Nintendo DS Lite Hands-on Review

Nintendo DS News writes "Those lucky chaps at Lik Sang have done a hands-on review of the DS Lite, with masses of screenshots and comparisons between the new and old versions. Now, you can officially add whiter, cooler, prettier, sleeker, and overall better to your arsenal of superlatives when describing the Nintendo DS Lite in comparison with the first edition of the Nintendo DS. The new edition has for sure a fashionable look, and appears more modern than the previous model, which many compared to a 'cheap plastic toy from the 20th century' when it first came out.""

Comments

I played with one the other day

[earthbound kid]

I was at J. Toys R Us and tried it out:

My first thought was, "Oh, the screen's not that bright." Then I looked over at one of the old style DSes. It looked so muddy and washed out in comparison! It's definitely a step up. Next, I tried the demo of Animal Crossing... but I didn't learn much from that besides that AC is only interesting when it's your town not some demo character. Mario Kart was much more interesting, because it taught me that the buttons are way more comfortable. The current DS buttons are sort of shallow and hard, but the new buttons are a lot easier on the thumb when you're holding down the gas with all your might. It's also seemingly easier to hit A while holding X, or whatever. The stylus is also better. I almost never use the built-in stylus now, since it's too small to be comfortable, but the new one seems just big enough to be useable.

I'll see if I can manage to find one or not when they go on sale (when the shops open in a couple hours from). I'm actually holding out for the new color, but I told a friend, I'd send her one at low commission. Usually, there isn't much problem getting a hold of things on their release date, but this might be more problematic than usual, since it's supposedly in short supply. We'll see.

Re:I played with one the other day

[grumbel]

### On some games it seems to be bright enough to wash out the colors a bit. I hope the DS Lite's adjustable brightness isn't tipped even further.

The washes out colors aren't the result of the DSs brightness, but the darkness of the original GBA, which forced the developers to use colors brighter then you would normally use to compensate for the dark display. So GBA games look wrong on everything other then the original GBA. Some emulators might counter act that by applying a low gamma before displaying the graphics, sadly none of the original Nintendo hardware does that.

GBA cartridges stick out? No sale.

[SilentChris]

Mark me troll if you want (I carry my DS during every morning and evening commute) but I'm not "upgrading" to a system that will have GBA cartridges sticking out one centimeter from the case. One of the best things about the DS was that you had 2 games ready to go, and the GBA library for classic ports is huge. Here you have an attempt by Nintendo to get people to play more DS titles (the same way GB titles stuck out of the GBA), but how much work would it have been to find the extra CM of space for the cartridge? I mean come on, Nintendo.

Pass. My silver DS works just fine, thank you, and I'll continue to enjoy it for quite a while.

Re:GBA cartridges stick out? No sale.

[meteorwake]

If you have seen the circuit board pictures on the FCC website, you will find that there is simply NO ROOM for both a GBA cart and a DS cart to to fit inside the DS Lite case. Check it out here

As you can see, the back of the GBA and DS connectors are practically touching. Sure they could have made it so that GBA carts won't stick out, but only if the case was extended. I prefer the cart sticking out over a larger DS.

Its not Nintendo was lazy.