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[garath]

I'm on the verge of picking up a new 3DSXL here in NA. It'll be my first Nintendo console since the original gameboy. It seems my life is moving more of a handheld direction as I get older with kids and job and wife, etc. I currently own a Vita but it's been sitting dormant for a bit. I'm very much into RPGs. One of the main reasons I'd want to grab a 3DS is for the myriad of RPGs available on the system. Immediately I'd be looking at:

Xenoblade
Fire Emblem Awakening
Bravely Default

With a possibility of Zelda and maybe even a Pokemon (my wife will absolutely laugh at me lol).

But considering it's still a significant cost at $210 (including the charger for a first time 3ds buyer), I have to wonder what the future of the system holds. I was looking at upcoming games and I'm not finding much. The only thing really catching my eye is a new Fire Emblem.

Are we reaching the end of life for the 3ds? Or is the game cycle usually small and releases aren't announced until they are closer?

I apologize for the ignorance but I really haven't followed the 3ds at all. Every gaming dollar counts these days so I'm leaning on the collective wisdom of GAF when it comes to the 3DS and RPGs to steer me in the right direction.

 

[robotzombie]

Bravely Default 2 if you end up liking the first

Also, since you like RPGs, have you checked out the 600 Atlus games on 3DS?

 

[Hibiki Kurosawa]

Fire Emblem if
Bravely Second
Etrian Odyssey II Untold
Etrian Odyssey V

Edit: I should mention Devil Survivor 2 considering I've been thinking about all day yesterday.

 

[E-phonk]

Are we reaching the end of life for the 3ds? Or is the game cycle usually small and releases aren't announced until they are closer?

Often games get announced about 6 months beforehand. Just today 4 new games were announced (by Level5).

GAF's semi-consensus estimate is that the successor of the 3DS will follow somewhere between Q4 2016 and Q4 2017.

Some great games with RPG like flavours (in all it's variety) include:
Monster Hunter, Fire emblem (awakenings, but the next one called "IF" will release in 2016 EU/US), pokemon, 3 zelda games (OoT, Majora's Mask, A Link Between Worlds), Xenoblade 3DS, Yukai Watch (coming soon), Bravely Default, Mario & Luigi: Dream Team, Etrian Odyssey and Shin Megami Tensei IV

EDIT: Oh, and you never owned a DS? In that case there are plenty good (2D) RPG's to check out that can be found cheap + the SNES library through the virtual console

 

[Mauricio_Magus]

Etrian Mystery Dungeon
Etrian Odyssey Untold 2
Etrian Odyssey V(hopefully it's a 3DS game lol)
Etrian Odyssey Untold 3(Believe!)

 

[Shiina]

There's DeSu2, Fire Emblem if, Bravely Second, EOU2 and I assume EOV will be on it as well. Probably not a lot of things still to come but there are enough good RPGs already out there to warrant the purchase imo. Some examples would be DeSuO, EO IV, EOU, Soul Hackers, SMT IV and the ones you mentioned.

 

[Slaythe]

Dragon Ball Extreme Butouden.

Ace attorney.

The next pokemon.

It just got Zelda MM and Xenoblade. Quite big.

 

[Adam Prime]

I had the same reservations about getting a NewXL - isn't this the end of the 3DS anyway?

For the three games you mentioned: Bravely Default, Fire Emblem Awakening, and Xenoblade .... it's worth it. You'll get your moneys worth if you managed to finish all three of those games. There's PLENTY of other good games besides though.

Basically if you're JUST NOW getting into the 3DS, it doesn't matter when the 3DS ends - you still have years of games waiting for you. 3DS library is one of the G.O.A.T.

 

[Spieler Eins]

The current outlook is indeed awful (E3 is the last chance for big announcements this year) and the thing probably won't survive next year, but there's enough to catch up on. In fact, since Gameboy was your last, you'll also be able to play Nintendo DS, which probably had the best 3rd party library of last gen, if you're looking for something different than your average AAA and indie game (aka tons of great midtier games).

 

[maxcriden]

I'd say the system has 1-2 solid years of releases ahead, given that the N3DS just released in the West. I'd expect late 2016 at the earliest for a successor. In the meantime, there are so many quality games available to you that it will take ages for you to catch up, whether your interests are specific or broad.

http://www.nintendolife.com/3ds/games?region=usa&sort=rating

http://www.nintendolife.com/3ds-eshop/games?region=usa&sort=rating

http://www.metacritic.com/browse/games/score/metascore/all/3ds?sort=desc

(Plus, all the DS goodness.)

The current outlook is indeed awful (E3 is the last chance for big announcements this year), but there's enough to catch up on. In fact, since Gameboy was your last, you'll also be able to play Nintendo DS, which probably had the best 3rd party library of last gen, if you're looking for something different than your average AAA and indie game (aka tons of great midtier games).

There are plenty of other opportunities throughout the year for big game announcements, apart from and after E3. Including Nintendo Directs and other companies' press conferences and press releases.

 

[Memory]

There is massive back catalog you are ignoring, especially if you didnt own a DS. Personally im waiting until E3 until i upgrade my 3DSXL to N3DSXL incase the 4DS is announced.

 

[sixteen-bit]

Are there any N3DS hardware exclusives in the pipeline after Binding of Isaac

 

[injurai]

Dai Gyakuten Saiban (I guess technically we don't know about localization though...)

 

[Spieler Eins]

There are plenty of other opportunities throughout the year for big game announcements, apart from and after E3. Including Nintendo Directs and other companies' press conferences and press releases.

Forgot to add that I meant big games that also still have the chance of coming out this year or anytime soon. In fact, April Direct usually was the latest point for that on 3ds, so I'm already being optimistic.

 

[Forkball]

Thirty Youkai Watch games are coming if you have a Japanese 3DS.

 

[garath]

Often games get announced about 6 months beforehand. Just today 4 new games were announced (by Level5).

GAF's semi-consensus estimate is that the successor of the 3DS will follow somewhere between Q4 2016 and Q4 2017.

Some great games with RPG like flavours (in all it's variety) include:
Monster Hunter, Fire emblem (awakenings, but the next one called "IF" will release in 2016 EU/US), pokemon, 3 zelda games (OoT, Majora's Mask, A Link Between Worlds), Xenoblade 3DS, Yukai Watch (coming soon), Bravely Default, Mario & Luigi: Dream Team, Etrian Odyssey and Shin Megami Tensei IV

EDIT: Oh, and you never owned a DS? In that case there are plenty good (2D) RPG's to check out that can be found cheap + the SNES library through the virtual console

I'd say the system has 1-2 solid years of releases ahead, given that the N3DS just released in the West. I'd expect late 2016 at the earliest for a successor. In the meantime, there are so many quality games available to you that it will take ages for you to catch up, whether your interests are specific or broad.

http://www.nintendolife.com/3ds/games?region=usa&sort=rating

http://www.nintendolife.com/3ds-eshop/games?region=usa&sort=rating

http://www.metacritic.com/browse/games/score/metascore/all/3ds?sort=desc

(Plus, all the DS goodness.)



There are plenty of other opportunities throughout the year for big game announcements, apart from and after E3. Including Nintendo Directs and other companies' press conferences and press releases.

A solid 1-2 years left isn't terrible. I have been exploring some of the backlog of games on the DS and definitely see some gems. Half of my wondering was if I should instead get a cheaper older used model and just skip Xenoblade. Trying to justify the extra $100 or so vs an older 3DS with the possibility of some good new releases that might push the hardware a bit more.

I had the same reservations about getting a NewXL - isn't this the end of the 3DS anyway?

For the three games you mentioned: Bravely Default, Fire Emblem Awakening, and Xenoblade .... it's worth it. You'll get your moneys worth if you managed to finish all three of those games. There's PLENTY of other good games besides though.

Basically if you're JUST NOW getting into the 3DS, it doesn't matter when the 3DS ends - you still have years of games waiting for you. 3DS library is one of the G.O.A.T.

That's definitely a good point. Getting into it now there are just so many good games in the library.

I guess if the successor is that far out, it doesn't make sense to just wait for that. Two years is a solid investment for $200.

I really appreciate hearing about all these upcoming games though. Most I had no idea. A second Bravely game would be awesome. I'm really intrigued by that game more than most. It looks good, and as a huge FFT fan, I love the idea of taking the job system and translating it into a "traditional" RPG. Even with the microtransactions and sleep mode stuff.

 

[Ricky 7]

I say it's worth getting since it's backwards compatible. Also Xenoblade should keep you occupied for a long time.

 

[SenatorBot]

3DS has been quite dead since around 2013 in terms of releases.

We're slowly reaching the end of the life for the 3DS, seeing as how Nintendo releases tend to slow down majorly around this time. However, this is also the perfect time to pick one up because you get to enjoy most of the library that are out without worrying about waiting for them to come out.

We'll probably see a successor next year in 2016 but it'll take quite a while before it gets games worth playing so I think you're in the perfect time to jump in.

 

[Fireblend]

There are at least 15 great-to-masterpiece games on the system, easily:

Fire Emblem Awakening
Super Mario 3D Land
Luigi's Mansion Dark Moon
Mario Kart 7
Bravely Default
TLoZ: Link Between Worlds
TLoZ: Ocarina of Time
TLoZ: Majora's Mask
Pokemon X/Y
Pokemon OR/AS
Persona Q
Shin Megami Tensei IV
Kid Icarus Uprising
Kirby Triple Deluxe
The Etryan Odyssey games
The Monster Hunter games

And there are more like Mario & Luigi or Animal Crossing which I really enjoyed but I know are not universally praised if you're not attracted by that kind of catalogue, I really can't tell you to buy a N3DS.

Plus the entire DS back-catalog, for which I can name like 30 games that are as good as any of those. Just the entire Ace Attorney saga is like 6 games that I'd rank as masterpieces, and then there's The World Ends With You, 999, Ghost Trick, the Mario & Luigi games...

 

[Beartruck]

I really appreciate hearing about all these upcoming games though. Most I had no idea. A second Bravely game would be awesome. I'm really intrigued by that game more than most. It looks good, and as a huge FFT fan, I love the idea of taking the job system and translating it into a "traditional" RPG. Even with the microtransactions and sleep mode stuff.

The microtransactions are super easy to circumvent and not really essential. Basically just leave the system plugged in in sleep mode overnight and you're good. That Bravely Second feature it activates literally breaks the game anyway, so it's up to you if you want to use it.

 

[HitCtrlAltDel]

Portable gaming doesn't work like console gaming. We know about games potentially years before release on consoles (looking at you Quantum Break), but on portables it could be only a couple of months from announcement to release. Look at Majora's Mask 3D; it was only announced last November 2014 to be released 3 months later in February 2015.

My point is, that it's very difficult to know what the future of the 3DS is simply because we can only see a couple months into the future for releases. Now that we are pre-e3 we know even less. E3 will bring us a clearer picture of what 2015 will bring, but we won't really know how the year will play out until August or September I bet.

3DS still has a lot of life left in it, and if you dip into the awesome library you'll have tons of great games to keep you busy.

 

[Akiyama_AE]

Monster Hunter games easily !

 

[Steel]

3DS has plenty of games already released to make it worth it. Just look for the Atlus catalogue in the store and fill up on JRPGs.

That being said on the future RPG front the Vita is actually looking better at this moment. Lost Dimension(Choice based game where you have to find out who in your party is a traitor before the final boss, and the traitor is randomly chosen) coming over, a couple of Legend of heroes games and some other stuff I can't remember off the top of my head. So you have a lot of things to go over between the two.

 

[Circinus]

There aren't that many high-profile upcoming games for 3DS, but there's a substantial catalog of already released games. It should be worth having for that alone. Especially if you include DS games as well, but for some reason Nintendo has yet to put them on the eShop.


But if you aren't that keen on playing on your current handheld (PS Vita) already, I'm not sure if buying another handheld with expensive games is a smart thing to do.

I got a PS Vita and never looked back to 3DS.

 

[z0m3le]

Well if you haven't owned a Nintendo console outside the Gameboy, I think you should look at DS RPGs too, if you've missed chrono trigger, the DS remake is the best version of the game, there are dozens of great RPGs for it.

3DS RPGs (not an exhaustive list)
Etrian Odyssey series
Etrian Mystery Dungeon
Persona Q
Fantasy Life
SMT4
SMT: Devil Summoner
SMT: Devil Survivor
Kingdom Hearts DDD
Tales of the Abyss (if you missed it on PS2)

3DS RPGs coming in the next 18 months or so:
Youkai Watch
Fire Emblem IF
SMT: Devil Survivor 2
Puzzle & Dragons Z + mario
Lord of Magna (xseed rpg)
Stella Glow

DS RPGs you might have missed:
The World Ends With You
Final Fantasy 3 & 4
DQ 9
Chrono Trigger
Radiant Historia
SMT: Strange Journey
Many many more...

Having listed all of those, I do have to remind you that Nintendo will announce NX next year (probably at E3) They could push for a 2016 holiday release (roughly a similar turn around between DSiXL and 3DS launch to n3DS to holiday 2016 (at least in japan)

Good news is, you can likely resell your n3DS, but this is something you have to weight with any system that has been out for 4+ years, it sounds like you'll have plenty to keep you company, until you are ready to pick up your next system either way.

 

[maxcriden]

Forgot to add that I meant big games that also still have the chance of coming out this year or anytime soon. In fact, April Direct usually was the latest point for that on 3ds, so I'm already being optimistic.

That I would much more likely agree with. Sorry if I jumped down your throat, man. Thanks for the clarification.

 

[maxcriden]

A solid 1-2 years left isn't terrible. I have been exploring some of the backlog of games on the DS and definitely see some gems. Half of my wondering was if I should instead get a cheaper older used model and just skip Xenoblade. Trying to justify the extra $100 or so vs an older 3DS with the possibility of some good new releases that might push the hardware a bit more.

Heck, yeah. If the improved 3D isn't important to you, go for a GAF B/S/T or refurb for like $100 for a good condition used one. I prefer the OG 3DS myself. These days I'd probably go for a 2DS since I hear it has good ergonomics and I don't use 3D.

ETA: apologies for the double post.

 

[JCX]

I'm really hoping for a FF Explorers localization, otherwise there are no interesting 3DS games on the horizon for me.

 

[akidnamededdy]

Xenoblade is pretty widely considered the best JRPG of last gen sooooo...that might be worth the extra money for you. You could always sell your useless Vita

Anyway the system still has some life left and yeah, you've got a lot of DS games to catch up on as well.

 

[garath]

Well if you haven't owned a Nintendo console outside the Gameboy, I think you should look at DS RPGs too, if you've missed chrono trigger, the DS remake is the best version of the game, there are dozens of great RPGs for it.

*snip* games

Having listed all of those, I do have to remind you that Nintendo will announce NX next year (probably at E3) They could push for a 2016 holiday release (roughly a similar turn around between DSiXL and 3DS launch to n3DS to holiday 2016 (at least in japan)

Good news is, you can likely resell your n3DS, but this is something you have to weight with any system that has been out for 4+ years, it sounds like you'll have plenty to keep you company, until you are ready to pick up your next system either way.

Great post. Thanks for this. It's looking more and more like a new 3dsxl pickup isn't a bad choice at all. Just for the heck of it I went looking through the last 6mo-1yr of Vita releases and re-confirmed why it's been collecting dust. Suikoden II was the last game I played on it.

I'll probably hold onto it rather than trade it in though and maybe when the NX drops I can trade in both the vita and 3ds.

2 years is a decent window and as everyone has pointed out, big backlog to jump into.

For a lot of these older games, is the e-shop the only way to grab them or are there physical copies still out there? Maybe I should get a bigger SD card right off the bat.

Still doesn't look like a lot of great games on the horizon but I think there's easily $200 worth of entertainment to be had to help justify the money on the hardware.

 

[Robert at Zeboyd Games]

There's not a whole lot on the horizon for the 3DS but if you like RPGs and haven't owned a Nintendo handheld for a while, there's a ton of games to check out between the existing DS & 3DS libraries.

For a lot of these older games, is the e-shop the only way to grab them or are there physical copies still out there? Maybe I should get a bigger SD card right off the bat.

Unlike the Vita, not every 3DS game is available digitally. And pretty much nothing that was released at retail on the DS is available digitally.

 

[VLiberty]

The upcoming 3DS line up is mostly just rpg at this point(unfortunately for me, as I don't like the genre), and the system has got a lot of good rpg in the past years. Also, DS library(which was also largely made of good rpg). Therefore I think that it's a no brainer for you to get it.

 

[Owwari]

Bravely Second is definitely my most anticipated title of the bunch!

 

[garath]

Just wanted to thank you guys for the recommendations.

Ended up grabbing a new 3DSXL and Bravely Default at Target over the weekend with their 10% off electronics cartwheel coupon.

I have some Amazon credit that will go toward Majora's Mask, Xenoblade Chronicles and I'm going to try and find a used copy of DQ IX next time I make it to a gamestop. Great suggestions all around.

Loving Bravely Default btw. It's like Final Fantasy 7 and Tactics had a baby. I now cannot wait for Bravely second to make it to NA.

I'm also really impressed with the 3D. It's a lot better than I remember it looking when I was checking out friends 3DS. I guess they weren't kidding when they said improved 3D on the new 3ds.

 

[higgsboson1997]

You really should check out some of the other games apart from the ones you listed. The system has many, many amazing games imo.

With that said, the stuff that will come in the future includes:

- the new Fire Emblem game
- Bravely Second
- Youkai Watch
- Monster Hunter
- Etrian Odyssey V/Untold 2
- probably the new Rhythm Heaven
- other unannounced E3 stuff
- Hatsune Mikue: Project Mirai Remix
- Attack on Titan game
- Puzzles and Dragons (+ the SMB edition that comes with the game)

 

[redcrayon]

At the moment I'm looking forward to
Great Ace Attorney (I'm expecting a late digital-only release here, really)
Etrian odyssey Untold 2
Bravely Default 2
Fire Emblem If
Final Fantasy Explorers.

I'm in Europe and we haven't had Codename STEAM or Etrian Mystery Dungeon yet either, but seeing as Monster Hunter 4 has taken up all my gaming time fr the last two months and for the forseeable future, I'm not that bothered!