Nintendo 3DS Roundup

By Keza MacDonald Published 27 July, 2010

Nintendogs and Cats, Pilotwings and Hollywood 61.

You can forgive Nintendo for leaving 3D alone for more than a decade after the brain- and eye-breaking abomination that was the Virtual Boy. This time, they really have got it right. The 3DS needs to be played to be believed, and a post-E3 showcase this afternoon gave us the chance to have some hands-on time with the handheld's first playable demos.

For more on the handheld, check out our first ever Nintendo 3DS hands-on at E3, Digital Foundry's dissection of the hardware and Eurogamer TV's hands-on video.

Nintendogs and Cats

The addition of cats to Nintendo's wildly successful virtual pet simulator theoretically redeems it from being nothing more than a re-release, but sadly we're not allowed to play with kitties yet - only a beagle, a golden Lab and a terrier, gambolling around in a typically sparse Nintendo virtual living room.

I wonder, fleetingly, what on earth happened to my old Nintendog, Steven the black Labrador, in the several years since I last switched on his cartridge. Does he still sit in that virtual living room, flea-ridden, awaiting my return, or has he finally given up on me and run away? Thankfully the 3D effect in this update is breathtaking enough to distract my conscience.

Eurogamer TV gets its hands on the 3DS.

The Nintendogs themselves always were profoundly adorable, but 3D multiplies the cute factor. Using a flat touch-screen to pet a 3D virtual animal feels strange at first, but you soon get used to it, and seeing a ball apparently disappear into the distance when you chuck it into the screen can't help but amaze. The doggies scamper in and out of the screen without screwing with your depth perception at all. When they're stood up on their hind legs with their paws up against the screen, the instinctive temptation is to reach out and try to touch their paws.

The 3D effect isn't the only addition. The camera allows for facial recognition, meaning that your puppy now recognises when you're holding the 3DS up to your face and leaps up for some enthusiastic licking. This didn't exactly delight me - I'm a cat person - but it reduced two grown men standing behind me to girlish giggling. It will be interesting to see how far the facial recognition goes: will Nintencats and dogs recognise their owners, or be able to tell the difference between new playmates and old ones?

Pilotwings

At first it's difficult to decide which fact is most incredible: the eventual appearance of a brand-new Pilotwings years after most fans had given up the ghost, or the fact that it's magically in 3D in your hands. It feels made for this technology. A flying game is in many ways the ideal showcase for the 3DS - hillsides and buildings come gradually towards you and banking narrowly around corners feels absolutely instinctive when canyon walls come rearing out of the screen. The demo consists of two levels - a ring challenge in a biplane, and a jetpack challenge where the goal is to burst as many floating balloons as possible with your fast-zooming little form.

The demo appears to be set on the Wii Sports Resort Island. I spotted the swordfighting dais, the baseball stadium and a few other prominent landmarks from my hours spent doodling around in free flight mode in Island Flyover, wishing for a new Pilotwings. Gently guiding the biplane through hoops in Ring Challenge feels almost as natural with the sensitive, lovely-to-use 3DS analogue stick as it does with the MotionPlus. The quality of the hardware here is beyond question. The responsive stick is so far removed from the PSP's fiddly nub that it beggars belief.

The rocket challenge features a very Mii-like jetpack wearer, which raises the possibility that Miis might go cross-platform. It's simple to control - you press A to fire up the rockets and use the analogue stick to adjust the direction of the jets. The little pilot goes zooming and bouncing around the island at surprising speed, but the 3D effect and depth of field has no trouble adjusting. I found it worked a little better with the 3D effect turned down slightly with the slider on the side of the screen - otherwise my eyes would occasionally try to focus on my plane and the background at the same time and send me crashing into the side of a building.

Hollywood 61

As a Ubisoft-developed title, Hollywood 61 is the only non-Nintendo game playable at the showcase, and unfortunately the difference is immediately apparent. The 3D isn't well-suited to the hand-drawn graphical style and all the characters and objects on-screen look like poorly stacked cardboard cut-outs. Turning the 3D effect down confuses the image, too. The cut-out effect might be intentional, though, and it's very much a work in progress, so there's no need to rush into the comments thread and proclaim that third-party developers can't make games for the 3DS just yet.

It's a puzzle-based murder mystery game, clearly aimed at the bewilderingly enormous Professor Layton-devoted portion of the DS-owning casual crowd. The demo opens with a car journey towards an old theatre, during which a comically animated cardboard man gives us a little badly lip-synched background information about the murderer on the loose, who has a dangerous obsession with the as-yet-unnamed protagonist.

The 3D makes parking up outside the theatre and getting out of the car far more visually interesting than it should be, and a lot more interesting than the first challenge, which is a light puzzle designed to turn on the floodlights in the theatre. I've mentioned before on Eurogamer that I have absolutely no capacity whatsoever for light puzzles. My brain just cannot understand how they work. Once the floodlight is eventually awakened through sheer trial and error, it reveals a body hanging above the stage with a written note inviting me to pan the camera around to find the hidden message. Panning all the way to the left and right of the stage reveals the words "YOU'RE NEXT!" daubed on the stage curtain in white paint, before the demo ended. To be honest I'm not enormously scared yet, Ubisoft, but the finished game does have the potential to be interesting.

For more on Nintendo's latest handheld, check out our first ever Nintendo 3DS hands-on at E3, Digital Foundry's dissection of the hardware and Eurogamer TV's hands-on video.

Picture of Keza.

About Keza MacDonald

Read more articles from Keza by visiting the Keza MacDonald archive page.

You may also like...

Comments (44) Latest comment 2 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • cianchristopher #1 2 years ago

    Ubisoft eh? Can't wait to experience screen tearing in 3D!

  • jonsaan #2 2 years ago

    Rayman please.

  • SG #3 2 years ago

    Analogue stick - about fucking time!

    I know that Nintendo's handhelds tend to hold back a generation - the GBA SNES equivalent only having 6 buttons as opposed to 8 was bad enough - but it seriously hindered the DS with some games - prime example being SM64DS which was a fuller game than the N64 original but the controls were criminal.
    Edited by 1 at 27/07/10 @ 16:29

  • darc #4 2 years ago

    3D *and* decent control hardware! I must have one immediately.

    I wonder what Sony's next move will be in the PSP line. Sounds like they've got a very tough act to follow here.

  • jonsaan #5 2 years ago

    It depends. I can see a million watchdog style Nintendo 3DS made my kid blind tv shows in the works.

  • macmurphy #6 2 years ago

    I don't play my DS much - it's a good bit of kit but I don't travel a lot and when I'm at home I inevitably play a full size console. I was hoping to hold out next gen but I'm pretty sure Pilotwings alone will make me fold like a cheap suit.

    I hope they don't just rehash things though. Played Lylat Wars, Animal Crossing and Nintendogs to death (mostly the wife was playing Nintendogs, you understand). If it's just Nintendogs with a few cat skins and then Animal crossing is the same I'll be pretty unimpressed. Still really excited by Pilotwings though, and an F-Zero port seems inevitable.

  • hy4000uk #7 2 years ago

    Ubisoft presents murderz

  • MiniAmin #8 2 years ago

    I can't wait for this machine. It looks brilliant. I had considered buying a PS3 slim or a 360 slim, but this has changed that. I'm saving for the 3DS now and I really can't wait.

  • Sir_TimAlot #9 2 years ago

    i need one of these NOW!

  • dr_faulk #10 2 years ago

    Virtual Boy is one of the best console ever. Anyone who owns one knows it! LEAVE IT ALONE! =O

  • abigsmurf #11 2 years ago

    Eurogamer (or anyone else who attended):

    Can you confirm what the home buttons are like? Are they touch sensative, membrane buttons or what? hard to tell from the pics.

  • Widge #12 2 years ago

    Damn 3D gimmi----oh it actually enhances games. WHO WOULD HAVE THOUGHT?

  • Widge #13 2 years ago

    *ahem* 2 analogue sticks?

  • ryohazuki1983 #14 2 years ago

    Really can't wait for the 3DS :) Pilotwings sounds great.

  • miiiguel #15 2 years ago

    Looks very good, not too into portable gaming devices, aesthetical resons and stuff, but, idk, maybe.

    off-topic: I like Johnny Minkley, he's very good,naturaly elequoent, and a je ne sais quoi of honesty - which can be a problem, he almost sold me this already.

  • antony_williams #16 2 years ago

    Post deleted at 11:19:54 12-02-2012

  • smurphs #17 2 years ago

    Ah, pilotwings how I do love thee, and now you come in spangly 3D. Happy as a nut I am.

    As for the lack of the second analogue stick, as the top screen is the main play screen I'm sure the touchscreen will be used as a pretty decent analogue camera control by many games.

  • smurphs #18 2 years ago

    Oops, what he said. Great minds.

  • darth_paul #19 2 years ago

    Ill buy the 3DS on "day 1" just because of Pilotwings. THE game I was waiting for, ever since having played it on N64 :-)

  • kwesleyb #20 2 years ago

    Ive never ever been interested in a hand held games device before, but this one is starting to interest me a bit too much now...

  • Rack #21 2 years ago

    Even a genuine touchscreen is no substitute for an analogue pad, and the pressure sensitive DS touchscreen is really no good at all. This is only a concern though in that it seems if not for this the 3DS would be absolutely perfect. Well, aside from the inevitable minor glitch Nintendo seem to love adding to their portables :)

  • BonzoBanana #22 2 years ago

    I'd love a version of Half Life for this. Don't suppose its powerful enough for Half Life 2 but the original Half Life would be brilliant in 3D and for the first time portable.

  • sanctusmortis #23 2 years ago

    I feel bad for seeing "baseball stadium" and immediately thinking "there is no baseball on Sports Resort, so it must be the Sword Fight one".

  • Stuz359 #24 2 years ago

    It's probably the worst thing that we keep hearing how brilliant the machine is but there is no way to show people just how brilliant it is without physically seeing it. Totally excited for it though.

  • Gromit #25 2 years ago

    If it comes with that Dalmation puppy I'm sold!

    I think Nintendo should be as excited as we all are because I don't think I've read so much as a sceptical comment about the 3ds yet.

  • Widge #26 2 years ago

    Whats the layout of the buttons like? Wouldn't using the touchscreen be a bit like finger Twister?

  • Notez #27 2 years ago

    Oh man, I think I need to get one too, at least when the first RPGs start getting published! This thing just looks like too much fun, seeing that the hardware and controls seem to be spot on. The DS library has always been very enticing with all the good RPGs on offer, but somehow I never felt it offered enough to warrant purchase. Could be the bad experiences with PSP earlier or something else, but the 3DS is starting to look good enough to brush all that aside.

  • gav_and_the_gavster #28 2 years ago

    I've not bought a console on day 1 since the N64, but I'll be fighting tooth and nail and hijacking lorries to get this on day -1!

  • neonxaos #29 2 years ago

    You don´t understand light puzzles? Could we get some other examples?

  • Keza #30 2 years ago

    @neonxaos: One further example: [link url=http://www.eurogamer.net/artic les/zack-and-wiki-quest-for-barbaros-treasure-review
    ]http://ww w.eurogamer.net/articles/zack-a...[/link]

    Also, the second-to-last desert temple dungeon in Ocarina of Time. Basically anything that involves directing light at something with the use of mirrors. I can't EVER do them.

  • LazyDan #31 2 years ago

    I've never wanted a Nintendo console more than this, and I stayed up for over 24 hours hunting a Wii on launch day; involving standing in a Tescos for 4 hours around midnight, arguing with staff, finally being thrown out, then being threatened with the police when I turned up again an hour later.

    Lord knows what I'll do for this

  • azazel_fallenangel #32 2 years ago

    Realy can't wait for this, as long as tghe 3D effects are as good as everyones made them out to be. Shame you can only really see it in person.
    Might make the long old travel to the great metropolis of london, to the Eurogamer Expo, but only if they have these on show.

  • Doctor_What #33 2 years ago

    Do the Nintencats ignore you, fall asleep, then barf on the virtual carpet?

  • swissorc #34 2 years ago

    Love the 3DS can't help thinking that the d pad should be below the buttons though instead of below the analogue.

  • EclipseDj #35 2 years ago

    @ Widge and beemoh - I also thought the 3DS needed a 2nd analog stick until I watched this game in action on the iphone 4 using it's new gyroscope which the 3DS also has built in!;

    [link url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qs1_oLT70BY&feature=rel ated
    ]http://ww w.youtube.com/watch?v=Qs1_oLT70...[/link]

    This will mean FPS games and many other genres will work really well on 3DS, possibly better than home consoles (No need to strech those thumbs either beemoh, lol) It leaves the new analog stick for movement and tilting/panning for your aim, which is perfectly natural to do and will propably help enhance the 3D effect too.
    Edited by 1 at 28/07/10 @ 12:42

  • SpaceMonkey77 #36 2 years ago

    I want one and will evetually get one.

    The thing that is going to hurt that for me, is the fact that Nintendo are going to sell me Star Fox 64 and other games, and expect full price for something that's been out for over a decade. Now while I welcome such ports for nostalgia and fun sakes, I know they will move them and no one will bat an eyelid in protest.

    Nintendo still has no budget price range for its handheld games, like it does home based games (if you can really call it that). If they stuck ports of F Zero, Star Fox out for say £10-15 each, I'd be more positive about them on 3DS.

    As for Pilotwings, I too love it, but have been insanely angry, why its taken over a decade to get a new version of it.

  • EclipseDj #37 2 years ago

    @SpaceMonkey77 - I don't mind buying classic titles again on 3DS at full price if there is enough added content to make it worthwhile.

    i.e. I don't just want some sharper textures and the 3D mode.

    Zelda OoT - could add some new side quests, temples, puzzles, relocate items.
    Starfox - could also relocate power ups, add online 4 player co-op, 8 player dogfighting with Team Fox and Team Wolf.

    Pilotwings - already looks different enough, being set on WiiSports Resort Island. Nice to see the Plane back from the SNES days. Imagine hang gliding in first person mode (just seeing your hands on the bar) and tilting and panning the 3DS gyroscope to change direction!

  • Segnit #38 2 years ago

    A bit off topic but I just saw some close up pics of the 3DS hardware on cvg and I gotta say that I find the design of the hardware pretty ugly. There is plenty of room for a massive redesign a year down the line.

    Still, I expect the unit to retail for €300 and I am personally prepared to pay more just for the ports of classics of old. I think even if it ends up retailing for €300, even then, this thing will be a smash hit. I have never been so giddy for a console in my life.

    Pilotwings can't come soon enough!

  • GamesProgrammer Verified Games Team Programmer, Eutechnyx Ltd. #39 2 years ago

    My only gripe after all the shit Sony has gotten for only having 1 analogue stick, they went and did the same!

  • Segnit #40 2 years ago

    Don't forget that a lot of the PS1 games only used one stick (or no stick) and N64 games used just one stick. 3D gameplay doesn't need dual analogue to work. I wish there were two as well but a single awesome stick is a good enough foundation.

  • EclipseDj #41 2 years ago

    @ GamesProgrammer and Segnit - I felt the same as you guys at first about only one analogue stick but check out my link on post #40 to see why it really isn't needed on the 3DS!

  • Widge #42 2 years ago

    I wish the design was a bit more... slick too.

  • Segnit #43 2 years ago

    @ EclipseDj: The only thing is that when you're using motion and gyro, you run the risk of getting out of the 3D sweet spot. I'm probably missing something and most probably all my concerns will be alleviated once I get a hold of it myself.

  • Bluetooth #44 2 years ago

    Can't wait, but maybe I should put off until the 3DSi XXL Lite version comes along