The 3DS, in particular the "New" models, I think are really recommended to pick up cheap. They are well built devices that are supremely hackable with access to lots of fun games.
The 3DS library is good despite somewhat lacking in diversity. But the 3DS also has native compatibility with the entire excellent DS library, and after hacking it can also run the entire great GBA library without emulation (like Matroshka dolls, the 3DS hardware includes the complete DSi hardware which in turn includes GBA hardware, and it has firmware support to access them both).
The old models emulate a lot of 8 and 16 bit consoles well, whereas the New models have nearly complete compatibility for 8 and 16 bit consoles and additionally can emulate some Playstation 1. Moreover, hacking the 3DS has become even more accessible due to recent newly found exploits. Still getting a lot of fun out of mine.
If picking up a 3DS, I highly recommend a "New" model. They include cameras that track your eyes, making the 3D effect much better.
It's true the 3D effect is just a gimmick, but it's a very neat one. Games like Metroid Samus Returns are much better in 3D IMO. The game feels like an actual mini diorama is in front of you.
Absolutely agree. I just got into 3DS development last year and it's been such an exciting development experience. The open-source tools are excellent (even supporting remote debugging!), and the system hits that sweet spot between being powerful enough to build interesting things and taking real work to make those things fast.
Over the last year or so I've been squeezing individual fps's of performance out of the PSX emulator and it's been some of the most fun hobby programming I've done in a long time.
Plus you can write for a platform with a 3D screen! How cool is that?
It also still supports the entirety of the original DS homebrew scene, including my favorite flashcard: the SuperCard DSTWO [0], which includes an onboard CPU and RAM for running software that's more powerful than the host DS! You could feel the chip bulging out underneath the label, and the cartridges went into the slot with an odd "squish" because of that. A ridiculous yet beautiful piece of engineering.
Yes! Don't forget you also get GameBoy Color and GameBoy games. IMO this massive library (N3DS, 3DS, DSi, DS, GBA, GBC, GB, SNES, NES) has at least 10 "must play before death" games in them (for people that care a lot about videogames, anyway).
Of course all of this can also be achieved on a PC with a simple 10$ amazon controller and free emulators, if you're comfortable pirating games.
I was confused by this article because the 3DS has been unavailable for months now (except for random editions from Amazon sellers for above MSRP).
The main change seems to be them removing the 3DS page from the Nintendo website? My impression was that they stopped making them long ago and were only making new versions of the 2DS (which kind of defeats the entire purpose of the device).
They also don't make enough Switch consoles to meet demand, and they don't update basic things with their software (friend codes really?)
I'm not sure what the culture is like at Nintendo, but there's a lot of low hanging fruit that would make things a lot better (and make them a lot more money at the same time).
Personally I think the PS Vita is just as good, if not an even better value. You can get lightly used ones for around 80-100€ and they have a very nice OLED and a fast CPU. They can emulate pretty much anything up to PS1/N64.
I would say a DSi XL is the best choice for original DS games though, you get a larger screen with the exact same resolution as DS games play in and you get possibly the nicest and most durable of Nintendo's portable designs.
The DSi as of last year is pretty hackable in itself too.
I got one basically as a bonus in an ebay auction a few months back along with a 3DS I was getting for a friend and I've found myself playing original DS games on it more than I ever did on my own New 3DS XL so I was almost certainly picking up on the iffiness of the upscaling to fill the screen.
I always try to imagine what the final production run looks like at a factory for one of these. Is there usually some sort of ceremony for the very last unit rolling off the line? Or does it just run towards the end of the shift as normal, everything gets boxed up and shipped to retailers as normal, there just....isn't another shift after that? What happens with all the manufacturing hardrware?
It's not the same, but ‘Farewell, Etaoin Shrdlu’ (you can find it easily online) is a documentary about the last day that the New York Times used linotypes and hot metal typesetting before they switched to electronic/optical typesetting.
I think it's a wonderful, heartfelt, and technologically fascinating documentary. I recommend it when you have a half hour to spare.
For things like this, they're generally produced in (large) batches on a line, then once the run is finished the line is retooled for whatever is next on the schedule.
If nintendo use a third party manufacturer then I can't imagine there was much ceremony. If they own their production facilities then maybe they had a little mini-party? Most likely it'd depend on the particular teams working in the factory and what the culture is like.
Having said that, they may not even have known when the run was finished that it was going to be the last (management still pondering whether to do another run, or stock from the previous run lasted longer than expected so no new product produced) so it may well have been a total non-event.
I don't think there's much room for sentiment on a factory floor where most things are automated. It's nice to imagine there's some nostalgic engineer who grew up with Nintendo consoles and personally put the finishing touches on the last 3DS or something like that... but it's more likely that the last one got pushed out and they went on making all the other consoles instead. Manufacturing hardware can most likely be repurposed and, if not, simply gets sold off for parts.
Factory has a retooling shutdown and then commences making something else if economy is good. If not, factory still has shutdown but the only thing commencing is an awkward all-hands meeting and a lot of paperwork.
As other comments mention, most Nintendo hardware is now made in China and I doubt they care, but there is also a factory in Uji staffed by Nintendo employees who definitely care.
I’m not sure what all they do these days, but at least they do a decent amount of serious testing and QA. They might have had a send off when authorizing the final models.
I don't just mean "the first time I saw a stereoscopic 3D effect in movies or a game console."
It was the first time I ever saw in three dimensions ever. As a human being.
It's a little bit hard to describe my typical experience with you, since I've never had "normal" version and I don't know what it's like. I would compare my life to playing a video game with a first-person perspective. You know how when you play one of those games, you're thinking in three dimensions, even though you're seeing the game on a flat two-dimensional television?
Well, that's my life. I see the world in two dimensions, even though I'm thinking about it in three dimensions.
But playing Zelda on a 3DS XL? Wow. I mean, it took my breath away. THAT'S HOW NORMAL PEOPLE SEE THE WORLD? You can just look at things and immediately know how far away they are? You don't have to move your head around to see a parallax effect to help your brain compute the distance? WOW. AMAZING.
I'm not a brainologist, so I'm not sure why the 3D system on the 3DS worked for me when nothing else had ever worked for me before, such as 1950s-style red/blue glasses. I'm still nearly blind in one eye, and the 3DS relies upon a lenticular stereoscopic effect that requires two eyes. It seems to me that it shouldn't work. But it did.
(Maybe modern VR headsets with stereo displays would work for me as well; I don't know -- I tried an early one in the 1990s and it didn't work for me, but obviously that was ancient tech)
Regardless, I had never ever experienced three-dimensional vision until the 3DS XL showed it to me. Thanks, little dude.
My first job coming out of college was working on a multi-platform game engine, and my first task was assembling a 3DS prototype board[1] and porting the engine over.
It was horrible and fantastic at the same time. The debugging tools were poor, most of the documentation hadn't been translated to english yet, and testing the dual-camera rendering pipeline required hunching over the desk to be in the sweet spot for the parallax to work.
I still love that kind of low-level development, but these days python and shell scripts pay the bills. RIP 3DS, and thanks for the memories.
The docs were probably better than they were for the NES. Nintendo's were poor translations from the already sparse Japanese version (think of an entire book full of the Engrish found in early NES games). Australian developer Beam Software did good business writing their own NES docs that were much more user-friendly.
Dominic Arsenault goes into why this was something of a deliberate strategy for Nintendo in his book on the SNES, Super Power, Spoony Bards, and Silverware.
I wonder what the game plan is for offering these games in the future. The dual-screen setup obviously doesn’t map to the Switch, so it’s not just a simple eShop port like you’d have for an old SNES game.
I am mostly thinking about Pokémon. They’ve got this rich new Pokémon Home system to transfer between generations, but that’s reliant on having functioning older hardware. Now, there’s a massive pool of functional 3DS systems out there, so it’s not a pressing issue, but eventually, some poor Ash Greninja will be trapped on a 3DS cartridge. (I suppose the answer is: port all the Pokémon games, profit, swim in giant Scrooge McDuck moneybin of coins.)
Looks like it's finally time to grab all those games I held off on grabbing because my backlog was already extraordinary, lest I have to find them in a couple years on eBay at wildly inflated prices.
Most in-demand 3DS games have not been cheap in years. They've been pretty expensive due to low printing (Bravely Default, DQ remakes, most Atlus RPGs) for years now. I'm guessing Nintendo games are OK due to so many people owning them though.
3DS eShop might be a safe bet but aside from the usual downsides of digital, the games are tied to the system, not your eShop account.
I mean, I've been completing my GameBoy and GameBoy Color collection recently, and even the big titles that everyone wants(Zelda, Pokemon, Metroid) are not crazy, the most I've paid was £20 each for pokemon games. Not sure why 3DS games would go sky high in prices with time.
3DS is an excellent platform to learn Japanese games. I fully recommend it.
I think it's an amazing time, and the games will stand the test of time just like the original mario series because the content is rich and great vs having to fall back on pushing systems & I/O to the max.
Nothing recently has given me as much joy as to replay N64 classics on the 3DS with better graphics, added gameplay and 100% solely in Japanese after originally growing up with them as they were released in the USA/English.
The context and general idea helped alot to drive me to replay the games and relearn vocabulary in a different language. And how the games are targeted at a young audience makes full kana or furigana available, with settings to use just Kanji if you want is fantastic.
It's something that every other learning app doesn't have for Japanese - but then again when you learn more languages you don't really go for the cultural angle, you do it to communicate and use culture as a reference point.
Can you make some recommendations? I‘ve tried my luck with the Japanese DS Zelda games because they have furigana (either above characters or when tapping), but I couldn’t get far since there has been too much dialect. In Pokemon B/W there overall has been too much text. I didn’t try playing something I knew by heart yet tho. Are you referring to something like the N64 Zelda 3DS remakes (which are excellent)?
Nintendo insisted that the 3DS was not being replaced by the switch, in the same way that they told me that the game boy line would keep going after the DS began.
I've been playing games all my life on many different platforms, but some of the best fun I've ever had has been on handhelds.
Even when I also have the PC or console version, some games just feel more at home on a handheld, and more appealing when you don't have to commit to a whole session of playing them.
On one hand, handhelds take less focus than sitting in one place staring in one direction, so you can play on them in bite-sized breaks, putting them away at any time and instantly resuming where you left off.
But on the other hand, something so close to your face, that you can snuggle with in any position anywhere, also has a level of intimacy not found in bigger screens and bulkier controls.
Nothing can compare to dozing off in bed while engrossed in a game with a captivating story, mechanics, and music..
Laptops are too bulky, and phones or tablets don't have built-in physical controls.
Which is why I'm a bit concerned about there being only one handheld left. The Vita was amazing and I still love it but Sony did everything they could to kill it off, and the Switch's success hasn't inspired them to try again.
If anyone feels like making a new handheld that anyone can develop for, my money is yours. :)
There are a whole bunch of those OGA-derived handhelds (see https://obscurehandhelds.com/). I have an RGB10 on its way to me right now. Unfortunately, the library of native titles is very, very small, basically just Tux Kart and whatever open source engine recreations have been packaged for the particular distro you're running on it. So it's mostly about emulation, which means that what you're seeing is a pretty far cry from the "real" capabilities of what that processor could do on a 480x320 display. For my part, I'm hoping to get the toolchain set up enough to try compiling OpenJazz for it.
On the other side of things are deliberately wacky low-powered, lo-fi devices with novel distribution mechanisms, like Playdate: https://play.date/
Phones don't need built-in physical controls. Attachable controls like the Nintendo Switch Joy-cons have been becoming more popular as phones have replaced handheld gaming system for the majority of people. The new Razer Kishi looks good though my phone is too big to fit it. ASUS ROG and Xiaomi Black Shark gaming phones also have their own official controllers.
A new handheld will probably not be able to succeed without software. That's what killed Windows Phone.
I can’t believe it’s been a decade! I bought one on launch day - $250 and barely a 3 hour battery life. I later bought a New 3DS XL (or whatever the crazy naming scheme was) and it was wild how much better the newer hardware was than launch day.
Hopefully Nintendo releases the SDK? It's been a decently active platform for indie titles and homebrew games. I'm not 100% sure, but I don't think the 3DS is covered by the same NDA as the Switch in terms of toolchain/docs/etc. I believe you can find those after signing up for a developer account at https://developer.nintendo.com/
The small New 3DS is the last portable console I can actually fit in my pocket, and for that I still take it out with me instead of the Switch on some days. So much easier to whip out of my pocket.
The nice thing about the 3DS is that the emulator (Citra) is pretty good. I've used it to play "undubs" of games I own, where fans have taken the audio from the Japanese version of a game and put it into the US or EU version.
It's not perfect, but tons of games are fully playable and development is still very active.
It's a shame how many people didn't get to experience the Advance Wars series since they were only released on the GBA/DS. I think a Switch version would do really well.
Ever since the 3DS launch I found myself hoping for an upgraded version that would render at a higher resolution. 400x240 has always looked terrible to me for 3D graphics.
Finally portable gaming console platform is dead now. Why portable-only form factor isn't accepted well nowadays? (Switch is the replacement with hybrid design)
[+] [-] DCKing|5 years ago|reply
The 3DS library is good despite somewhat lacking in diversity. But the 3DS also has native compatibility with the entire excellent DS library, and after hacking it can also run the entire great GBA library without emulation (like Matroshka dolls, the 3DS hardware includes the complete DSi hardware which in turn includes GBA hardware, and it has firmware support to access them both).
The old models emulate a lot of 8 and 16 bit consoles well, whereas the New models have nearly complete compatibility for 8 and 16 bit consoles and additionally can emulate some Playstation 1. Moreover, hacking the 3DS has become even more accessible due to recent newly found exploits. Still getting a lot of fun out of mine.
[+] [-] city41|5 years ago|reply
It's true the 3D effect is just a gimmick, but it's a very neat one. Games like Metroid Samus Returns are much better in 3D IMO. The game feels like an actual mini diorama is in front of you.
[+] [-] justinweiss|5 years ago|reply
Over the last year or so I've been squeezing individual fps's of performance out of the PSX emulator and it's been some of the most fun hobby programming I've done in a long time.
Plus you can write for a platform with a 3D screen! How cool is that?
[+] [-] mintplant|5 years ago|reply
[0] http://eng.supercard.sc/
[+] [-] komali2|5 years ago|reply
Of course all of this can also be achieved on a PC with a simple 10$ amazon controller and free emulators, if you're comfortable pirating games.
[+] [-] gonehome|5 years ago|reply
The main change seems to be them removing the 3DS page from the Nintendo website? My impression was that they stopped making them long ago and were only making new versions of the 2DS (which kind of defeats the entire purpose of the device).
They also don't make enough Switch consoles to meet demand, and they don't update basic things with their software (friend codes really?)
I'm not sure what the culture is like at Nintendo, but there's a lot of low hanging fruit that would make things a lot better (and make them a lot more money at the same time).
[+] [-] Tepix|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] JansjoFromIkea|5 years ago|reply
I got one basically as a bonus in an ebay auction a few months back along with a 3DS I was getting for a friend and I've found myself playing original DS games on it more than I ever did on my own New 3DS XL so I was almost certainly picking up on the iffiness of the upscaling to fill the screen.
[+] [-] jerryoftheyear|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] NwtnsMthd|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dTal|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gambiting|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gugagore|5 years ago|reply
I think it's a wonderful, heartfelt, and technologically fascinating documentary. I recommend it when you have a half hour to spare.
[+] [-] remus|5 years ago|reply
If nintendo use a third party manufacturer then I can't imagine there was much ceremony. If they own their production facilities then maybe they had a little mini-party? Most likely it'd depend on the particular teams working in the factory and what the culture is like.
Having said that, they may not even have known when the run was finished that it was going to be the last (management still pondering whether to do another run, or stock from the previous run lasted longer than expected so no new product produced) so it may well have been a total non-event.
[+] [-] WrtCdEvrydy|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] WilTimSon|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] letitbeirie|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] aikinai|5 years ago|reply
I’m not sure what all they do these days, but at least they do a decent amount of serious testing and QA. They might have had a send off when authorizing the final models.
[+] [-] x87678r|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] JohnBooty|5 years ago|reply
The 3DS XL was the first time I ever saw 3D.
In my life.
I don't just mean "the first time I saw a stereoscopic 3D effect in movies or a game console."
It was the first time I ever saw in three dimensions ever. As a human being.
It's a little bit hard to describe my typical experience with you, since I've never had "normal" version and I don't know what it's like. I would compare my life to playing a video game with a first-person perspective. You know how when you play one of those games, you're thinking in three dimensions, even though you're seeing the game on a flat two-dimensional television?
Well, that's my life. I see the world in two dimensions, even though I'm thinking about it in three dimensions.
But playing Zelda on a 3DS XL? Wow. I mean, it took my breath away. THAT'S HOW NORMAL PEOPLE SEE THE WORLD? You can just look at things and immediately know how far away they are? You don't have to move your head around to see a parallax effect to help your brain compute the distance? WOW. AMAZING.
I'm not a brainologist, so I'm not sure why the 3D system on the 3DS worked for me when nothing else had ever worked for me before, such as 1950s-style red/blue glasses. I'm still nearly blind in one eye, and the 3DS relies upon a lenticular stereoscopic effect that requires two eyes. It seems to me that it shouldn't work. But it did.
(Maybe modern VR headsets with stereo displays would work for me as well; I don't know -- I tried an early one in the 1990s and it didn't work for me, but obviously that was ancient tech)
Regardless, I had never ever experienced three-dimensional vision until the 3DS XL showed it to me. Thanks, little dude.
[+] [-] dpiers|5 years ago|reply
It was horrible and fantastic at the same time. The debugging tools were poor, most of the documentation hadn't been translated to english yet, and testing the dual-camera rendering pipeline required hunching over the desk to be in the sweet spot for the parallax to work.
I still love that kind of low-level development, but these days python and shell scripts pay the bills. RIP 3DS, and thanks for the memories.
1: https://www.engadget.com/2010-05-17-is-this-a-prototype-of-t...
[+] [-] gxqoz|5 years ago|reply
Dominic Arsenault goes into why this was something of a deliberate strategy for Nintendo in his book on the SNES, Super Power, Spoony Bards, and Silverware.
[+] [-] perardi|5 years ago|reply
I am mostly thinking about Pokémon. They’ve got this rich new Pokémon Home system to transfer between generations, but that’s reliant on having functioning older hardware. Now, there’s a massive pool of functional 3DS systems out there, so it’s not a pressing issue, but eventually, some poor Ash Greninja will be trapped on a 3DS cartridge. (I suppose the answer is: port all the Pokémon games, profit, swim in giant Scrooge McDuck moneybin of coins.)
[+] [-] AdmiralAsshat|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] peruvian|5 years ago|reply
3DS eShop might be a safe bet but aside from the usual downsides of digital, the games are tied to the system, not your eShop account.
[+] [-] gambiting|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] clubsoda|5 years ago|reply
For example, Pokemon Platinum, is selling used for about 120-150.
[+] [-] bzb5|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rootsudo|5 years ago|reply
I think it's an amazing time, and the games will stand the test of time just like the original mario series because the content is rich and great vs having to fall back on pushing systems & I/O to the max.
Nothing recently has given me as much joy as to replay N64 classics on the 3DS with better graphics, added gameplay and 100% solely in Japanese after originally growing up with them as they were released in the USA/English.
The context and general idea helped alot to drive me to replay the games and relearn vocabulary in a different language. And how the games are targeted at a young audience makes full kana or furigana available, with settings to use just Kanji if you want is fantastic.
It's something that every other learning app doesn't have for Japanese - but then again when you learn more languages you don't really go for the cultural angle, you do it to communicate and use culture as a reference point.
[+] [-] DanielleMolloy|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fiblye|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Multicomp|5 years ago|reply
Something tells me this is Nintendo hedging bets
[+] [-] Razengan|5 years ago|reply
Even when I also have the PC or console version, some games just feel more at home on a handheld, and more appealing when you don't have to commit to a whole session of playing them.
On one hand, handhelds take less focus than sitting in one place staring in one direction, so you can play on them in bite-sized breaks, putting them away at any time and instantly resuming where you left off.
But on the other hand, something so close to your face, that you can snuggle with in any position anywhere, also has a level of intimacy not found in bigger screens and bulkier controls.
Nothing can compare to dozing off in bed while engrossed in a game with a captivating story, mechanics, and music..
Laptops are too bulky, and phones or tablets don't have built-in physical controls.
Which is why I'm a bit concerned about there being only one handheld left. The Vita was amazing and I still love it but Sony did everything they could to kill it off, and the Switch's success hasn't inspired them to try again.
If anyone feels like making a new handheld that anyone can develop for, my money is yours. :)
[+] [-] mikepurvis|5 years ago|reply
On the other side of things are deliberately wacky low-powered, lo-fi devices with novel distribution mechanisms, like Playdate: https://play.date/
[+] [-] ThatPlayer|5 years ago|reply
A new handheld will probably not be able to succeed without software. That's what killed Windows Phone.
[+] [-] unknown|5 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] NYCHomosapien|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] datalus|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Wowfunhappy|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] TillE|5 years ago|reply
It's not perfect, but tons of games are fully playable and development is still very active.
[+] [-] gldev|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kyoob|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ralmidani|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] beefhash|5 years ago|reply
EDIT: I'm already aware that the system has been exploited to death and back, so I'm mostly curious if people haven't already dumped everything.
[+] [-] r00fus|5 years ago|reply
Hadn't been plugged in for years (I don't have a charger). Turned on and played a game. Amazing.
[+] [-] Guybrush_T|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] causality0|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fomine3|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ThatPlayer|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] undersuit|5 years ago|reply
Or maybe are there any better ways to input text into a 3DS?