3DS Demos Are Now Live, But...

I guess that would suck if you have friends interested in playing the demo. It's not that having a limit on a demo is a bad thing, but a demo is really a limitation in itself so it really just doesn't make sense.

@ToTheMax said:

Consider their main demographic and this actually makes some sense. I have kids and they're more than willing to play a hand full of demos over and over. Sometimes its for a game I really have no interest in buying and they're satisfied just with the demo. By having unlimited access to the demos it would make a small portion of the market more inclined to buy games because their kids cant cycle through 20 demos over and over.

Oh look a sensible comment that uses logic...I wonder if this is an anomaly...

@JJRage said:

Dumb.

A coworker told me the RE: Revelations demo went live, first thing I noticed upon "unwrapping" it was that usage counter. I highly doubt I'll play it 30 times (only demos for games like Skate have ever gotten that much play from me) but it's still a silly and asinine restriction.

EDIT: First time I ever even tried to get that quest.

Nintendo doesn't owe you anything. This makes sense in some cases. People still play that UT2004 demo.

That's a picture of a 3DS game?

Holy crap.

I don't think there's any demo except Halo CE, Battlefield 2 and UT2k4 demos that I've played more than 30 times. The restriction should only really apply to multiplayer games like that. 
 
That said, it's not a big problem because again, I don't even think there's enough time to play this demo 30 times before the game launches next week. 
 
Hell, it launches TOMMOROW in Japan, but they've had this demo a little longer too.

Nintendo makes so much sense! No wait, I don't get it.

@gorkamorkaorka said:

@JJRage said:

Dumb.

A coworker told me the RE: Revelations demo went live, first thing I noticed upon "unwrapping" it was that usage counter. I highly doubt I'll play it 30 times (only demos for games like Skate have ever gotten that much play from me) but it's still a silly and asinine restriction.

EDIT: First time I ever even tried to get that quest.

Nintendo doesn't owe you anything. This makes sense in some cases. People still play that UT2004 demo.

Not a matter of entitlement, though. Restricting the demo implies the assumption that playing the demo somehow takes away from purchasing the game.

That... is not true. XBLA supports demos on everything and they are all unlimited. That has helped them, not hindered them. If this is really forced at the Nintendo level it only continues to prove that they don't understand the online space. It doesn't work how they think it works, and they need to get up to speed fast.

What the hell is wrong with Nintendo - making expiring demos? That's so dumb. At least we're getting demos at all, I guess.

@vinsanityv22: Are you seriously going to play ANY demo more than 30 times? I mean, seriously...

The only demo I've played multiple times was the Mirror's Edge demo, just because that was a really cool and fun showcase for that game. Anyways, yay demos!

maybe the 30 has something to do with the release date. i think there is about 20 days until release...u might play the game more than a couple times a day and be like damn, i want to play more of that game ill just buy it.

Maybe Nintendo/Capcom are just trying to test to see if it makes an impact on sales. ever thought of that people? companies are always trying to get more more and data on how consumers react.

First of all, this is pretty old news. Like almost 6 months or more old.

Secondly, this is not Nintendo's restriction. It's Capcom's descision to put the 30-play limit there. There's going to be another demo from another developer in the future which will have a 3-play limit! Yes, three plays. I don't remember which game it was now though, but I think it was from Ubisoft.

So really, 30 plays is more than plenty. I don't think I've ever played a demo more than that.

But I want all of the plays!

I just played the demo and barely had the will to finish it once, so the 30 times seems more than fair. It gave me the chance to decide in a hands on way whether the game was for me or not, so the limit hardly seems to conflict with what a demo is meant to do.

30 is plenty, but why have a restriction in the first place.

I know it's a number I would never hit (most demos you can complete in one sitting, and if you play it 30 times you might as well buy it) but it's still a really weird limit to have. Does Nintendo have some problem with demos that Sony and Microsoft just don't?

Edit: Just read in the comments that this isn't a Nintendo thing. Still a really weird restriction to have,

If you can't make up your mind about a game after playing the demo thirty times, I don't think that's the fault of the play limit.

I can't even think of a single full game I've fired up more than 30 times, except for maybe World of Warcraft.

On the complete flip-side of this is Sony with their 60 minute game demos for Plus members only. Yikes, how's that for restrictive?

Making the demos limited and more importantly making that number visible at a glance is actively user hostile. It says the higher-ups at Nintendo think you're showing up for a gaming handout.

The real irony here is it'll be moot sooner or later once Chinese hackers figure out how to make a next-gen R4 card and people get to give themselves unlimited "demos" of full games instead.

I just finished the Revelations Demo (looks good btw), but I couldn't help but ask that same question. What's the point of the thirty use limit other than to be needlessly restrictive about the process? Nobody would ever really use up that many tries on a demo, and if they did, why would you even care?

@Detway81 said:

30 is plenty, but why have a restriction in the first place.

Yeah, I'm not mad at this news or anything, but pretty curious.

That's a weird restriction. The demo should just be unrestricted, but should only take 10 minutes or so to beat. I remember Half Life 2's Ravenholme demo was one of the more convincing demos I've ever played. Also, the Battlefield 1942 demo, back when demos weren't called open betas, which contained one multiplayer map (Wake Island).

Maybe something cool and totally awesome will happen when we played the demo 30 times :D

Very nice demo, looking forward to playing the final product. Even though I think they should have put 2 analog sticks from the start, hell even the first PSP should have had dual analog sticks! I'm happy that RE: Revelations supports the circle pad and that there is a RE: Revelation + Circle Pad bundle.

Lol. Even if they made it 5, I still wouldn't care.

@Hailinel said:

If you can't make up your mind about a game after playing the demo thirty times, I don't think that's the fault of the play limit.

This.

I looked in my log for all my games and I haven't even played Mario 30 times and that's a game I own and have played for over 20 hours. most people will play demos once or twice and be done with them. I didn't even play the Cooking Mama demo for a full playthrough let alone 30.

Cruise ship!? Topical.

What? Is Nintendo a huge fan of restricting demos or something? And arbitrary numbering restrictions as well? This is so strange...

30 individual sessions (assuming there's no other limit beyond the length of the demo) seems pretty fair to me. Let's not forget that XBL has had several games that offer only a 30 minute demo (Battlefield 1943 being one of them).

I would prefer the limit not be there at all, but it's not totally unreasonable.

It's weird just having this limitation... I launched the demo to see what the graphics would look like while at work, quit after about 30 seconds so my boss wouldn't see (he HATES Capcom) and noticed I had 29 uses left.

Love a good arbitrary limit. Nintendo don't half act oddly every now and then. They do something that everyone else does but... a bit weirder.

The demo limit is really odd. It also doesn't tick down unless your close the game and restart it. I played through it twice and it stayed at 29 remaining.

The game itself looks interesting. Normal difficulty wasn't a pushover and I felt tense and nervous even though its a handheld. The graphics are also really good.

It has an option to use the circle pad pro as well, which I thought was funny, but cool.

I tried out the Resident Evil demo after reading this.

Fuck. This may be the best Resi game yet. I am so sold on it. It looks better than I thought 3DS games could look, it plays well and it can actually scare.

I'm glad I bought a 3DS for pretty bullshit reasons now. I could take or leave 3D, but there are some solid games on it.

I imagine that's reason enough for companies to release demos. I didn't really have any expectations until playing it for myself.

The uses stuff is crazy though. So is taking down demos. The XBLA system is great; you're guaranteed to be able to try a game before you buy it. I've never played a demo over 30 times to my knowledge, but the limitation annoys me, especially pre-release; before you can even give them your money they'll take away the demo.

Hard limiting the number of times you can play a demo doesn't solve any sort of problem that demos suffered from. Get the fuck out, Nintendo.

Nintendo literally cannot do anything right when it comes to online :/ disappointing.

That is pretty asinine restriction. Not that many people will play a demo that many times, but to make a policy (and deliberately develop the platform to work that way) about limiting access to promotional material is rather stupid.

Its like Nintendo doesn't get modern features. It took them 6 years to get rid of online friend codes... maybe we will see achievements in the Wii U-2.

The 30 times thing seems like a zero issue to me.

Well that is totally rediculous being moderated about doing an accent, since when is that racist?. If someone does a posh English voice for a British person is that racist? Not impressed by this at all.

Is this the same demo that came with Resident Evil Mercenaries 3D? Curious, because I really enjoyed this demo and want to play more of this game. Thinking of picking up a cheap copy of Mercenaries if the demo is different.

@Brendan said:

@Detway81 said:

30 is plenty, but why have a restriction in the first place.

Yeah, I'm not mad at this news or anything, but pretty curious.

Sounds like they're starting it at 30 to test the waters........could get worse.

Nintendo are excessively weird.

@Large_Soda said:

@Brendan said:

@Detway81 said:

30 is plenty, but why have a restriction in the first place.

Yeah, I'm not mad at this news or anything, but pretty curious.

Sounds like they're starting it at 30 to test the waters........could get worse.

That's cynical.

I wanted to play Cooking Mama 4 way more than 30 times, now I have to buy it.
 
fuck
 
I know sometimes people attribute bizarre business decisions to 'Japan' but this is just a case of Nintendo being Nintendo. Sony have never taken this stance with demos.

@Mattyboysmith said:

Well that is totally rediculous being moderated about doing an accent, since when is that racist?. If someone does a posh English voice for a British person is that racist? Not impressed by this at all.

"British" is a nationality. They're white dudes, bro.

30 times! You can only play thirty times! That's as many as three tens! And that's terrible... ~ long live the superdictionary

The tech is in place. Once they can get away with it, they'll be selling us bundles of plays for software we own too.

This 30 usage thing is so dumb.

Nintendo are giving publishers the option to set play restrictions. So, it was on Capcom wether to set a limit or not.

@MattSchwabby said:

Is this the same demo that came with Resident Evil Mercenaries 3D? Curious, because I really enjoyed this demo and want to play more of this game. Thinking of picking up a cheap copy of Mercenaries if the demo is different.

It is not.

Awkward game that really needs the Circle Pad Pro to play.  I died in the middle of the demo and it sent me back to the main menu.  I deleted it after that.
 
Nice graphics, good looking 3D, but I'm going to pass.

I not sure whether to laugh or just stare in disbelief.

Demos are basically advertisements. You should be glad that people even bother to watch your ad / play your demo ...

Next they will be limiting the number of times you can watch the video trailers you download from them.

Well, since most of you probably ain't gonna play a demo even close to 30 times, why even bother complaining?

Now that's dumb. =D