More DS fan concepts : DS Compact

Whist on my fevered search for all new DS related news, I found this video for the "DS compact" which was posted in the murky past of December last year. If this existed I don't think my missus would be able look at her DS lite again. Check it out...

Litecompact
by reelgood0008

Nintendo DS Revamp

New DS with Camera, MP3's, Buzz Saw.

Ahead of the Nintendo Event this Thursday, the tinterweb is abuzz today with the news that Nintendo are planning to launch a new model of their popular handheld console. And what rumor mongering website has leaked this news? Well, Nikkei of course, Japan's premier economic newspaper.

According to their article, this new DS will come with an embedded camera and will feature the ability to play MP3s from a SD memory card. They also suggest that the camera will have some functionality in a new wave of DS games, something similar to what Nintendo tried to achieve 10 years ago with the Game Boy Camera. But probably not crap. There are also rumors (and these are rumors) that the two screens will be made bigger, and the top screen will also be a touch screen.

In the past Nintendo have regularly provided updates to their handheld consoles, and going by previous timescales the DS is probably just about due a revamp. What is unclear at this stage is whether this is an upgrade, or a new model akin to Nintendo's move from the Game Boy Advance to the DS. The timing of this announcement also comes as Apple have started making some serious money on selling games on the app store for the iPhone encroaching on Nintendo's territory. Now it seems that Nintendo are fighting back on this by putting music functionality into the little console. Maybe we may see a Nintendo version of iTunes that can be accessed through the Wii?

The downside of this news is that this is probably Nintendo's big announcement that was due this Thursday coming, and I had all of my limbs crossed that it was going to be another Zelda. One of the most pleasant side effects of today's news though is how the forums are filling up with ideas about the DS new design. This is my favorite redesign so far....

Sex! Drugs! Violence! My kinda DS game!

Dan Houser, one of the Dons of Rockstar games, has said today that the DS version of GTA will not be the watered down, nimbly-pimbly effort that we all feared it would be when its existence was announced at E3.

Speaking to Edge Magazine, Houser stated that GTA : Chinatown Wars "can’t be softened to make it family-friendly – that’s not the game we’re making. We’ve never not done well by sticking to our guns.”

Never not done well, eh?

Houser also revealed that everyone's favourite nimbly-pimbly, watered down game company are totally down with the mature direction they are taking, "Nintendo wanted us to make GTA, and we wanted to make a game on their platform. They didn’t want us to make a GTA for kids, and we weren’t interested in making a game we wouldn’t normally make.”

This news is hardly surprising given that Rockstar are hardly renowned for compromising on their games (Manhunt, Bully) and that there are already a number of mature rated games on the DS (Dementium : The Ward, Mortal Kombat, Resident Evil : Deadly Silence), but im sure that this is a fact that The Mail will gleefully ignore if they ever get hold of this info. Shhhh, please don't tell them....

I am aware that my burgeoning blog is turning into a GTA : Chinatown forum for my excited DS sandbox rantings, but I will make sure I will write about something else soon. Maybe about how tickled I am that Phoenix Wright : Trials and Tribulations is coming to Europe next week. It's almost time to stand in my underwear and shouting "objection!" at my DS again. I cannot wait.

UPDATE 25/09/2008 2241 : Oh golly gosh. It looks like the Sun got there first, proclaiming "FURY OVER DRUG DEAL VID GAME".

GTA : Chinatown Wars images

Some slightly wonky and mostly grainy images of the GTA : Chinatown Wars have started popping up on the tinterweb.

The screens which appear on Nintendo Everything show that the DS version is played from a similar top down perspective of the original PC versions and subsequent Game Boy Advance iterations of GTA, which was to be expected given the limited graphical power of Nintendo's plucky little system. The game will also have a cel shaded art style, and it seems that the story will be related through comic book panels on the touch screen, with dialog appearing on the top screen.

The mini-map looks as if it was lifted from straight from GTA 4, but it does appear to lack the sat nav that was so very useful in the last game, so I expect to be consulting an actual old-school map, which might be a bit awkward on the train. The images also reveal some of the touch screen interaction we can expect in the final game with what appears to be a tattooing mini game and a machine gun being retrieved from a dumpster.

Everyones favorite murder simulator is being developed by Rockstar Leeds, it will be corrupting young minds early 2009 and it's looking pretty neat.

Panic?

A new Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy book is being penned by Eoin Colfer. I greeted the news this morning with slack jawed bewilderment, and I am still finding it hard to get a grip of my feelings about this.

My inital emotions were of point blank fan boy anger at such an abhorrent suggestion, which curiously enough is a similar reaction that Colfer had himself when he was approached by Penguin books and Adams's widow. "My first reaction was semi-outrage that anyone should be allowed to tamper with this incredible series," Colfer stated, possibly storming out of the room on himself in indignation, before calming down and sending himself an apologetic text after realising that "this is a wonderful opportunity to work with characters I have loved since childhood and give them something of my own voice while holding on to the spirit of Douglas Adams."

And I think that Colfer has touched on the main problem I have with this sixth book. For me, Hitchhikers is Douglas Adams, all his intelligent super funny ideas that were just about reigned into a semi coherent story. There was more of Douglas in the books than there was plot. Even Arthur Dent is a thinly veiled projection of Adams.

But I must admit that I am intrigued, and I had been completely unaware of Eoin Colfer before this news. The publishers have also stated that Colfer will not be writing as Douglas Adams, which is just as well as I don't really think anyone else could imitate his style.
Despite all reservations, when "And Another Thing..." arrives in the bookshops, I will probably be beating people out of the way with my towel to get a copy. I just hope that Colfer is a hoopy enough of a frood to pull it off.

Infinity and Beyond....

Bi...bi...bicycle.
Tri...tri...tricycle.
Test...test...testing. One, two...