase. But it's a balance in Nintendo's bank account and not my own. Oh, and do you think that balance is available to use on the Wii U? Well guess again, as a unified account is far, far too complicated for Nintendo to figure out. Sony manage it between the PS3 and the Vita. Apple manage it between all the iDevices and iTunes but it is apparently beyond Nintendo's capability. Just to add to the insanity; on the Wii U estore if you choose to buy something then that it the figure that get's taken out of your bank account - the cost of the product - none of this pre-loading bull.

So yes, I will be buying digitally. But until Nintendo pull their finger out and sort out their storefront it will be a major exception and not the rule.

Digital, not only is it way cheaper in my region, I want to get it at midnight!

Likely digital since if I play it, it's because I've bought the XL bundle.

@nezza: Weird, over here we can match the amount we want to add with the price of the game.

@dahuntha: Which is exactly how it works on the Wii U. So it is even more of a weird practice.

Physical probably, because I'll probably end up getting the 3DS with the game as pack in.

Don't they always do digital with the bundles now? I say that as someone who got that stupid pink XL bundle with a cart of Style Savy Trendsetters last year. Normally I see digital copies pre-installed though.

With the way Nintendo handles digital games I won't be buying games digital on 3DS. So physical here.

@skyfire543: From the looks of it the game is pre-installed on the SD card rather than a physical pack in.

This really seems like the perfect game to have on the 3ds at all times so I'm going with digital.

I'll probably get the physical copy because I'm too cheap to buy a more spacious SD card.

My fiance bought it for me physical, otherwise I would have gone digital so I could be sure to have it with me always. And forever.

Just ordered the physical version.

Digital for this reason.

If I'm getting the 3DS XL bundle, does that count as both?

Digital game inside a new, giant brick.

@mideonnviscera: @altngr: Well shit. That's convenient.

Digitial, of course.

@nezza: Not sure about the UK store but on the US eShop if you don't have enough on your account as your checking out you can choose to only add the required funds. Right now I've got $20 sitting on my account so when I buy it tonight it'll only charge my debit card the other $15 plus whatever tax their is.

More like a giant pop tart.

True. I'm totally embracing the dumbness of its appearance.

I would like to buy digital but I see myself buying a 3DS XL soonish. Also I don't spend that much on any digital release.

I'm picking it up digitally because ...

1. It's out at midnight
2. It's a game perfectly suited for being on the 3DS at all times

It's the first 3DS game I've felt that I should own digitally because I'll always want to jump here and there in between the games I'm currently playing. Mario Kart 7 is the same deal but I got a physical copy of that since that was before Nintendo started doing same day digital releases.

Guys, it's out right now. When they say midnight they mean the earliest midnight possible, east coast midnight.

Yep. Also made up my mind. Going to try to get a Physical copy tonight if my local Walmart has it. If not, then I'm going Digital. I want to play this fucker tonight.

Really curious how slow it's going to be to download it. I bet a ton of people are trying to download it right now.

Here we go!

My download is going at a decent pace. Almost half done. It's about 6002 blocks, ~700mb

@taku128 said:

I didn't even think about that. Went digital on this one, thanks.

Going to get physical copy. I hate the crazy way Nintendo ties purchases to hardware instead of account.

20 minutes into the download and I'm at almost 70%. I'd say it's about a 25 to 30 minute download and my internet is pretty fast.

I was trying to get the physical copy in hopes that a local store would sell it today before the street date, but no luck there. Since it is now passed 9PM PST and Animal Crossing is on the eShop, I'm getting it digital. I have no patience when it comes to getting new games that I've been excited for. This is my first Animal Crossing game and I cannot wait to dive in.

Time to transfer to a 16GB SD card, after Animal Crossing I only have 200 blocks left on my XLs 4GB card.

Five minutes in and I'm sitting at about 40% downloaded, the wait is killing me!

Same for me. Going to try my Local Walmart in about 35min. If they don't have it, then Digital for me. They did have Luigi's Mansion when I went to get it, so I hope they have this one as well at Midnight.

Digital. It's going to be my free game in the buy 3 get one free promotion we have here. I'm glad someone mentioned how big it is as I wont have to buy a new SD card.

No luck at my local Walmart. Downloading it right now! First Digital Retail game for me.

I'm glad I got the game at midnight, but there's nothing really to do at this hour in town haha. Oh well, tomorrow I will be all over ACNL.

I figured as much. Still, I wanted to dick around with it tonight then having to wake up early to get the game.

@haziqonfire said:

Yeah. I'm psyched that I have it, but Animal Crossing isn't exactly well suited for a midnight launch.

@chaser324: Nope, it's not! I didn't know that going into it! I've never really played much of Animal Crossing before!

@jjor64: Yeah lol. Essentially I explored the entire town and tried to talk to as many people as I could, though more than half the town is asleep ... so I think I should do the same heh :P.

@haziqonfire: Yeah. I can't even get the 500 bells necessary to take an ID photo so that I can start traveling to other towns.

Already bought digital, sadly everything's closed right now so i picked all my fruit and stopped playing. Have like 5 stacks of cherries....

Bells sometimes fall out of trees, so if you shake enough of them you can get your photo taken and visit other towns. If you shake all the trees in town and still don't have enough I think saving and then restarting will reset all the trees.

Also everyone should pay Mr. Resetti a visit.

That's what I did. Also found a Freezer and a Magic Lamp from the trees I shook as well. Also got a Spring Shirt from Lobo in my town. Looks like a Winter sweater.

Where is Mr. Resetti at?

Damn! I guess you don't have the, "Needed Funds" button in the UK eShop? That's a bummer. All I have to do is click that button and it will add the exact amount.

EDIT: Saw that someone already addressed that issue. It's bizarre that the Wii U has that feature, but not the 3DS.