3DS on it’s way
Well, not for a while yet, but the handheld will be unveiled at this year’s E3.
Details at this point are sketchy, but what Nintendo has confirmed is that the DS successor, the 3DS, will have 3D capability without the need for any sort of glasses to perceive the effect. Nintendo have also stated that the new handheld will be completely backwards compatible, so you’ll still be able to play the full library of DS and DSi titles.
At this point, confirmed details of the handheld run dry, and the rest comes from speculation from newspapers in Japan. Japan’s largest newspaper, Yomiuri Shimbun, says that the 3D technology being used by Nintendo comes from Sharp’s 3D LDC panel, which works by having a thin film suspended slightly above the actual screen, which each eye interprets slightly differently, causing the image to look three dimensional. Personally this sounds like a great way to feel nauseous after a short while of game play, but I’m sure Nintendo wouldn’t have gone down this road should that be the case.
The Nihon Keizai Shimbun, a Japanese newspaper usually entrusted to break all Nintendo news, has reported that Nintendo is planning to use an analogue stick for controlling characters in 3D, and rumble technology is also expected for the new handheld. Both odd notions to me. To continue with a sleek design, the idea of an analogue stick seems somewhat of a sore thumb, and it makes me wonder if they’re planning on sticking with the same folded design. I certainly hope so.
Supposedly the new 3DS will also have much better battery life and wireless, but the screens aren’t set to go as large as the DSi XL - watch that chunky hardware sit on shelves for a long time to come! - but will have an accelerometer, which is the same technology that allows electronic devices to know when they are being tilted, so you’re already familiar with this if you’ve played a Wii, even if you didn’t know the fancy name for it.
That’s all the info that’s out there at the moment. No one eve knows what the thing is going to look like, but I do have to wonder why Nintendo announced it just days before the DSi XL hit shelves everywhere other than Japan. Just on IGN I saw many comments on the 3DS article from people saying that they’d just cancelled their pre-orders for the DSi XL. Seems a faux par, but still, the handheld is not set to ship until March next year, and that’s only for Japan.
