New DS confirmed

[Akoji]

... viral marketing?

 

[Deleted member 76381]

...people care about the Pandora?

 

[Dunny]

...people care about the Pandora?

They must do - the first 2000 sold out in 2 hours

Don't get me wrong, I love my DSL and wouldn't get rid of it for the world - but when something as powerful as the Pandora comes along, it's too good to pass up. Did I mention that mine will have 64gb of storage on it, btw?

D.

 

[miketh2005]

looks very cool, buying domain names now

 

[Minox]

...people care about the Pandora?

They must do - the first 2000 sold out in 2 hours

Don't get me wrong, I love my DSL and wouldn't get rid of it for the world - but when something as powerful as the Pandora comes along, it's too good to pass up. Did I mention that mine will have 64gb of storage on it, btw?

D.

It won't have 64GB storage on it. Just 256MB onboard and 2 SDHC card slots that could use 2*32GB SDHCs.

 

[Deleted member 76381]

...people care about the Pandora?

They must do - the first 2000 sold out in 2 hours

Don't get me wrong, I love my DSL and wouldn't get rid of it for the world - but when something as powerful as the Pandora comes along, it's too good to pass up. Did I mention that mine will have 64gb of storage on it, btw?

D.

Granted (and wow, only 2000 for a "launch"?), but look at this from the point of view of the Everyman, He Who is Ignorant of Piracy. What does the Pandora offer him? Sure, you can say anything and everything about how this can emulate so many systems and perfectly too, but how is the Everyman going to know about that? And to further my point, let's say he does find out about it, but he takes the moral highroad to this and refuses to pirate despite how well the Pandora will allow him to play so many games. Then that benefits him even less-so than it could have to begin with.

Not trying to be a little bitch or anything, but you have to see these things in a different viewpoint, which is difficult since almost all of us here steal games. =P The DSi wasn't made to concede to us, since we're not even a factor (debatable). The DS was made to cater to gamers, yet it has a fairly rampant piracy issue. The Pandora...well, apart from piracy, what else can do you do with it?

Then again, that whole argument completely ignores the PSP and we all know how that one went, eh?

 

[doyama]

A few things that are somewhat annoying from looking at this

http://weekly.ascii.jp/2008/10/ds_i.html

1) The stylus is slightly longer on the new version. Possible that your current stylus will not be compatible.

????????????

2) AC charger slot shape has been modified. Again means any AC charging things you have now will not be compatible.

AC??????????????????????????

Some things that might be annoying

1) Power button on the inside of the unit. I suppose its possible that if you have giant hands or something that you might press it by accident. I see it more of a problem when holding the DS vertically, where you might press it by accident.

2) Volume is controlled by buttons. This is a personal thing I guess if you like buttons or the old slider. Again because it's right next to the D pad on the side, if you have fat hands you might activate this by accident a lot.

 

[Deleted member 76381]

A few things that are somewhat annoying

1) The stylus is slightly longer on the new version. Possible that your current stylus will not be compatible.
2) AC charger slot has been modified.

Some things that might be annoying

1) Power button on the inside of the unit. I suppose its possible that if you have giant hands or something that you might press it by accident. I see it more of a problem when holding the DS vertically, where you might press it by accident.

2) Volume is controlled by buttons. This is a personal thing I guess if you like buttons or the old slider. Again because it's right next to the D pad on the side, if you have fat hands you might activate this by accident a lot.

The first half:
1.) Same issue from DS -> DS Lite. I have a Wii wriststrap with the Lite stylus attached because of my mammoth hands. XD
2.) Same thing with the DS -> Lite too. Probably why I'm so irritated looking for DS Phat-compatible stuff because nothing is anymore, it's all Lite instead. And now, everything will be DSi-only.

And second half:
1.) The original DS had power on the inside too, same side, just directly above the control pad. Considering you have to press the button for about a solid half-to-a-full second for the system to power off, I didn't find that to be a big problem. My thumb never goes to where the switch is now anyway.
2.) That's new, and I kinda wonder how that's going to go. I mean yeah, you're SOL if the buttons break, but aren't you equally-so if your slider fucks up on you? I've always had problems trying to get the DS to be quiet, but still audible without headphones, and doing that with a slider takes very minute touches to ease it to the right just enough...maybe buttons are a better way to go. I gotta try it to be sure.

Never had a Lite myself so I think I'd be more adjusted to these changes since it seems like they brought together ideas of the old and new DSes for this thing.

 

[Dunny]

...people care about the Pandora?

They must do - the first 2000 sold out in 2 hours

Don't get me wrong, I love my DSL and wouldn't get rid of it for the world - but when something as powerful as the Pandora comes along, it's too good to pass up. Did I mention that mine will have 64gb of storage on it, btw?

D.

Granted (and wow, only 2000 for a "launch"?), but look at this from the point of view of the Everyman, He Who is Ignorant of Piracy. What does the Pandora offer him? Sure, you can say anything and everything about how this can emulate so many systems and perfectly too, but how is the Everyman going to know about that? And to further my point, let's say he does find out about it, but he takes the moral highroad to this and refuses to pirate despite how well the Pandora will allow him to play so many games. Then that benefits him even less-so than it could have to begin with.

3,000 for the launch. Small beans indeed - but there are three guys who have to buy components and build every one of them. There's no fab-plant involved. Also they have to stump up with their own money, so can't afford very many. Another batch (probably another 6,000) should be along in 2009, and more after that. They just don't have the cash behind them that other companies do.

You're absolutely right, of course - the markets that the two consoles are aimed at are very, very different - and I'd be surprised if the majority of GBATempers even knew of the pandora's existence (and we're usually pretty clued-up around here). And there's the price too - a pandora is almost twice the cost of a DSL, and so doesn't appeal to the teenager that the DS usually does. All things considered, the DSi will probably sell bucket-loads and the pandora will not. That's not to say it's not going to be a success though. Ninty is a multi-million dollar establishment, whereas openpandora is a team of three guys. Ninty may make a shitload of cash, but it's a drop in the ocean compared to their usual profits. The pandora team have sold 3000 pandoras at $330 a pop, which they can spread between them (after buying components). That's a fuckload of cash for just three guys. In those terms, they've already succeeded.

But no, it will never be mainstream, and it won't ever compete with sony or ninty's offerings - good job it's not meant to.

QUOTE

Not trying to be a little bitch or anything, but you have to see these things in a different viewpoint, which is difficult since almost all of us here steal games. =P The DSi wasn't made to concede to us, since we're not even a factor (debatable). The DS was made to cater to gamers, yet it has a fairly rampant piracy issue. The Pandora...well, apart from piracy, what else can do you do with it?

Heh. "what else?" - I'll ignore that for the time being, there's so much I could ramble on about that it can do, besides games and emulators

I think the most appealing aspect of the pandora is that when ninty announced the DSi, they went to the community and said "this is what you want in a handheld". The Pandora crew went to their community and said "what do you want in a handheld?" The pandora guys didn't design it, the community did. We're getting everything we asked for, which is a gamer's dream come true.

And it's a shame that it won't get the success of the vastly inferior Nintendo offering, but that's life. And it won't detract from the pleasure I've had in playing all the really classic and cool games that my DSL gave me. For me at least though, this news from the big N is the final nail in the coffin - I'm tired of being told what I want, and what I can have, and now I get to decide.

And I can code for it without anyone telling me I can't. Epic WIN.

Back on topic -

I don't think that GBA games will ever be a factor again, now. The DS doesn't have the horsepower to emulate the GBA well enough - though the recent megadrive progress has been astonishing even for a seasoned emu-author like me, I suppose anything is theoretically possible. I would say this though - if GBA emulation was possible, it would have been done by now simply using RAM expansions. It hasn't - it's run on native hardware with extra RAM via slot-2. With the removal of slot 2, I suspect a lot of the extra GBA hardware (not the ARM7, but certainly the display hardware) will be removed to make room for the camera and extra tat.

And that's why I don't lay out another $180 on the new DSi, but will be buying another DSL for the missus at xmas - she loves her GBA games, and when packaged up in the same box as brain training and other puzzlers, she's in heaven.

Assuming the DSL is still available, of course.

D.

 

[zlac]

All I'm interested is hardware processing power, will it be the same as old DS or will it be more powerfull...
I saw some PSP games for the first time few days ago, and I have to say it would be really sweet to have graphics like that on DS.

It's quite sad that PSP poker looks way better than DS state-of-the-art games!

 

[Deleted member 76381]

You have a lot of good points. And yes, I didn't know jack shit about the Pandora apart from it being a clamshell design and that one picture of it that was on here a few days ago. The fact that three guys are taking even a minor share in a mostly-Nintendo-somewhat-Sony handheld market is indeed interesting. Best of luck to them, despite the fact that all odds are against them, and their biggest draw to gamers is what could potentially land them all in jail. =P The whole "tape recorders are illegal" argument again, oh brother.

I'm a cheap-ass using the DS I got for Christmas three years ago and a slot-2 flashcart I got the summer afterwards. Outdated to the max, you can say. I'm lucky that most of the games coming out now still work with the slot-2, compared to most slot-1s having 99.99% compatibility with no patching (I'm also using a firmware that hasn't been updated since Mega Man ZX Advent (U) was out, and that STILL doesn't work). But it gets me by. I got a PSP fully-knowing I was going to hack that thing as soon as I could, and I even bought a second memory card just for PS1 and emulators.

Why am I rambling again? I don't know. But anyway, yeah. It unfortunately doesn't matter how much more powerful one system is over another, it's all about the support. The original Gameboy defeated the superior Game Gear by a large margin. Why? Better games for one (and Pokemon moved systems like you wouldn't believe), and the Game Gear had a monstrous battery eating habit. The GG was a bit before its time though, so that's something that would come back to haunt Sega again during the Dreamcast (at least in America where it failed horribly, unfortunately).

I think I'm done here now. =P

 

[gussesa]

will have compatibility with FLASHCARDS?
I HOPE YES....

 

[NeSchn]

Damn, I want this. Maybe I will ask for it for X-Mas!

 

[sirhiro]

I just hope this 'new firmware' doesn't stop flashcarts from operating..

 

[Agjsdfd]

SO.. we will be able to connect it with Wii?
Is it gonna be region locked, or can we just play any region games like the DS, if so then am gonna get it on launch =)

 

[Roman_42]

This can't be true, useless Cameras and internal storage space for useless multimedia stuff for the price of the good old GBA slot and that's it? That's the new Nintendo Handheld? I don't believe it. This can't be, they gonna be smoked by the next Sony handheld.

This is not a DS2, this is just a DS revision. Like the PSP Slim&Lite or PSP 3000.

Yes, but unlike the update from the old DS to the DS Lite they didn't just improve the handheld, this time they've changed it.

New DS games which require a Camera and internal memory won't work anymore on the DS Lite/Phat.
Old DS games which require the GBA slot won't work on the DSi anymore.

So IMHO this is almost a new system.

 

[BORTZ]

Holy crap im so over whelmed. i want it but money is tight with college and stuff. and i just sent away for a new shell for my dsl. crap.

 

[Gore]

Bah, I'll be getting a job, I'll give my DSlite to my brother and buy one of these.
After a PSP of course.

 

[Dunny]

One thing that has occurred to me -

This lack of a slot-2 option is a little disturbing. Everyone knows that piracy is rampant on the DS. If a game company wants to ensure that there are maximum sales of their game then the best way would be to include an extra that you can't get by pirating.

The guitar-hero grip. Motion sensor. Paddle controller. Edit: There's also the Browser add-on. I know that Opera is being bundled in with the system firmware (possibly), but someone was selling that browser for the DS, and now they can't.

None of those can be used by the pirate unless he or she buys the game. And the games are nowhere near as much fun without them.

Looks like the removal of the slot-2 is

a) Going to make things easier for pirates \o/
b) a huge kick in the nuts for the game studios that offered us these extras, and probably a huge kick in the nuts for their sales potential too.

Erk, eh?

D.

 

[superbob]

Well, I don't know if strategically it's a good idea from Nintendo to release a DS update like that.
The actual DSL is very popular and even it doesn't have the same multimedia capabilities than a PSP, it's for me a "coherent hardware solution".
It seems they released it only to step on the PSP market ...
And I'm not sure leaving GBA slot is a good thing, mainly for expansions (like guitar hero) because it makes the console not totally backward compatible.
I think it was a very bad idea ... (even if they did the same for GBA with GBC support)

Personally I bought my DSL for gaming and this new hardware don't convince me at all for this point (even if I know it's not a new console, just an upgrade).
The only thing I hope is that a new hardware could be available for the actual DSL (WPA security could be great).

I'm a little upset because I was waiting for good ds games for "core gamers" and, instead developping on that, we've got a huge (useless for me) multi-media upgrade...
one more thing to decieve gamers like me ...

Please nintendo, make GAMES (and good ones ...)

EDIT :

The guitar-hero grip. Motion sensor. Paddle controller. Edit: There's also the Browser add-on. I know that Opera is being bundled in with the system firmware (possibly), but someone was selling that browser for the DS, and now they can't.

[...]

Looks like the removal of the slot-2 is [...] a huge kick in the nuts for the game studios that offered us these extras, and probably a huge kick in the nuts for their sales potential too.

I totally agree with you !