Topic: Nintendo DSi (Read 2039 times)

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1) Those guys were saying they wanted it as an addon for the GBA slot, thus on a regular DS.  Therefore, what you're saying isn't the same argument I was replying to.  However, games released that use the camera will be DSi only, so you're buying a DSi anyway.  An addon is not likely to work since the games using the camera rely on the exact positioning of the camera (dead center) where it is on the DSi.
2) I'm not sure about it always being on (did you read this somewhere?  I'd like to see it), but in that case it would be much easier just to change the system to save power by not leaving the camera on instead of making some dumb addon that won't work properly.
1. I want the camera as an addon for the GBA slot on a regular DS. It would have been easier and cheaper to do, and I wouldn't have to buy a new DS if there was any games using the camera that I did want to play (I already own a perfectly fine, working DS, why should I have to buy a new one just to play some games?).
Also, the positioning of the camera at the moment seems like a pointless issue to mention. If you take a look, in the video in this topic that features a game using the camera, it has instruction on where the DSi should be placed. I doubt it matters where the camera on the DS is placed, you'll always have to position or hold the DS in the correct way to make ideal use of the camera. Though, if the camera was an addon, they could have stuck it on hinges and made it adjustable
2. I can't remember where I read it, on some site giving the DSi a review. But the point still remains, this issue could have been easily avoided if the camera was an addon, not an inbuilt feature. And for all we know, the camera might not turn off because of some hardware related issue, not software issue (haha, there is your major upgrade for the next version of the DSi, the camera can now be turned off!).

If you ask me, the camera would have worked better as an addon for a variety of reasons. It is quiet obvious the only reason it is not an addon is because Nintendo want you to buy your 3rd DS.
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2. The camera addon decreases the battery life of the DSi. It is always on, even if it is not being used.
I highly doubt this. Bigger screens and a more powerful processor are probably the main culprits, but this sounds like a load of shit!
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That and the fact the DSi has less mAh in it's battery than the DS lite (850 compared to 1000).
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I want the camera as an addon for the GBA slot on a regular DS. It would have been easier and cheaper to do, and I wouldn't have to buy a new DS if there was any games using the camera that I did want to play (I already own a perfectly fine, working DS, why should I have to buy a new one just to play some games?).

I own a perfectly fine Playstation, why did I have to buy a PS2 for the handful of games I wanted to play?  I guarantee only a handful of games are going to use the camera, and they aren't going to be worth it.  If they are worth so much to you that you HAVE to have them and would buy a detachable camera to play them, I doubt you'd be so against selling your current DS and paying the difference.  In fact, you would probably end up paying the same price you would if Nintendo sold it separately.  A regular DS plus the camera would almost DEFINITELY cost as much as the DSi.  I'm not just making excuses for Nintendo, I don't consider the DSi or any of its games so far to be worth the purchase at all, but if you think the games are worth buying a separate, overly expensive camera for (thank god....I can play a WarioWare game that doesn't even function properly as shown in the video), then there's no reason to think Nintendo is ripping you off as-is.  You'd be ripped off by buying the camera, you might as well just stop fussing about it and be ripped off the regular way like everyone else.
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A regular DS plus the camera would almost DEFINITELY cost as much as the DSi.
But if you already have a DS (like 99% of the population) then a regular DS plus a DSi would cost a lot more than just a shitty little thing to plug in your bottom of the DS and a normal DS.

I own a perfectly fine Playstation, why did I have to buy a PS2 for the handful of games I wanted to play?
Because you can't buy a new processor, RAM and graphics card to put in your PS1...
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But if you already have a DS (like 99% of the population) then a regular DS plus a DSi would cost a lot more than just a shitty little thing to plug in your bottom of the DS and a normal DS.

No it wouldn't, this is a really DUMB assumption.  DS (Lite) prices on ebay are roughly $130, and you could possibly sell them for more.  The DSi is $170 on Amazon.  Consider the fact that the Game Boy Camera was $50 (iirc) when it came out and an Xbox Live camera is around $32, and you'll realize that you're spending roughly the same amount.  You just want it to be bulkier and more ridiculous, and you want an extra thing to carry around in your pocket.  Also,

Quote
Because you can't buy a new processor, RAM and graphics card to put in your PS1...
You can't add any of these things to the DS either.  Oh wait, but they just added a camera, it's not like they added a bigger screen (which can affect games btw), an SD slot, a different CPU and RAM, or other things that change how the system works or anything right?  It's just the camera.
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No it wouldn't, this is a really DUMB assumption.  DS (Lite) prices on ebay are roughly $130, and you could possibly sell them for more.  The DSi is $170 on Amazon.  Consider the fact that the Game Boy Camera was $50 (iirc) when it came out and an Xbox Live camera is around $32, and you'll realize that you're spending roughly the same amount.  You just want it to be bulkier and more ridiculous, and you want an extra thing to carry around in your pocket. 
It's also a dumb assumption to assume that everyone is willing to sell their DS' on eBay. Plus I dont know how things are doing over in the US but on ebay (UK) a DS lite costs about £80, as opposed to the £145 DSi off of Amazon. That's a £65 difference. Hell, you only need £15 and you can buy TWO DS lites for £160.
You can't add any of these things to the DS either.  Oh wait, but they just added a camera, it's not like they added a bigger screen (which can affect games btw), an SD slot, a different CPU and RAM, or other things that change how the system works or anything right?  It's just the camera.
But did they really NEED to add all of those things? We don't truly know yet, I'll admit, but they better make damn use of it all then.

edit: yeah, i cant be arsed with this anymore. in my eyes it's a shitty idea, which is too expensive for the time being and just... pointless. im done here.
Last Edit: April 07, 2009, 11:37:20 pm by Pink
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No it wouldn't, this is a really DUMB assumption.  DS (Lite) prices on ebay are roughly $130, and you could possibly sell them for more.  The DSi is $170 on Amazon.  Consider the fact that the Game Boy Camera was $50 (iirc) when it came out and an Xbox Live camera is around $32, and you'll realize that you're spending roughly the same amount.  You just want it to be bulkier and more ridiculous, and you want an extra thing to carry around in your pocket.  Also,
You can't add any of these things to the DS either.  Oh wait, but they just added a camera, it's not like they added a bigger screen (which can affect games btw), an SD slot, a different CPU and RAM, or other things that change how the system works or anything right?  It's just the camera.

they're really that expensive now?  Wow, I did pretty well with getting my DSlite from ebay for 70 dollars a year ago
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But did they really NEED to add all of those things? We don't truly know yet, I'll admit, but they better make damn use of it all then.

If they didn't NEED to add a camera, then you don't NEED to play the games that use it.  That's all I can really say about that!

Also eBay prices are horribly inconsistent but it was the only real example I could get since there's no universal price for selling used things.  I've won several one cent auctions on ebay, but that doesn't mean those people couldn't have gotten more from them.
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I own a perfectly fine Playstation, why did I have to buy a PS2 for the handful of games I wanted to play?  I guarantee only a handful of games are going to use the camera, and they aren't going to be worth it.  If they are worth so much to you that you HAVE to have them and would buy a detachable camera to play them, I doubt you'd be so against selling your current DS and paying the difference.  In fact, you would probably end up paying the same price you would if Nintendo sold it separately.  A regular DS plus the camera would almost DEFINITELY cost as much as the DSi.  I'm not just making excuses for Nintendo, I don't consider the DSi or any of its games so far to be worth the purchase at all, but if you think the games are worth buying a separate, overly expensive camera for (thank god....I can play a WarioWare game that doesn't even function properly as shown in the video), then there's no reason to think Nintendo is ripping you off as-is.  You'd be ripped off by buying the camera, you might as well just stop fussing about it and be ripped off the regular way like everyone else.
But the PS2 was at the time brand new software and hardware, not just slightly upgraded versions of what the PS1 has (lets not forget the years of research and development the PS2 had, and the hundreds of millions of dollars that cost). The DSi is basically a DS with slightly better hardware and a camera.
It'd be more accurate to compare a PS2 slim to an older PS2 (there is a very minor improvement to hardware).

Also, I fail to see how a DS + camera addon would cost as much as a new DSi. Unless I did not already own a DS, even then, I'd guess a DS and camera addon would still be cheaper than a new DSi.

I can buy a brand new DS Lite for £70. Lets assume that a camera addon would cost £40-50, that is still only £110-120, a new DSi costs £140-150.
If I want a DSi now, I have already paid £90 for my DS, and can trade it in and get half the price knocked off a DSi, so that is £90 for the original DS, and £70 for the DSi, a total of £160.
If I attempted to sell my DS on ebay, I'd get maybe £30-40 for it, which would result in me paying a total of (90-40)+140, or £190, which is even more.

No matter how you look at it, it is more expensive to buy a DSi that it would be to buy a DS and camera addon. You are crazy, or really bad at math if you cannot see this!

BUUUUTTTT... I also cannot realistically sell or trade in my current DS either. If I did, I would be left with 11 useless GBA games. And then have to splash out EVEN more cash to buy a GBA to play them. (Apparently, it will be possible to buy them with this DSWare or whatever it is called, but Nintendo can get fucked if they think I am going to buy a game I already fucking own)

The point is. IF in the future a game that is DSi only (for whatever reason) is released and I want it, I am forced to spend a lot of money on a console that I basically already own. And I cannot spend or trade in my old DS because then I cannot play some games and have to spend even more money so I can play those too.
People in my situation are fucked either way basically. Because to get the best of both the DS and DSi I have to spend a whole ton of money, which wouldn't and shouldn't be necessary if they simply made a camera addon.
Nintendo are good at one thing, forcing people to buy stuff they already own!
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The new games using the camera very likely use the upgraded hardware in order to process the camera information.  Do you not see why this won't work for an addon?  Sorry, but at this point, all I can say to this

Quote
The point is. IF in the future a game that is DSi only (for whatever reason) is released and I want it, I am forced to spend a lot of money on a console that I basically already own.

is you're out of luck.  Nintendo is releasing games for an updated console.  You either get it to get the new games or you don't, it's not up to you what hardware they use or how they implement these games!  It's not the same thing that you already own, it's the slightly better model.  It's like cars, there are cars that differ slightly between models, but you can't insist that because they both get you somewhere and look a lot the same that you deserve the same perks, especially when one is newer.  If you want the games that use the camera, you have to get the system with the camera.  If you want the games from the DSishop, you have to get the system that supports it.  You're just fussy with Nintendo because it's not worth the money to you to replace your DS.  That's your problem, not Nintendo's.  It doesn't matter if they didn't make a huge jump between the technologies, a lot of electronics work this way.  You can't argue that it's not fair that you have to buy a new computer sometimes to play the latest games.  That's how electronics work, and insisting that Nintendo goes out of its way to not take advantage of their updated hardware in order to keep you in the loop is ridiculous.  If you don't like it, don't buy Nintendo products instead of complaining about them.
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The new games using the camera very likely use the upgraded hardware in order to process the camera information.  Do you not see why this won't work for an addon?  Sorry, but at this point, all I can say to this

is you're out of luck.  Nintendo is releasing games for an updated console.  You either get it to get the new games or you don't, it's not up to you what hardware they use or how they implement these games!  It's not the same thing that you already own, it's the slightly better model.  It's like cars, there are cars that differ slightly between models, but you can't insist that because they both get you somewhere and look a lot the same that you deserve the same perks, especially when one is newer.  If you want the games that use the camera, you have to get the system with the camera.  If you want the games from the DSishop, you have to get the system that supports it.  You're just fussy with Nintendo because it's not worth the money to you to replace your DS.  That's your problem, not Nintendo's.  It doesn't matter if they didn't make a huge jump between the technologies, a lot of electronics work this way.  You can't argue that it's not fair that you have to buy a new computer sometimes to play the latest games.  That's how electronics work, and insisting that Nintendo goes out of its way to not take advantage of their updated hardware in order to keep you in the loop is ridiculous.  If you don't like it, don't buy Nintendo products instead of complaining about them.
Bu... But... I thought the whole point of a console was that they were a single platform that was the same for everyone, thus guaranteeing universal support for any games released on said console for all owners of said console.
If I am having to buy upgrades for my console every year... What is the fucking point? Why not just... Use a PC, which pretty much everyone on the planet owns. They are have much more uses, cheaper (if you know about them) and from a developers point of view, have a much larger market, and if I am having to upgrade my consoles every year or two, PCs are superior to consoles in everyway possible for gaming. Why even bother with consoles anymore? All these video game developers must be crazy for even developing games on a console!

Oh wait... I am pretty sure Nintendo are the only console developer ever to release "upgrades" for their consoles, and then try and force people into buying these upgrades (except you cannot actually just buy the upgrade, you have to buy a new console).

Mannn... Nintendo and Nintendrones really are a fucking cancer on the gaming industry, hopefully Microsoft and Sony don't start making upgrades for their consoles and then trying to force people into buying these upgrades (in the form of a new console!).

Someone think of a witty name to call Nintendo that somehow relates to their money making tactics (kind of like how people call Microsoft "Micro$oft").
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Someone think of a witty name to call Nintendo that somehow relates to their money making tactics (kind of like how people call Microsoft "Micro$oft").
Nintne$ndo

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The NDS specs are not significantly different from the DSi specs.

Here are your DS specs.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nintendo_DS

Here are your DSi specs.
http://www.joystiq.com/2008/10/02/nintendo-dsi-vs-psp-3000-vs-ipod-touch-v1-0/

Practically the same ram and processor. The screen size is probably the only caveat for porting DSi games to the DS. That's right, you're paying $150 bucks for an extra quarter of an inch. I kin haz moar pixzels!

This was a bad marketing move. First, it was bad timing -- coincided with a shitty economic downturn, which means less people are inclined to buy it. They would've made *alot* more money milking the DS and then releasing (a better version of) the DSi after a rebound. Two, many people are already content with their DS, so they won't buy a new system. I have yet to compare the sales figures, but I guarantee that the DS sales were far higher than the DSi sales. Three, most people recognize that the add-ons the the DSi are just bullshit peripherals, which actually acts as a disincentive to buy the product. Four, there is actually a market for those peripherals, which gets in the way of their sales (E.G. the SD-GBA cart I mentioned). All in all, they're touting a DS clone with a lower battery life, of which the only saving grace is a camera and a networking system that will probably end up trafficking cp.
Last Edit: April 08, 2009, 06:32:31 am by Juris
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Actually Juris, in Japan, the DSL has taken a dip in light of the DSi, according to Media Create the DSi should be more than 600,000+ over the DSL for the year come this week's report.  No idea what is going on in other territories (seeing as it just released elsewhere) but at least in Europe the DSi has managed to beat out all other gaming platforms for the week and not too long ago GAME noted that their DSi preorders eclipsed that of the DSL's; it's at least having a stronger start.  It was also noted prior to launch that DSi preorders were more than double the DSL according to Gamestop.  Not sure how things will be in the long term and we probably won't be able to see how DSi fares outside of Japan for at least another month. (DSi likely won't be reflected in the upcoming NPD report which covers March data despite it extending a bit into April)

EDIT:  Apparently, there will be word that DSi/Lite sales won't be separated in NPD.  Wouldn't be surprised if those particulars were leaked somehow anyway or if Nintendo comes out and gives numbers, but otherwise...

In any case, the DSi isn't so much a replacement in a sense of being a DS2 though more of an extension on the original product.  In time, unless Nintendo slowly kills off the DSL (In Europe, they're killing off two of the colors because those SKUs are underperforming compared to the others, not sure if that spells anything at the moment) I think the DSL may fare better on price alone, but I think you're making too much of the idea that there isn't a market for the DSi.  It's essentially the same platform but if you really want all the bells and whistles it's there for you, if you don't, the DSLite is still there as well, either way you'll still be able to get your kicks on the next Pokemon or Ace Attorney game or whatever.  It's just taht with the DSi's enhancements the experience can be taken further if you care to go that route.  Those who are content with the original DSL can stay content with it, however there are those that might want to upgrade from that to the next thing.  Heck, I know people who still have the DS"Phat" when they could have since gotten a DSL quite some time ago..
Last Edit: April 08, 2009, 09:33:20 am by Kezay
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The NDS specs are not significantly different from the DSi specs.

It has FOUR TIMES the amount of RAM, do you really think that can't possibly affect games to where they wouldn't work on the original DS?

Look guys, I'm not disagreeing with you that this isn't enough of an upgrade to be worth buying it--I probably won't unless something good for it comes out that is worth buying it a few years down the line--so why would you complain about them releasing DSi specific games and not making a camera for the old DSi?  They plan on doing it like the gameboy-gameboy color upgrade:  Some games are for the original DS and won't be different on the DSi, some will be an in-between that just has special features on the DSi (like several gameboy color games had), and some are DSi-only (remember gameboy color-only games?).  It's the same exact thing.  The only difference is that buying this system doesn't make sense to me and so I won't do it, whereas you guys all seem like you deserve to have compatibility between two systems that have very different capabilities.  There's just no reason for this.  Why not just use a PC?  I don't know, why not?  The DS has been out for five years, it's about the right time for some sort of upgrade, even if it's not as much as you want.  It's just the same as the switch from the gameboy to gameboy color, if you don't like the way Nintendo handles its hardware, then stop buying their products instead of insisting on them changing them.
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The NDS specs are not significantly different from the DSi specs.

Here are your DS specs.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nintendo_DS

Here are your DSi specs.
http://www.joystiq.com/2008/10/02/nintendo-dsi-vs-psp-3000-vs-ipod-touch-v1-0/

Practically the same ram and processor. The screen size is probably the only caveat for porting DSi games to the DS. That's right, you're paying $150 bucks for an extra quarter of an inch. I kin haz moar pixzels!



No. Joystiq can duck sick. They need to do more research. The DSi has a main processor with a clock speed of 133mhz compared to DS Lite's 67 mhz. This handles 3D graphics coupled with the 4 times ram it'll make a huge difference.
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yo juris maybe you missed that the article was from OCTOBER and had this little footnote with the processor speeds
Quote
2: Architecture of the DS Lite and, as noted, subject to change pending official release notes

also yeah i don't see why people are acting like this is an every couple of years thing. I mean the DS Lite came out just 3 years ago, BUT there was no compatibility difference between it and the DS. if you bought a ds lite already owning a ds that's 100% your fault! a 5 year support life is pretty long for a handheld, especially when they haven't stopped making games for it yet.

EDIT: and for the record i don't own any ds, and don't plan to.
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I feel like the DS Lite is what made everyone forget how old the DS is.  tbh I'm really surprised that it's as old as it is, it doesn't feel that old to me either!
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