Hi guys, I never owned anything Nintendo before so I didn't know about this region lock issue. I have New Nintendo 3DS from Japan, which is now basically an expensive paperweight. I've been trying to get rid of it on Amazon at a pretty low price ($200CAD). But since no one has been interested, I might start using it myself. But it won't play my games, so what else can I do with it? (Besides taking bad quality photos). AND I don't even have a charger for this thing! Shouldn't these types of game consoles come with chargers? Can I download English games on it? I never tried because I've only opened it once, then put it away, cleaned it, and boxed it back up hoping I could sell it.

Hey, sorry to hear the bad news, I can understand how this would be annoying/frustrating for you. Your best bet is to keep it up on Amazon, or possibly even Ebay, to try and make back some of the money you spent. You could always import Japanese games or download them from the Eshop, but unless you understand Japanese, you probably won't get the most out of your games. As for the charger, that has been a big complaint with a lot of people concerning the N3DS. You can buy a new charger for $10 at EBgames or something similar, or even on Ebay for $3. It's more of an inconvenience than anything, it's really not that big of a deal.

The main thing to remember is that nowadays, most electronic things are region locked. DVDs and Blu-ray discs are two examples. It's always good to do research before importing an electronic device or something similar from another country.

Best of luck!

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Currently playing: Digimon Story: Cyber Sleuth, Story of Seasons, Professor Layton vs. Phoenix Wright, RF4.

Now I know! I'll just keep it up for sale since there's nothing I can do with it. I definitely should have done some research ��

Yeah, it's definitely a bit of a bummer, but try not to let it go you too down. I'm sure someone will be interested in buying it off you eventually. And just in case you're wondering, a North American charger will work with your Japanese 3DS, in case you ever do decide to keep it for some reason.

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Currently playing: Digimon Story: Cyber Sleuth, Story of Seasons, Professor Layton vs. Phoenix Wright, RF4.

Thanks Rich! And the charger is around $10? Seems reasonable

Not much you can do other than playing games, because that's what it's meant for. You can use the pretty decent internet browser as a way to view mobile sites though. It's a very nice browser when you consider other browsers from other consoles. This one actually supports HTML5, and displays most sites just fine as long as they have mobile support.

You may also just use it as an MP3 player, as the Nintendo 3DS Sound app works with MP3 and M4A files. These need to be put on the microSD card, either using the System Settings, where you can then wirelessly connect with a Windows 7/8.1 computer to put the files on, or by using a screwdriver to take the microSD card out from underneath and then inserting it into a laptop that way. It also supports headphones which have the "audio operation" buttons on them allowing the easy pausing or skipping of tracks. [one tap for pause, two for skip forward, three for skip previous]

The Game Notes icon on the HOME Menu also doubles as a nice quick way to jot down notes to yourself, which is convenient because the 3DS is easy to carry around. It even fits nicely in my pocket.

If you need the Nintendo 3DS for more practical purposes, the Nintendo eShop has a whole section dedicated to applications (as of writing, it's the last item to the right on the bottom shelf of the eShop) , such as Netflix, Calculator by CineMax, Inchworm Animation for creating simple Flash animations, or even an Instrument Tuner and Metronome.

The HOME Menu can be organized using folders, so you may wish to put anything you don't care about, such as the games that come with the 3DS, in one folder, while everything you actually use may be in another.

The New Nintendo 3DS Browser supports HTML5 Video, and works perfectly fine with YouTube, so it's also nice for watching 3D videos without any glasses. This will not work on an older model of Nintendo 3DS without the YouTube application from the eShop, which only supports 2D playback and is unfortunately pretty laggy and barely capable of playing back videos even in low quality. Given you have a new one though, you should be alright.

Really though, the 3DS is a gaming device and games are where it's at on the 3DS. I'd recommend Mario and Luigi: Dream Team, Super Mario 3D Land, MarioKart 7 or of course Super Smash Bros, they're all good games that a lot of people play. If you're not interested in gaming, that's fine though, and the device isn't entirely useless. It's just not being used to its full potential.

And yeah, the reason the charger doesn't come with it is because the charger is backwards compatible with the Dsi or Original 3DS models, and seeing how many people wanted to upgrade their old system to a new one Nintendo decided to sell the chargers separately.

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A=C/2*r
Yes, I am a Janus. Yes, I figured that out myself.

Thank you, Tomy.

As for the games you recommended, is language not necessary in those games? I am interested in gaming, that's why I bought the DS, I just didn't know I won't be able to do much gaming on it due to language barrier, haha... I think I will have to go with those types of games if I end up not able to resell my DS.

As for the charger issue, I guess that's nice, so the manufacturers are being less wasteful.

Dream team has a lot of text, so i wouldn't recommend it in japanese.
anyways, if youre into music games, the best thing to get in the japanese eshop
is a game that never ever came out of the west on the 3ds-

Taiko no tatsujin! best thing ever.

i myself got a japanese 3ds, old though. pretty good, i enjoy all the stuff they release there the west don't have.

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Maybe selling it for the original price is why it isn't selling? I didn't know there were region locks, which is stupid, but if it is between it being a paperweight and lowering the price, why not sell it for like $120? Aren't they $200 new at the store?