DS Touch Screen?

[Atarinvader]

Play-Asia News Article

 

Now... just what we heard lately is that the second screen would be a touch panel screen. That sounds more like it, granted. Game developers can come up with setting up additional GUI elements in there, inventory items could be displayed at large and just be selected with your fingertips. Possibilities are even more, but, things aren't really confirmed - it's a nice lookout though. The LCD's are being mounted "vertically aligned" on the unit, that's a fact....

 

...Screen

 

Screen A: LCD, 256x192 pixels, (up to 262k colors)

 

Screen B: Touch-Sensitive LCD, 256x192 pixels, (up to 262k colors)

[Jasoco]

Maybe it'll have a built-in eReader and allow you to play GBA games like SMB3 that require a second Game Boy and eReader to use that feature. Only this time you wouldn't need the second GBA.

 

Or something.

 

Still, I am very curious as to what this will turn out to be.

[Ze_ro]

Hey, it worked for the Game.com. Well, not really... but that's pretty much all that kept the Game.com in the "fairly bad" section instead of the "really bad" section, so maybe it can provide a bit of a push for the DS (or Nitro, or whatever they want to call it). Odd that only one of the screens is touch sensitive though.

 

They mention that it could be used for inventory management, but that doesn't make a lot of sense to me. The whole point of adding another screen in the first place was to eliminate breaks in play by allowing you to manage your inventory on the fly... but since we're talking about a handheld here, with relatively small screens, you'll probably have to grab a stylus to actually use the touch screen, which disrupts gameplay even more. Unless Nintendo has some trick up their sleeve with this, I'm not sure quite how this is intended to work...

 

--Zero