It's story time as 3DS has been out for about a week now.  This week amongst my gamer friends has all been about the buzz around 3DS.  Most of us picked it up on launch day, had our own initial "Wow that's really cool" grin ear to ear, even then games or a new feature we had not known about on the system comes to our attention and can still envoke that same grin.  We've been tagging, trading Miis, taking 3D, playing Face Raiders, dominating each other at Street Fighter, and just can't wait for OoT. One of these friends is a long time hater on Nintendo and after he saw everyone else with the 3DS and how much fun people were having with it he decided he needed one too, he eneded up selling a lot of his old DS titles to us to buy one (scored myself some Pheonix Wright titles and Custom Robo)

Anyway that groups been amazed by it, been showing it to each other, getting penis envy when someone doesn't have one, but they are in fact nerds and gamers. On the opposite side of the coin, launch day I brought my 3DS into work so I could get my game coins for the day while walking, on my break I was playing Face Raiders, snapped a few photos of peoples faces, showed them the 3D effect and showed them how the 3D images worked, they too were shocked, and one of them was wondering if I could take pictures of our displays we made and send them to corporate, I had to inform her they couldn't see it in 3D unless they had a way to view it, still the women had reactions much like you saw in the Nintendo commercials with the actors at E3.

Finally yesterday I went to my friends sushi bar, he and his friend were my old bosses at one of my old jobs, they would be amongst the "X-Bros" the Xbox gamers that play nothing but Gears, Halo, Call of Duty, Guitar Hero/Rock Band, and sports titles. As I sat down he said "man you still haven't sold me on Nintendo" after seeing my Mario shirt I had on, I asked him "why is that?", he followed up with "I dunno just seems like they lost the gamers", not surprised by that statement since he's said it since 2006 I just reply how I usually do "well there's a lot of games for all types of gamers"  then he asked me "have you seen that new 3DS? Was reading Game Informer and they actually had nice things to say about it" my response was "you actually read that magazine?  But yes I have my 3DS on me" he asked to see it, I popped in Super Street Fighter IV for him, he started getting that ear to ear grin and had to show the other people on staff, once our other friend was freed up we showed it to him as well and he was shocked as well.

I then told them how SSFIV has the online modes and such that the console version has, they thought it was crazy a handheld could do all that, then I showed them Ridge Racer 3D, they really enjoyed it, as racers in 3D just seem to catch peoples eye, and the effect actually helps in the game.  So the 3DS ended up getting the whole entire resturant staff huddled around it, passing it around, and thinking it was really awesome. 

I honestly think situations like that is exactly what Nintendo is going for, people being social in real life, not some internet posters praising or hating on the machine, cause the people they're talking to cannot see for themselves.  The 3D just has the eye catching "must have" feeling they were talking about at GDC, the only way to truly show off the 3DS is to have people play it for themselves, so the 3DS comes with software that flat out encourages being social, from Face Raiders, to the photo apps, to the game coins.  It makes sure you carry it with you, get others involved, and most of all have fun while doing it. 

Also of note, from the large groups I've shown, only two had issues seeing the 3D, one of which was not wearing his glasses and was still sold on the idea after showing him Ridge Racer, the other I showed him the depth slider and toned it down and he saw it fine, he was still clinging to his DSi XL however cause he bought it not long ago.

Anyway I hope you've enjoyed my first week with the 3DS, feel free to discuss or share any stories you guys have with showing the 3DS to others!

interesting anecdote; I've shown it to a bunch of friends of mine as well as my mother and they've all been impressed. The AR games in particular really impressed my mom and my brother

Yeah people are really amazed at that aspect especially when it starts warping the ground and such.  And truly anecdotal evidence is all we have to go on right now, it's been a week, but things like what you said and my experience really is what started the Wii fire in 2006.

The problem with the hater part you described is that it seems they aren't really liking Nintendo games, or third party games on Nintendo systems, for what they are, but the gimmicks. If that is what it takes to impress them, THEY are the fake gamers.

Mostly these guys just hate Nintendo because they want to hate Nintendo not because they dont enjoy their games. So if Nintendo can get these people to get interested they must do something really well. btw go moan somewhere else, it´s not a gimmick.

Yeah 3D in games is about as much of a gimmick as motion controls, since one of the biggest problems with games is that you can't judge depth as well since the images don't allow for that.  Racing games, flying sims, and 3D platformers this holds especially true. 

And yes these people from my story are the gamers that really didn't give Wii the time of day, but the 3DS had such a great wow factor that it even impressed them.

if 3ds had pokemon i would have it right now!

You're stating that as if there's been a true killer app for all their devices at launch, DS didn't have one till Nintendogs, oh wait 3DS has that uh I guess I'll go with Mario Kart and Animal Crossing then and that took a year to release.

The 3D is a gimmick, just as much as motion controllers, but gimmicks sell, just look at the Wii. 

OT: For some people, it also has the "ow" factor cause their head is hurting. I really wanna try it and see if the headaches could present a problem.

VGC has the first year at 9.26 million but when compared to GBA that was a slow start I guess, but even GBA didn't have stand out original titles, it had its slew of SNES ports which sold many myself included on the system, I just wanted to play my SNES games on the go.

Also Rol how much do you socially game? Just wondering as that is fairly important to the reasons why Wii was such a success and is reflected in how the 3DS is designed.