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Europe Sees Launch of Nintendo DS
Eurogamer has coverage from last week's launch of the Nintendo DS handheld in the EU. The article covers the improving opinion of the handheld in Europe, and sales are reportedly already going quite well. From the article: "The dual screens were sensibly sized, the touch screen robust and responsive, the stylus well kept, the buttons pretty well distributed, the size and weight of the thing surprisingly comfortable, the list of games as long as your arm and the technical gubbins and service potential far greater than any other handheld." The BBC has details as well.
They must have gotten an entirely different set of games. Last I checked, there were about 15 or so games for it here in the states, which even in a large typeface would make a list roughly the length of my hand.
This flies in the face of science.
Its the first handheld i've bought. The touch screen really had me interested. Just thinking of how they could use it. The battery life is great too. Its been lasting a day of a lot of play since i got it.
Which was one of my reasons for getting it instead of a psp. I wanted a handheld game device. Not a dvd playing, graphic intensive (read: battery hog) handheld. I already have a dvd player and would buy a portable dvd player if i felt the need for one. I doubt the psp will gain the support of the film industry. How many films are actually going to get released on UMDs.
I'm very happy with its features; wireless multiplayer + single cart multiplayer, touch screen and the microphone. I have an xbox for the more graphic intensive games. When i'm playing a handheld gameplay is much more important.
Now i'm looking forward to the proposed internet play with Animal Crossing DS.
My only quibble is the launch games are a bit lacking. Only mario 64 ds and wario touched interested me and wario was sold out.
What a dumbass - does it need to be spelt out? It means all the Gameboy Advance titles that you can get also, which is a huge library. Conversely, the PSP only has PSP games available on launch. Duh.
That said, I saw the display unit at a local Game store and amazingly the unit was intact!
This particular store suffers from a constant barrage of youths with their oily clambering hands and scratchy unkempt nails, but still the DS remained in one piece, with no visible scratches on the touch screen, and all controls functioning correctly.
If it can survive the kind of punishement that only 60 days of teenage rampancy can inflict, then I feel a lot happier about its longevity.
From Eurogamer article:
So I wasn't the only one who has the automatical reaction of playing GB Tetris on any new GB hardware? =) That certainly was the first game I played with my original GB, the GBA and GB Player.
Due to my personal distinct lack of any and all GBA versions of Tetris, I had to settle for Rampage Puzzle Attack, which indeed had unprecedented picture clarity on this amazing backlit screen.
There's still one original GB's accessory that I use: the headphones. =) And if I can't find a proper carrying bag for DS soon, I may need to use the original GB bag too (which isn't too good for carrying around GBA/DS games, though...)