Hardware The reason why there is an infrared port on the 3DS

[Necron]

There is the answer, the IR port will be used to allow multiplayer in NES and GBA games, the IR is easier to adapt to old games than wireless or bluetooth.

Well, FireRed, LeafGreen and Emerald used wireless, so can I see other GBA games adapted to wireless.

 

[commdante]

Lol, MP with infrared? You know it's highly subjective to outer influences right? Also, it's pretty slow. (Only reason for Pokemon to be faster might be because it doesn't have to filter other devices for interuption, so setup of comms is faster, actual trading is done in a fraction of the animation).

And trading with GBC over IR wasn't that bad, just needed to have clean ports and something to cover the top of the area between them (we often used a playing card) to block sunlight.

I doubt there is a camera in there for aiming wiimote controls, but it has already been said(/rumoured) the DS/3DS will (/could) be used on the Wii-U.

The most annoying part of GC-GBA connection was getting enough GBA peeps AND enough cables. Also, it was mandatory and not optional. The 3DS could be used (in certain games bla bla/sometimes) instead of that tablet controller of the Wii-U imo.

Also, I kinda hope they make a VC/3DS eSHop remake of Four Swords Adventures (the GC game) since I never got to play that one much. Internet and voice-chat could be a lot of fun with it.

 

[KidIce]

Nintendo has been trying to get us to use our handhelds as a controller w/ their consoles since the GBA and Cube, only almost no one ever supported that functionality (even them). The only thing I can think of right now that did was Four Swords. And because it never panned out before, they're going to build it into the damn console this time around (I'm talking about the pad, not the 3DS). Good move Nintendo!

It's actually kind of a shame it has never really been supported. It's great for being able to see and do things w/o letting others playing w/ you seeing what your doing. You could use it to pick your plays in a sports game, set and control your units in strategy games, etc. The VMU on the 'Cast was used for this sort of thing.

Anyway... The idea for using IR for communication when it has wireless is just silly. It's not like you'd miss out on trading your Pokemon w/ some random child toucher you met in the bathroom of Chuck E Cheese because you didn't bring a cable. It'd be hopeless for any multiplayer (as pointed out). Any emulator that could allow games to play multiplayer over IR could be coded to use the wireless instead. The only thing it might make sense for is the Pokewalker, and since the 3DS has it's own pedometer a Pokewalker for the 3DS is pretty pointless.

 

[Deleted User]

For Pokémon B/W, dood.

 

[chauffler]

The game boy color had an IR port I just read it on the back of the box case closed

 

[FAST6191]

"easier adapt to old games than wireless or bluetooth"

Very interesting- NES stuff is more or less taken care of by a VNC type arrangement (although if I wanted to be a tart I might consider a measure of data sharing) as the likes of kaillera have done for years now and I would have thought they would have just emulated the GBA (GBA stuff is not especially latency sensitive if memory serves although timing issues are a different matter). This being said wireless and bluetooth do have their own overhead where IR can be pretty much whatever you like in whatever timings you like.