Nintendo DS news!!

[sfu_lifer]

DON'T buy ANY game console if you're worried about school.

I'd buy this over the PSP though just because of Sony's proprietary protection crap you KNOW they'll put into the PSP so you can't run just any homebrew software/movies on it.

[Draff]

Nintendo DS wireless hub trick up its sleeve?

Posted Sep 28, 2004, 12:38 PM ET by Joshua Fruhlinger
Related entries: Gaming, Wireless

A recent flurry of rumors and pictures has handheld gamers going nuts with speculation over the thought that Nintendo still has a huge trump card up its sleeve. A batch of pictures featuring creepy marionettes with the words “Find(s)me� along with a shot of a lone boy in a forest using a DS as some sort of navigation device seem to point to the possibility of a massive DS wireless network that’s bigger and badder than we previously thought. The DS could act as both a wireless 802.11 device and as a repeater hub. In other words, you won’t need a wireless router nearby to get online with these things - you’ll just need someone close enough to connect to, and he’ll be able to connect you to someone just as close to him even if that person isn’t so near you, and so on. Potentially-huge networks of gamers could appear organically and play against one another regardless of pre-installed routers or proximity. While we worry a bit about the lone boy in the forest (should people know he’s out there alone, and should his DS be announcing as much? Go home, boy, go home!), the possibility of a spontaneous wireless gaming network of multiple hubs is straight up amazing. Or is it downright creepy?

[cmge]

DON'T buy ANY game console if you're worried about school.

I'd buy this over the PSP though just because of Sony's proprietary protection crap you KNOW they'll put into the PSP so you can't run just any homebrew software/movies on it.

actually u can sorta run homebrew stuff on the PSP... in the Tokyo Game Show all the games were running off sony's magicgate ports... the gumstick memory cards... the UMD were taking up too much juice on the PSP...

so that means the games were on the meory cards.. meaning they already have software with it u can tinker and etc... not to mention ths PSP supports divx and mp3... which can be loaded on the gumstick... hehehehe..

PSP > DS .. imo

[Draff]

2 hours of movie watching, not even enough for a lot of movies these days.

The battery life is a pretty big problem, as is the pricetag. I'll be surprised if it sells for anything more than $300 USD or $250, depending on how much Sony is willing to lose.

Additionally:

Sony plans power restrictions on PSP games
Concerns over battery life become a problem for developers

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/content_page.php?aid=4667

Developers working on PlayStation Portable titles will have to ensure that their games don't over-tax the battery on the device or risk falling foul of Sony's technical guidelines, according to sources working on games for the system.

Draft guidelines sent to developers, which will eventually evolve into the technical requirements checklist (TRC) for the system, are alleged to include a demand that games should not exceed a certain level of power consumption.

This apparent response to concerns over the battery life of the system - which is quoted as around 10 hours for music and two hours for movie playback - places the problem firmly in the developers' court.

Sony apparently intends to include a "battery emulator" as part of the PSP development tool set, which will evaluate the projected battery use of a game over an extended period of play. Titles are likely to be judged based on how many hours of play a single battery charge can provide.

(...)

While the PSP has been generally praised for being exceptionally easy to develop for, this new restriction will add a layer of complexity to the development process - and will almost certainly rule out the type of disc streaming technology which has become commonplace in PlayStation 2 titles such as Grand Theft Auto 3, as constantly accessing the disc in this manner would seriously impair battery life.

I do think the PSP is an incredibly sexy machine though.

[sfu_lifer]

actually u can sorta run homebrew stuff on the PSP... in the Tokyo Game Show all the games were running off sony's magicgate ports... the gumstick memory cards... the UMD were taking up too much juice on the PSP...

so that means the games were on the meory cards.. meaning they already have software with it u can tinker and etc... not to mention ths PSP supports divx and mp3... which can be loaded on the gumstick... hehehehe..

PSP > DS .. imo

HAHAHAHA. In your dreams. yes they ran games off the MemSticks at the TGS. You'd be naive to think Sony is gonna let that slide and allow you to run homebrew code. Developers all know they have to publish games off the UMD media. There WILL be some protection to prevent you from running your own media/software on the PSP. And who's to say PSP can run DivX media. They say mpeg4, they did not mention Divx nor xVid. Sony being a media company savvy to piracy, until there is huge customer demand for the piracy-prone format (see mp3), I doubt you'll see them promoting some format that has little/no form of distribution control.
So until the PSP is hacked, DS >> PSP IMHO since the DS is gonna bring something new to the table and is already partially hacked (see GBA support).

[Draff]

Here is the package we'll see in a couple of months
http://home.comcast.net/~brendan/ds.jpg