Nintendo is playing the tiered pricing card to corner resellers who want a cheaper console. In short, learn Japanese or prepare your wallet.
Nintendo has found an original way to counter the resale at exorbitant prices of its Switch 2, expected on June 5. The company will offer two versions of its console: a Japanese one at 49,980 yen (around 310 euros) and an international one at 69,980 yen (434 euros). The difference? The first only supports Japanese, the other is multilingual. This complicates the lives of resellers who buy in Japan to resell in Europe.
Why such a price gap? Nintendo is banking on discouragement: by making the local version unusable outside the archipelago, speculators lose their interest. It's impossible to resell a Japanese model twice as expensive abroad if it remains stuck in Japanese. A deliberate move, even if the company hasn't made it official.
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Drawing and stock control
To avoid rushes, Nintendo has also set up a lottery system on its website since April 4. Whether you're aiming for the Japanese or global version, you'll have to try your luck online. The only downside: in Japan, physical stores and e-commerce sites will only offer the local edition. The international version, however, remains exclusively accessible via the Nintendo website.
This double barrier, price and logistics, allows the company to better control its stocks. No more shortages like with the original Switch, where resellers emptied the shelves to supply the gray market. By limiting access to the export version, Nintendo is cutting the grass under the feet of profiteers.
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It remains to be seen whether foreign players will agree to pay more than 100 euros more for an English menu, or if some will try to tinker with the Japanese console to force it to speak other languages. Perhaps in a few months, some will be able to find a workaround, as has been the case in the past.
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