The Quest for the Golden Gargwa Egg

Once upon a time, there was an ordinary man named K who loved to play video games. When he heard that the New Nintendo 3DS XL handheld console was coming out soon, he decided to preorder it on a whim. Little did he know what a treasure he had in his hands...

The four release versions of the New Nintendo 3DS XL for North America (Source: Nintendo)

You see, Nintendo decided to create four designs for North America's launch day:

• standard red
• standard black
• The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask 3D limited edition
• Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate GameStop-exclusive edition

To give you an idea of how rare and desired these things were, the Majora's Mask version sold out on GameStop's website in 15 minutes and was being sold on eBay for $300 (originally $200). And because of the US West Coast labor disputes, it was becoming hard to even find the regular red and black handhelds. As for the Monster Hunter version, well, let's just say they were going on eBay for a whopping $400! And of course, that would be the one that K now had in his hands.

Now, I didn't know or care anything about the new 3DS XL, other then to note how pretty the cover of K's new toy was. K had of course ordered me the Monster Hunter 4 game itself, which I was more than happy to play on my old 3DS XL. But K kept raving on and on about how awesome the new system was, with its improved 3D face tracking, built-in second analog stick, and faster processing speed. Finally, he had convinced himself that I definitely needed to upgrade. Mmm sorry, not interested. There are plenty of other things I'd rather spend $200 on than a new handheld console when my current one works perfectly fine.

No more going cross-eyed when looking at 3D images (Source: GameStop)

But K was on a mission... there was nothing too good for his baby, and I was going to get the best, whether I liked it or not. The selling factor for me was the 3D face tracking where the camera tracks the player's eyes and automatically adjusts the 3D "sweet spot" so that you'll see a crisp 3D view even if you slightly move your head. (Do you know how hard it is to keep your head perfectly still when playing a video game? Yeah, not fun.) "Fine," I told him, "but I want a Monster Hunter one like yours." It was soon afterward that we realized how rare they were, and there was no way I was going to let K spend double the amount to get one.

Now it might surprise you, but in our family K is the shopping expert, and when he wants something hard to find, he uses NowInStock.net as his go-to product availability tracker. Apparently it combs the Internet for hard-to-find items and lets you know as soon as they're back in stock. Using that site, he was able to find a couple red 3DS XLs (my second choice) at Walmart and Toys "R" Us. But then, a random comment was posted about someone was selling an unopened Monster Hunter edition at near original price because she had mistakenly ordered the wrong design and just got the Majora's Mask one that she actually wanted. Now she was looking to give her extra unit to a true Monster Hunter fan - not just someone who would turn around and sell it on eBay for a profit. Therefore, in order to qualify as a buyer, you had to provide proof of your love of monsters.

Check out that crisp, blue dragon logo with the brushed silver metal background... so sexy!

Without me knowing, K submitted my blog as proof, with its many posts dedicated to this love of mine. The seller and her husband ended up going through all the entries, and chose us to be the buyers! How awesome is that!! Better yet, how wonderful is my husband? I can't believe he went through all that effort to procure the perfect system for me. It feels like one of those fairy tales where the hero has to gather three precious treasures – a dress made of starlight, a talking cat, and a goose that lays golden eggs* – from the ends of the earth so he can win the princess' hand in marriage. I'm so thankful that I get to wake up every day to my Prince Charming. #^_^#

* In Monster Hunter, a golden gargwa egg is a rare item that you can sometimes surprise a gargwa bird into dropping. So it's kinda like a golden goose egg. ^_~

Question:
What's the coolest, hard-to-get thing someone has ever gotten for you? Or vice versa, have you ever found something rare for a loved one?