Nintendo unveils brand new DS

Story posted at Eurogamer

Nintendo has unveiled the next iteration of the DS at a press conference in Tokyo.

The DSi, as it's called, will have 3.25-inch screens - that's 17 per cent bigger than the current model. It will also feature a 3-megapixel camera.

You'll be able to take pictures with the DSi, save them to SD card and view them on your TV via the Wii. The GBA cartridge slot is being done away with.

The DSi will have a built-in browser, and you'll be able to download games - known as DSiWare - and store them on the SD. Some titles will be free, while others will cost either 200, 500 or 800 Nintendo points (GBP 1.70 / 4.25 / 6.80). There will be a special deal offering customers 1000 points which must be spent before March 2010 - but it's not clear yet what the terms are, or whether the deal will be available in Europe.

A separate DSi Shop selling downloadable software is also being launched. Customers will receive 1000 free points to spend at the shop

The handheld's audio capabilities have been improved - you can now adjust the pitch and playback of sound. This is designed to help with language study and improve the experience of listening to music, apparently.

So what do you think?

update: (thanks to flaminfox)
http://img515.imageshack.us/img515/1...mparionwg9.jpg

More info, and images:

8:10 : The conference is now over.

7:54 : Iwata leaves the stage, and Miyamoto comes up to show Wii Music for the Wii.

7:53 : A new video of Monster Hunter 3 tri- for the Wii has been unveiled.

7:52 : The "mothership" title for the Tales series has been announced.

7:48 : Numbered titles in the Musou series will come to Wii. Sengoku Musou 3 announced for Wii.

7:45 : Nintendo has announced Punch-Out!! for the Wii. Also, Another Code and Sin and Punishment 2 announced for the Wii.

7:41 : Prope, Yuji Naka studio, is developing a Wiimote-free game called Let's Tap. Pikmin will be re-released in the "Wii playable Selection".

7:38 : Animal Crossing : Let's Go to the City for the Wii presentation. It will use both data from the DS version and Mii characters. The game will come with Wii Speak and will be released for 7800 yens (5800 yens without the Wii Speak) on November 20th in Japan.

7:30 : Wii software will be able to be downloaded to SD memory cards. Also, Wii software will be able to be easily copied to internal memory from the SD card. This will be available in Spring 2009.

7:24 : Nintendo is showing new screens and videos from Dragon Quest IX : Protectors of the Starry Sky for the Nintendo DS. The game will be released in March 2009 in Japan.

7:20 : The Nintendo DS and Wii connectivity title Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles : Echoes of Time is being introduced. The game will be released at the same time for both Wii and Nintendo DS on January 29th 2009.

7:19 : The Nintendo DSi presentation has concluded.

7:12 : Nintendo DSi will be released in white and grey-black color variations, and launch on November 1 for 18900 yens in Japan.

7:10 : The Nintendo DSi will come with a browser included.

7:01 : There's also an internal memory for storing apps (Nintendo DS Ware) and games. You can download games via Nintendo DS Shop with "Nintendo Points.". Wii Points will be renamed to become Nintendo Points. Titles will be placed into Free, 200, 500, and Premium (800) categories. DSi systems that connect by March, 2010 will receive 1000 Points as a gift.

7:00 : There's an SD memory card slot. Pictures you take can be viewed on Wii photo channel.

6:59 : Both screens will be increased to 3.25 inches.

6:52 : The size of the unit has been reduced by 12%, 2.6 millimeters thinner, GBA slot will be excluded, bigger screens, better speakers system, 300,000 pixels camera. Only one screen will be touch panel, and photographs should be able to be manipulated through the touch screen.

6:51 : It's going from one system per house to one system per person.

6:37 : New Nintendo DS announced by Iwata, it's called Nintendo DSi.

6:37 : The conference begins.

6:16 : Nintendo is about to start its press conference in Japan in a few minutes.

http://www.gamekyo.com/Webmasters/Im...24_0_small.jpghttp://www.gamekyo.com/Webmasters/Im...41_0_small.jpg
http://www.gamekyo.com/Webmasters/Im...00_0_small.jpghttp://www.gamekyo.com/Webmasters/Im...10_0_small.jpg
http://www.gamekyo.com/Webmasters/Im...23_0_small.jpghttp://www.gamekyo.com/Webmasters/Im...10_1_small.jpg
http://www.gamekyo.com/Webmasters/Im...13_1_small.jpghttp://www.gamekyo.com/Webmasters/Im...13_0_small.jpg
http://www.gamekyo.com/Webmasters/Im...06_0_small.jpghttp://www.gamekyo.com/Webmasters/Im...13_5_small.jpg
http://www.gamekyo.com/Webmasters/Im...13_2_small.jpghttp://www.gamekyo.com/Webmasters/Im...13_3_small.jpghttp://www.gamekyo.com/Webmasters/Im...40_0_small.jpghttp://www.gamekyo.com/Webmasters/Im...13_6_small.jpg

Source

Edit:

Video

DS + SD card = easy hacking?

God, I feel like such a Nintendo-whore.... I WILL be buying this.

Yes yes yes! I need it. No, I take that back. I need at least four, lol. Can't wait to get my hands on one, and it also kills any possibility of me getting the Pandora. Sorry Pandora, you're just to expensive.

Here is the Official Picture in comparison to the DS Lite.

http://img515.imageshack.us/my.php?i...mparionwg9.jpg

Sounds great and all. But won't there be an anti R4 something on there? Or it won't boot non-nintendo cards?

I just worry for the future of homebrew on the new DS. >.>

Although,the SD card thing sounds like easy exploits indeed.

The battery life may be a deal breaker for me. Its great that they made the screen bigger and sound is better, but losing 6 hours of battery life is a big deal.

How often is the camera going to be used anyways? I dont even use the camera on my phone much. I think this is one system i'll pass on unless I can get it very very cheap

ok, i swear the new ds MUST be packing some slightly more powerful parts, there is NO WAY the original ds lite is going to be capable of some of the stuff i saw in the vid...

higher res screen please?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Kraid773

Sounds great and all. But won't there be an anti R4 something on there? Or it won't boot non-nintendo cards?

I just worry for the future of homebrew on the new DS. >.>

Although,the SD card thing sounds like easy exploits indeed.

---

I don't think the exploit will be that easy, the PSP exploint wasn't really an easy thing, and the wii, wich also has an SD slot was even harder, it will depend on how the security was developed and if devs can get around it in any "easy" (cof) way.

it's a 1/3 megapixel camera, not 3 megapixel

300,000 pixels, not 3,000,000

Yeah, i think a number of sites on the web claim its a 3mp.. where others claim its a .3mp..


0.3MP.... ARE THEY SERIOUS, WHY DON'T THEY JUST ADD HALF A QWERTY KEYBOARD IN THERE.

yeah, is it 3 megapixels or 0.3? if it's a vga camera, why bother with two of them? i read somewhere the active resolution was 640 by 480 (vga res).

EDIT: the japanese nintendo ds site has been updated, with the info. i can't read japanese, though, the comparison photo bit is a nice touch

http://www.nintendo.co.jp/ds/dsi.html

It sure looks cool! I want one, but I don't know if I'll buy one... Well, I have to wait until it will be released here, in Europe, in Sweden. Even if I want Nintendo to make a totally now console, I have to admit that they really made an impressive work on this.

*Edit* By the way, does DSi support WPA-encrypted networks? Or is it the same bad networkcard as in the Original/Lite?

Thankfully I already got a DS Lite.

DSi has no GBA slot and is more expensive. No more Guitar Hero, Slot 2 flashcarts, or rumble.

Cellphone camera built in? No thanks.

Get ready for the firmware wars with the new upgradable firmware and flashcarts.

Half battery life on highest screen brightness. Yuck!

BTW wiggy fuzz... the dsi has the same processing power than the ds lite, all those games you saw running there will run on both DS's (except for those which need the camera maybe.

Anyways I think this will be nice, the camera can't be much badder than my handy's.

Man I need money, this sounds good.

Looks like I'm buying a DSi.

Nintendo's on a roll.

The display 3.2 inch is OK :) it will be good if it come with resolution 320x240 or +, and it sucks no TV out , :mad:

I'd actually consider buying this.
DS has some decent games that I'd play. :)

Looks like i'll be staying away from this considering i just bought a supercard lite, guitar hero, and the opera browser....:mad:

The screen sizes, SD slot, Camera, multimedia capabilities and the new DS store seem to be good, but only problem with the new DSI is the screen resolution a 256 x 192 it’s really stinks :eek:, and it will be good if it come with resolution 320x240,:thumbup:

general feeling at the new DSi:

meh


my phone has a camera that is more powerful, and is a video and music player anyway, just like so many other phones out there.

pandora is looking even more tempting here =]_

You have to realize that there's PLENTY about this they're not announcing yet.
For instance, it very well could (and probably does) have plenty of internal RAM. It would have to if it has a built in internet browser.
As for rumble, could also be internal. We don't know for sure.
And they could even provide a "Virtual GBA" ala the Virtual Console...
I'll be buying it, even with a lack of GBA.

But if there is no Slot 2, then you couldn't use the Guitar Hero accessory.

but, guitar hero on tour was never released in japan - nintendo's primary market. other accessories like the slide controller seem to have never made the light of day, and the "ds camera" game thing has been taken care of with the built in camera. play yan (the awesome music player) has now been incorporated into the ds pretty much, and anybody with a large enough collection of GBA games should really still have a gba.

if anything, the original intention of the gba slot was never realised (damn pokemon games - you NEEDED the gba versions completed ti catch everything... outrageous...), so its removal, i doubt, will not be missed much. i only ever put a ram expansion cart in, because it looks cool, a clear dust cover. and the rumble pak sucked eggs, so i won't miss that.

Sucked eggs? No, it sucked batteries.
Seriously. With it, I could only get about two hours at the most of playtime before I had to charge.

The camera is .3 or 0.3 megapixels, not 3.0

300,000 pixels camera - 300k is 0.3 megapixels. 3 mil is 3.0 megapixels.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by purinlove88

The camera is .3 or 0.3 megapixels, not 3.0

---

A lot of sites have been saying 3MP, which would have been quite useful as a camera. But it seems that the camera is actually 0.3MP, which is absolutely pants as a camera. Okay for taking snaps for viewing on the DS & maybe uploading to the net. At that quality clearly it's not intended to be used for taking snaps to print off.

i looks great and all but losing 6 hours just for a tiny bit more screen and a camera(not to mention i already have an R4)
not worth it.

Would have been good if they made the touch screen multi-point like the i-phone/i-touch.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by jaybud4

You have to realize that there's PLENTY about this they're not announcing yet.
For instance, it very well could (and probably does) have plenty of internal RAM. It would have to if it has a built in internet browser.
As for rumble, could also be internal. We don't know for sure.
And they could even provide a "Virtual GBA" ala the Virtual Console...
I'll be buying it, even with a lack of GBA.

---

Aaand, you're right! http://www.gamedaily.com/articles/ne...than-ds/?biz=1
I called it too, this was pretty obvious since the original Opera required that RAM expansion in the GBA slot. I'm guessing they also have WiFi and CPU upgrades that they haven't told us about, mainly because the casual masses don't care about those kinds of things, but we do. At the least more RAM opens up a ton of possibilities for homebrew, even if at first it is blocked by Nintendo. A better CPU would just be icing on the cake. DSLinux, here I come!

There still seems to be a lot of mis-information about the DSi floating around on the net. People are still talking about 3MP camera, dual touch screens, details of the region-locking etc. There are some decent resources out there that confirm some details including an English translation of the Nintendo press conference were the DSi was announced. From this it is clear that the camera is infact 300,000 pixels meaning 0.3MP & not 3MP as speculated on some sites.
http://uk.youtube.com/results?search..._date_uploaded


The region-locking announcement has thrown up some questions. I don't think we yet have a concrete answer to some of these;

Will current commercial DS/DS Lite cards work on the DSi regardless of where they are from? Or will these be blocked by the new hardware?

Will future DS/DS Lite cards also still work on the DSi unless they are DSi specific i.e. that utilise new features of the DSi? Or will all future cards be region locked?

fits in with nintendo's ethos, that "if you bought a ds or a wii, you wouldn't care about specs.

when you're talking a few extra megabits of ram, it wouldn't be much to really shout about.

zomg, this looks crazy.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Epic Pie

zomg, this looks crazy.

---

Crazy meaning good ......... or the other one?

one word:

OBSELESCIENCE!

one word:

OBSELESCIENCE!

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Joel92

one word:

OBSELESCIENCE!

---

You said that twice so it doesn't count :) (you spelt it wrong as well).


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obsolescence