3DS Seen As Expensive, Unknown In Japanese Surveys

A recent survey shows widespread ignorance among the Japanese public about Nintendo's upcoming 3DS handheld, with a second survey showing many think the system's planned price as too high. The first survey, conducted by online research firm Macromill for the Nikkei Shimbun newspaper (both surveys via 1up), found 55.9 percent of 1,000 online respondents hadn't heard of the Nintendo 3DS, despite the system's international unveiling at June's E3 conference and a press conference announcing the system's Japanese launch details just last month. A further 36.9 percent of respondents knew "a little" about the 3DS, with only 7.2 percent saying they knew "all about" the system. Respondents showed similar ignorance of The PlayStation 3's recently added stereoscopic 3D game offerings, with 57.8 percent saying they didn't know about the option. A separate survey of anonymous web users published on Getnews.jp found only 16.4 percent of Japanese respondents found the 3DS' planned price of 25,000 yen to be "reasonable," with nearly 80 percent saying the system was either "a little expensive" "expensive" or "exceedingly expensive." The Nintendo DS is the best-selling system in Japanese history, with over 30 million units of the DS, DS Lite, DSi and DSi XL combined selling in the country over the last six years.