Finally

On Sunday evening, Nintendo held a special event in order to give gold and platinum Club Nintendo members a preview of the soon-to-be-released DSi. I was unable to make it, unfortunately, but our own man-on-the-scene, Matthew Green, was in attendance to give us the lowdown on what's what with the third iteration of the DS.

While he was largely underwhelmed by the presentation, he did come away with a nice bit of information with which to share. We knew some odds and ends about some of this stuff, such as the region locking and calculator programs for DSiWare, but there's some other goodies in store for those who lay out the cash to help Nintendo dominate the handheld market for awhile longer.

As we've heard before, Nintendo DSiWare will come in a variety of costs, including free: 0, 500, or 800 Nintendo Points ($0, $5, or $8) being the present plan. One might imagine this could increase at some point in the future, but for now, those are the price points you're looking at. At the very least, it's good to know that you won't be dropping a full ten bucks on any one item just yet.
We've heard that Nintendo is bringing back Opera, but it won't be included in the system's hardware. Fortunately, if you're eager to browse the web right out of the box, then you'll be in luck, as it will be available for download on launch day.

As for the calculators, you have your choice of oldschool Super Mario Bros., or something fresher with Animal Crossing's Tom Nook tallying your bells for a nominal fee.

I believe this part is new-- as a bonus for buying a DSi, you get ten dollars worth of Nintendo Points, i.e. 1000. That's a pretty sweet deal, but what can you spend them on? Funny you should ask, as our dreams are about to come true.

Unless I missed it previously, then the big piece of good news to surface from this event is that downloadable Game Boy and Game Boy Advance titles are coming. I'll just let that soak in for a minute. Finally, we may have a shot at playing some portable classics again, and without the hassle of gambling with eBay's counterfeits or peeling stickers off of GameStop's cartridges... which could also sometimes be counterfeits.

To start with, however, there will only be first-party Nintendo titles. Which, if you ask me, there is absolutely no problem with. Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins, Donkey Kong '94, The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening, perhaps Tetris... yeah, we're good here.

Just like everything else, though, these will be region locked. As a plus, you'll be able to save and run the games from an SD Card-- a feature we're still waiting on for the Wii. What's more, for those worried about space, the DSi will support SD Cards of capacities greater than 2GB, which is the current limit for the Wii.

I can't recall if this has been mentioned before, I know some mention of a soft reset of the hardware has, but a quick tap of the power button will operate in the same way as the "reset" button of consoles throughout history, returning you back to the main DS menu-- a feature I've long wished had been included in the previous versions.

http://ds.kombo.com/article.php?artid=7007

This was the only thing I needed to hear for me to buy this damn thing.

Eh, no biggie. If not being able to play Advance games really pisses you off that much, don't buy DSi. Personally I'd find it hard to imagine that most people who want a DS don't already have one.

GB and GBC games, Jeff. I have yet to experience Link's Awakening, for example. I lost my old copy of Pokemon, now I can get a new one. Oracle of Ages, Oracles of Seasons, Super Mario Land, Wario Land, Kirby...

I'm actually thinking about getting this thing now.

Oops, forgot to add that in.

My point still stands. DSi is nice, but I would think it's appeal is mostly towards someone who's never owned a DS. I mean, the thing's pretty expensive and in all reality it's an upgrade as opposed to a new handheld.

Originally Posted by Jeff

Eh, no biggie. If not being able to play Advance games really pisses you off that much, don't buy DSi. Personally I'd find it hard to imagine that most people who want a DS don't already have one.

its not the advance games, there just a cool extra.
Its the GB games that interest me. I only have a handful of them, and my GBC is almost broken.
I was already thinking about getting it, this news just pulled me over the line.

Nintendo are milking everything they can.

Hey, go buy the Nintrendo X6 This holiday season 2027, it's great. You can even download those old Wii games for $10 each - COOL.

Originally Posted by Jeff

Oops, forgot to add that in.

My point still stands. DSi is nice, but I would think it's appeal is mostly towards someone who's never owned a DS. I mean, the thing's pretty expensive and in all reality it's an upgrade as opposed to a new handheld.

I'll have fun playing classics, then.

So, guys. Gonna judge me now!? Back when I said I'd get it just for DSiWare...look at you fools changing your minds. I WIN

Still pretty pointless IMO. All of my old Game boys still work, including the brick. There's no reason for me to spend that much on something for a feature I have no use for.

^Yes, but not many people have the old gameboys or games

I could actually go to my local game shop and buy a GBC and all the GBC Zeldas for about half of what the DSi would cost.

Don't get me wrong, I think this is a great thing, but the DSi will have to justify itself a lot more (just a couple good exclusives is all I ask) before I think about buying one.

^^^ What do you mean by a couple of exclusives? You mean DSi only games? That would be horrible in my opinion, since it's just like a GBA game being "SP only!" to help sell the upgraded system. A game should only be exclusive to the DSi if it uses some gimmicky feature involving the camera's, and there wouldn't be a lot of those to make the "only for DSi" tag worthwhile. Making other games available only for DSi is an absolute crime, considering they could easily be made playable on the regular DS.

If you're talking about DSiWare though, I see your point, but isn't going to be for me anyhow.

If it plays Link's Awakening, the Oracles and Pokemon Gold/Silver/Crystal then I might just reconsider my stance on this matter.

A new Gameboy Camera? Those things were sweet.

And this is not too bad for someone wanted to upgrade their DS Phat, GBC missing a battery cover, and GBA missing a battery cover.

Only problem is, I spent money on all these games for the GBA/GBC. I want them free on the DSi.

Originally Posted by Jodd

A new Gameboy Camera? Those things were sweet.

And this is not too bad for someone wanted to upgrade their DS Phat, GBC missing a battery cover, and GBA missing a battery cover.

Only problem is, I spent money on all these games for the GBA/GBC. I want them free on the DSi.

Well, I think everyone knows that won't happen. I'm hoping for reasonable pricing. I'm guessing games will be between 5-10 dollars. Similar to the VC, which I think is totally reasonable as far as cost goes.

****, I just got a DS Lite because I thought that the DSi wouldn't have that.

Well, that's certainly good news, but how much you wanna bet it'll be years and years before some games that matter come out, if they do at all? Wii's Virtual Console sounded nice, but recently all it's given us is crap or games that everyone's played a million times and probably own several copies of.

I can already download any Gameboy game I want. For free, if you know what I mean.

I do not own a DS so I am a bit biased... I want the DSi so badly. I love the idea of a VC especially seeing as I have not played a lot of hand-held Zelda's (only LA and MC). If I had cash and wasn't a poor university student, I would get the DSi in a heart-beat!

Originally Posted by Abyss Master

If it plays Link's Awakening, the Oracles and Pokemon Gold/Silver/Crystal then I might just reconsider my stance on this matter.

This. I only own one of the Zelda handheld games (PH), and I would seriously LOVE to play LA, the Oracle games, and TMC.

So...now I'm sorta thinking about saving up for a DSi. My DS Phat is practically my sister's now.