Have we been paying for the price of the charger to any given electronic be it a phone or tablet under the guise that the cost is all bundled up under a single price and it is only now that we've started thinking about it?

People really think the system would be more expensive with the Charger? It's already at 199 $ for hardware dated as fuck! You can get smartphones with better specs that come with a charger and the manufacturers even have to pay more licensing fees there. You can also get a Vita with charger for that price and below complete with a charger which is more expensive to make. Nintendo could easily include a charger and still make profit like there's no tomorrow. How people can even think about defending this is beyond me.

Can I see your math?

http://n4g.com/news/1654169/a-charger-is-not-an-optional-peripheral

Thanks for the options, Ninty.

That's pretty ridiculous that they don't include a charger with the console.

You take for granted that the majority of buyers already own a previous Ninty portable with a compatible charger and you take for granted that the rest be happy with having to buy a proprietary one, almost surely more expensive, instead of a standard USB one. If the move were really to give users more choice and possibly make them save a few bucks, the obvious and honest choice would have been to use standard chargers, not proprietary ones.
This way, instead, only users already owning a previous and not too old Ninty portable get a possible advantage (and only if they really didn't want another charger, otherwise, buying it separately will surely cost them more).
Weak excuse is weak.

You will love it.

The slim boxes are sexy.

YEAH! They'll call it IKEA 3DS!   

I hear you have to assemble it yourself. They'd probably throw in an extra screw just to mess with you. LOL

lolwut, I didn't know this and it's been that way outside the US? O.o

We should probably boycott Nintendo for being anti-consumer.