14 DAY TRIAL // All video-game lovers that live in Japan and are interested in picking up a Nintendo 3DS handheld will probably have to wait for about one more day as industry sources inside the country are reporting that most if not all stores are out of the new device and Nintendo is struggling to resupply them.
It seems that Nintendo prepared around 400,000 devices for the Japanese launch, which took place on February 26, and all of them were gone in less than 24 hours.
Major central Tokyo stores saw queues that went from 400 to 900 people, with some of them reportedly standing in line in the cold for more than 10 hours in order to get the first new handhelds when the stores opened.
After the physical Nintendo 3DS consoles were gone, stores in Japan took pre-orders for new shipments, meaning that for a few days all actual consoles in stores already have an owner coming to pick them up.
Nintendo has said before the launch date that it planned to sell more than 1.5 million Nintendo 3DS handheld on the Japanese market and around 4 million in the rest of the world before the end of March.
The initial pace seems to have surprised the company and those estimates could be quickly surpassed.
The launch in North America and in Europe is prepared for late March, but if the Japanese continue to buy the 3DS in such numbers Nintendo might have serious problems in delivering the number of consoles needed in those two markets.
The company will probably not choose to delay the launch, but it will release the device in more limited supply, something which might actually serve to increase sales in the long term.
The big selling point for the 3DS are its three-dimensional gaming capabilities that do not require the use of any glasses, unlike the same experience on home consoles.