Our digital future may first require you to upgrade that SD card in your Nintendo 3DS.
On May 24, Nintendo will release Donkey Kong Country Returns 3D for its 3D handheld at retailers and on the system’s digital eShop store. As a download, however, it’s quite the beefy package. It requires 17,655 blocks (or 2.1GB) of free space, which is larger than the 16,384 blocks available in total on the standard 2GB SD card that comes with a 3DS.
This isn’t a problem for anyone buying the physical game or with a larger memory card. The 3DS XL, for example, comes with 4GB in storage.
I had a 4GB card in my 3DS, however, and I still had to upgrade because large games like Fire Emblem: Awakening and several other apps left me with only about 1.5GB of space. Of course, you can free up storage by deleting other games and data. But beware: Removing games from the SD card permanently deletes its save data.
You’re probably best off upgrading to a larger card. Thankfully, the process is very simple:
- Turn off your 3DS and remove the SD card.
- Put the card into your PC.
- Copy the files into a folder on your hard drive.
- Remove the original card and replace it with the larger card.
- Format the new card.
- Drag and drop the files onto it.
- Remove the card and pop it back into your 3DS.
Of course, if you’d rather just free up space on your 4GB card, you can rescue the save files by copying the game data to your computer and keeping it on that device until you need it again.
Thanks to Ned Lesesne for the math.