Outside of the 3D screen (which was super rad everyone who says it isn't is misunderstanding) the 3DS really didn't innovate much over DS and everyone seems to love it now
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If this has the potential to bring back Streetpass, I'm all for it.
Imagine if you could put a Joycon in your pocket and it tracks steps taken for Playcoins, and receives Streetpass data.
tbh, both console and handheld ends were iterative, which is why they spoke about the graphical arms race and made the wii and ds. then they iterated on those until they felt they needed another shift again. but people also forget that iteration doesn't mean no innovations are being made.
Plenty of companies do but they're all still fairly underground enthusiast. The biggest one Steam Deck hasn't had raw numbers since its launch year but that was like 1m units
We had the Vita for that, but Sony botched it and gave up on the system way too fast. I also very much remember smartphones back then being touted as the next new gaming handheld, but then games there settled for a specific, more casual, microtransaction heavy type.
I say even with the 3D screen (which was certainly non-essential if Nintendo themselves released a 3D-less model and late 3DS software had no stereoscopic 3D support) the 3DS didn't innovate much over DS beyond better graphics which should have been good enough, but people think Nintendo = gimmicks🥱
I think you’re actually highlighting the problem with Nintendo’s gimmicks. Devs don’t like tailoring software to one company’s gimmicks. Which results in an under-utilized gimmick (3DS) or lack of support altogether (Wii U). The gimmicks are there and you’re paying for them
And the fact that Nintendo released a 3D-less version of the 3DS shows that even Nintendo tends to abandon their ideas pretty quick. Think of how much money could have gone into better improvements on the iteration end if Nintendo didn’t put so many resources into creating some new gimmick
Original 3DS didn’t have a good 3D screen. I had to hold my 3DS at an angle to see it correctly. NEW 3DS fixed that with head tracking. I could hold the NEW 3DS correctly and it still worked.
If the joycon mouse is real, only the "unavoidable" gimmicks of Wii and DS were more radical. That would effectively make Switch 2 less iterative than many previous Nintendo console.
The best thing the 3DS did was make the top screen bigger on top of being 3D, that way devs were Borderline Forced to put the Gameplay on the Top Screen Doggammit! xD
I don't wanna look up at a map/menu, I wanna look down at it!
As always, it’s about the games. 3DS had em. Switch had em. I anticipate the same with Switch 2. As long as people know it’s a new console, it’ll do just fine.
I feel like the notes... Not quite app... But feature. It was really great. It's something they should bring back. If they had screenshots and video clips that let you draw on them with the mouse joy-con. It would be great.
Yeah. The more I think about it. You can draw on screenshots on switch. But it's having the 2 screens that helped with a quick glance at notes and current paused in game screen on top
Since the Switch combines home console and handheld, I think Nintendo had a big ol' question mark as to how far to innovate next. Their home consoles had significant tech upgrades and/or brand new gimmicks each gen. Their handhelds? Much less so outside of GBA to DS
I don't know. With the heavier emphasis on online features and the presence of miis and streetpass, the 3DS felt like a big step up from its predecessor.
I do agree that the Switch 2 doesn't need a ton of new stuff to succeed.
Physically visible hardware is the key here. A 3DS looks to a DS like a step upwards following the design philosophies of its predecessors.
At the tail end of the DS era, many games’ focus was on the top screen. Several more were squeezing its power for better visuals, so the 3DS delivered.
So, you swap your top screen from the equal to the bottom screen’s 4:3 to a slightly wider 5:3 monitor, you grant it an analog stick with the Circle Pad to illustrate that this machine will be capable of doing things far more powerful than the DS, and a HOME button that will make people curious.
I think that more specifically people are disappointed that there is so much competition to it compared to what they usually got out recently
There was nothing like a Switch, a Wii U, a 3DS, Wii or DS
I think a lot of people are sold on Nintendo hardwares for this besides their exclusivities
I'm personally absolutely pumped up about the idea of Nintendo getting more horsepower by itself and i'm super glad they didn't ditch the hybrid concept in favor of reinventing the wheel once again.
And in general I think a handheld console will always be a different experience to a handheld PC
gyro and analog stick were a pretty big jump from ds to 3ds even if everything else was very similar (you could also count cameras and ar but cameras were a thing on dsi)
It was pretty packed in features compared to ds, all things considered (although, again, I guess most were only new to ds)
If Nintendo made a successor to the Switch that was more inline with Wii/WiiU in terms of ‘weirdness’, journalist headlines would have just complained about it not simply being an upgraded Switch. They really couldn’t win either way, I think
Plus the versatility of the switch (2) and the joycons is what allows for potential crazier innovations like Labo or Ring Fit. It's just that now the innovations don't come with the risk of an entire console flopping because of them
It's also true that people were questioning if that was enough innovation, it didn't sell well in its 1st few years, & Nintendo made new versions w better specs, improved 3D, eventually removing the 3D
Getting games like Xenoblade and Monster Hunter on a portable Nintendo system felt like a big step forward from the DS. Even MGS: Snake Eater 3D was mind blowing in the 2012 handheld landscape. Games like that made the 3DS feel more like a PSP successor (especially in Japan where MH is huge).
I appreciate that you're talking more about the 3DS hardware being very iterative - like a DS Pro/Deluxe. But the power boost under the hood made types of games possible that could never have appeared on the OG NDS.
If the joycons have mouse like functionality, like the rumors suggest, then I think that's a huge feature imo. Also, the gamecube didn't have any big gimmick, and the controller had fewer buttons and less functionality than its competitors. Despite all that it's still a good console.
I get the feeling you’re only talking about hardware (in which you’re correct) I do think the software side was a big step up, it basically introduced “channels” and normalized digital game purchases
“Basically” was referring to when most people were introduced to it (DSi didn’t sell like 3DS) and the reason I put “channels” in quotations was just shorthand for 3DS receiving its own version of what the Wii had.
One of my favorite aspects is the fact that they slightly widened the top screen. That seemed to incentivize a lot of games to not default to touch screen controls
Hardware/graphics wise, it was a natural evolution. Looked great, but it didn't wow the way the Vita or even some high end phones did at the time. Software wise, there were a lot of new neat additions, but a lot of them were also already there on the DSi, so it felt more like a half step forward.
But it is undeniable that the 3DS was a very neat system, and as someone who was fully into 3D at the time, the screen absolutely was an amazing innovation! I still love mine very much to this day!
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Imagine if you could put a Joycon in your pocket and it tracks steps taken for Playcoins, and receives Streetpass data.
Plenty of companies already make switch 2-like devices now
Switch doesn't really have that PSP style rival
They had to do some _massive_ system updates and drastically drop the price _AND_ do the Ambassador program to get that going at any amount
I don't wanna look up at a map/menu, I wanna look down at it!
I do agree that the Switch 2 doesn't need a ton of new stuff to succeed.
At the tail end of the DS era, many games’ focus was on the top screen. Several more were squeezing its power for better visuals, so the 3DS delivered.
There was nothing like a Switch, a Wii U, a 3DS, Wii or DS
I think a lot of people are sold on Nintendo hardwares for this besides their exclusivities
And in general I think a handheld console will always be a different experience to a handheld PC
It was pretty packed in features compared to ds, all things considered (although, again, I guess most were only new to ds)
IDK if I want that cycle repeating for Switch 2
very similar experiences outside of streetpass
Was seriously a game changer and more influential than people will give credit for.
Maybe the mouse-controls will be similar
OoT3D aiming is still some of the best out there