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Discussion How to play TotK as soon as possible (japanese eShop)

LukasManak22

LukasManak22

who the fuck is that
So I was surprised that not so many people know about this, or are not using japanese eShop for any new releases. As few people asked me about this, I done a quick tutorial for you how to purchase TotK (or any other first-party release) from japanese eShop and play the game roughly 14 hours before release (US) or in my case (Europe) around 7-8 hours before midnight, so on the 11th.

I myself am buying physical copy but for those who are puchasing digital one, this might be useful for you. I bought few first party releases from Japan already.

There are places like Australia and New Zealand which are around 1-3 hours ahead of japanese time, however I haven't found any reliable sources where to buy eShop giftcards for these regions, but if you are based on AU/NZ this is easy for you as you can simply buy with your CC and the game will unlock at midnight that time.

TotK on the japanese eShop costs 7900¥ which is roughly $58.

So for japanese eShop:

First thing you need is a japanese account. You can switch your current one to a japanese region however I do not recommend that, you will need a 0 balance to do that and it's much more easy to create a separate one.
Here is a link how to create one (very easy to do), you will then tie the account into your Switch.

finalweapon.net

How to Make a Japanese Account on Nintendo Switch

Have you ever wanted to play Japan only games or demos? Check out this guide to find out how to make a Japanese Nintendo Switch account!
finalweapon.net finalweapon.net

Since the japanese eShop only takes japanese CC ((I believe it's the same for PayPal - you actually need japanese Paypal).
So you can either buy japanese eShop giftcards from sites like PlayAsia (which is very good site) however they charge a small fee, for example for 8000 yen cards you pay around $70, when the real currency of the card is around $58. Or buy if from Amazon Japan (the price there is the same as the eShop credit you buy).

If you want to buy from Amazon Japan, here is a simple tutorial from Reddit which is still up to date.



Keep in mind that TotK costs 7900 yen, so you need to buy 5000 and 3000 yen cards = 8000, you will pay around $59 in total.

Once Amazon emails you the codes (or you buy them from PlayAsia). You can open the eShop from your japanese account, open the left menu and go to the bottom where you insert your giftcard codes (as you would do normally on your eShop). Once you have this done, you just select TotK in the eShop and buy the game there. You can enjoy it hours before your timezone midnight, you can google your timezone for exact time difference, I hope this helps.
 
Raysu Delight said:
Some places deliver physical copies of games a day or two early too. Holding out hope that shopto in the UK will deliver early as they have done this previously.
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I really hope this will be the case for me this time, it never happened so far. But if someone wants the game digital this is probably the safest way to go, plus you save a few bucks.
 
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LukasManak22 said:
If you want to buy from Amazon Japan, here is a simple tutorial from Reddit which is still up to date.



Keep in mind that TotK costs 7900 yen, so you need to buy 5000 and 3000 yen cards = 8000, you will pay around $59 in total.

Once Amazon emails you the codes (or you buy them from PlayAsia). You can open the eShop from your japanese account, open the left menu and go to the bottom where you insert your giftcard codes (as you would do normally on your eShop). Once you have this done, you just select TotK in the eShop and buy the game there. You can enjoy it hours before your timezone midnight, you can google your timezone for exact time difference, I hope this helps.
Click to expand...

Sadly the amazon jp strat doesn't work anymore, i tried with both a fake address and vpn and they still won't sell the eshop codes outside of japan.
That guide is outdated
 
Kartina said:
Sadly the amazon jp strat doesn't work anymore, i tried with both a fake address and vpn and they still won't sell the eshop codes outside of japan.
That guide is outdated
Click to expand...
Damn I was counting on this. Does anyone know a good way to buy vouchers through eShop Japan? It's a nice discount compared to my country.
 
0
Kartina said:
Already tried multiple times and still doesn't work.
I'm from Europe so maybe it still works in the USA but I doubt it. If you succeed let me know.
The only safe way I saw was with playasia.
Click to expand...
I had someone from US who said today that they are waiting to receive codes. Let me see if Amazon delivered them, will reply to this as soon as I get an answer. Or maybe it's the US thing as you said, not sure if Amazon JP is blocking other CC.
 
0
LukasManak22 said:
So I was surprised that not so many people know about this, or are not using japanese eShop for any new releases. As few people asked me about this, I done a quick tutorial for you how to purchase TotK (or any other first-party release) from japanese eShop and play the game roughly 14 hours before release (US) or in my case (Europe) around 7-8 hours before midnight, so on the 11th.

I myself am buying physical copy but for those who are puchasing digital one, this might be useful for you. I bought few first party releases from Japan already.

There are places like Australia and New Zealand which are around 1-3 hours ahead of japanese time, however I haven't found any reliable sources where to buy eShop giftcards for these regions, but if you are based on AU/NZ this is easy for you as you can simply buy with your CC and the game will unlock at midnight that time.

TotK on the japanese eShop costs 7900¥ which is roughly $58.

So for japanese eShop:

First thing you need is a japanese account. You can switch your current one to a japanese region however I do not recommend that, you will need a 0 balance to do that and it's much more easy to create a separate one.
Here is a link how to create one (very easy to do), you will then tie the account into your Switch.

finalweapon.net

How to Make a Japanese Account on Nintendo Switch

Have you ever wanted to play Japan only games or demos? Check out this guide to find out how to make a Japanese Nintendo Switch account!
finalweapon.net finalweapon.net

Since the japanese eShop only takes japanese CC ((I believe it's the same for PayPal - you actually need japanese Paypal).
So you can either buy japanese eShop giftcards from sites like PlayAsia (which is very good site) however they charge a small fee, for example for 8000 yen cards you pay around $70, when the real currency of the card is around $58. Or buy if from Amazon Japan (the price there is the same as the eShop credit you buy).

If you want to buy from Amazon Japan, here is a simple tutorial from Reddit which is still up to date.



Keep in mind that TotK costs 7900 yen, so you need to buy 5000 and 3000 yen cards = 8000, you will pay around $59 in total.

Once Amazon emails you the codes (or you buy them from PlayAsia). You can open the eShop from your japanese account, open the left menu and go to the bottom where you insert your giftcard codes (as you would do normally on your eShop). Once you have this done, you just select TotK in the eShop and buy the game there. You can enjoy it hours before your timezone midnight, you can google your timezone for exact time difference, I hope this helps.
Click to expand...

Very nice indeed. My LE will arrive a bit late I believe (or so says Amazon) so this is a good option…
 
ah man, that's a throwback.

i remember people doing similar things with the Playstation Network to access demos for PS3 games early,
i only did it once though, for the 2012 port of Sonic Adventure 2. (of all things) i had to make a Hong Kong account for it.
 
0
I believe that if you want to swap from Japan to any other region (and vice versa), you MUST empty the entirety of your balance. If there's even 0.01, it won't accept.

At least it was like that, 4 or 5 years ago. In case this is still the case, be careful.
 
0
Worth keeping in mind that only the purchasing account can launch the game on a second switch (via the 'checking if game can be played' screen).

So if your save data is on your local region account (as you'd usually want, for NSO and so your time played is tracked on the same account, etc), you would not be able to play across multiple devices.
 
Rhod said:
Worth keeping in mind that only the purchasing account can launch the game on a second switch (via the 'checking if game can be played' screen).

So if your save data is on your local region account (as you'd usually want, for NSO and so your time played is tracked on the same account, etc), you would not be able to play across multiple devices.
Click to expand...
On top of this, any redownloading of software on a new Switch or something will always be under your alt account’s eshop page. You need to keep that alt account alive and active forever…I don’t know, seems like quite the hassle and inconvenience in the future just for a few hours extra. You will have to manage two accounts from now on just for this.
 
0
If you want to play as soon as possible you should get it from New Zealand eshop which unlocks 3 hours before Japan.
 
0
It's so funny that being an Aussie gamer now is a minor advantage, when in the olden days we got games months or even a year after everyone else.
 
Kartina said:
Already tried multiple times and still doesn't work.
I'm from Europe so maybe it still works in the USA but I doubt it. If you succeed let me know.
The only safe way I saw was with playasia.
Click to expand...
Not sure if this is relevant anymore. When creating my Amazon.jp account I was forced to use a local Japan address, which I just use the Tokyo International Airport address. I was then able to order a 5000 and 3000 yen card. I then went back in and changed my default address to my home address here in the US so it matched my credit card. I know that someone who lives in Ireland was able to do the same thing and it worked fine for them as well.
 
ZeldaPY said:
Not sure if this is relevant anymore. When creating my Amazon.jp account I was forced to use a local Japan address, which I just use the Tokyo International Airport address. I was then able to order a 5000 and 3000 yen card. I then went back in and changed my default address to my home address here in the US so it matched my credit card. I know that someone who lives in Ireland was able to do the same thing and it worked fine for them as well.
Click to expand...
Wait, that might be it.
I'll try later and keep you adjourned
 
ZeldaPY said:
Not sure if this is relevant anymore. When creating my Amazon.jp account I was forced to use a local Japan address, which I just use the Tokyo International Airport address. I was then able to order a 5000 and 3000 yen card. I then went back in and changed my default address to my home address here in the US so it matched my credit card. I know that someone who lives in Ireland was able to do the same thing and it worked fine for them as well.
Click to expand...
after many days I've finally resolved my stupid stupid problem. For some reason amazon jp has 2 different address, one for shipped and the other for digital purchase, all this time I kept changing my shipping address while the one for digital was still for my home country. Now it finally works, sadly I've already bought the xenoblade dlc with playasia so I've lost 5€. But still thank you and @LukasManak22 for the help. I guess I'll use this method for the inevitable TotK dlc
 
Actually I think jp vouchers should work right? If I buy 10000 yen in eshop cards and buy a jp voucher for zelda and pikmin 4 there shouldn't be any problem right?
 
Kartina said:
Actually I think jp vouchers should work right? If I buy 10000 yen in eshop cards and buy a jp voucher for zelda and pikmin 4 there shouldn't be any problem right?
Click to expand...
You need to have Switch Online and am sure 7 day trial for this will not work.
 
Kartina said:
I have it on my main account and I can just switch that one in japanese and buy the vouchers in the japanese eshop right?
Click to expand...
Checked online and seems like people are saying it works. I never changed regions, I prefer to have each account for different regions.
 
LukasManak22 said:
Checked online and seems like people are saying it works. I never changed regions, I prefer to have each account for different regions.
Click to expand...
I changed regions in the past to download the famicom and super famicom app and it worked without problems so I think it should work with vouchers too.
 
I did it through Amazon Japan so I could buy two vouchers for like $75. It definitely still works, at least with a U.S. credit card.
 
During the first year of the Switch I was able to buy from the Japanese eShop directly with my Chilean credit card. Not sure if it still works.
 
0
Kartina said:
Sadly the amazon jp strat doesn't work anymore, i tried with both a fake address and vpn and they still won't sell the eshop codes outside of japan.
That guide is outdated
Click to expand...
Works for me, I remember that somehow I set my country as japan in my profile.
 
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