Potent Portables

My new obsession is the Nintendo DS Lite that we recently procured (or NDSL as some people like to call it).  It's been quite a while since the original DS was released to much skepticisim, but after a spate of highly original games and intense popularity in its home country of Japan, the dual-screen platform has come into its own as one of the best hand-held consoles anyone can own.  For a while, I was more into Sony and it's beautiful wide-screen baby, the PSP, but after sitting down with the DS for a short demo, I was sold.

We've only two games right now, Brain Age and New Super Mario Brothers, and frankly, that's pretty good for us.  While there are a few out there still very elusive ( Phoenix Wright and Trauma Center anyone?) and a few more notable big releases ( Tetris DS!  Starfox Command!) it's been fun just banging away on the ones we have right now.  Thank goodness it's also backwards compatible with the Gameboy Advance games we already have, or we'd have a real portable problem on our hands.

While gaming is the main draw for the DS, there are other parts that one might not expect to come from Nintendo.  Anyone familiar with the PSP knows that it's not just a powerful gaming machine, but truly (well, supposedly) a personal media center of sorts.  You can watch movies via the dying UMD format, listen to as much music as your memory stick can hold, and even use its Wi-fi capabilities for various other activities.  Fancy, eh?  Well, being the innovators that many people consider them to be, Nintendo has incorporated only a couple of those aspects that they felt were integral to gameplay, the biggest of which being the Wi-fi.  One has the ability to chat via their lites, download others' games, and eventually even surf the web .  The one thing the DS lacks in media capabilities, it more than makes up for with games.

So, if you're still on the fence deciding whether or not to trek down and nab a DS, I can say with full confidence that it's an enjoyable little machine.  What more incentive does one have than for the two new colors that will be released next month. 

Play on!