After the Digital Boy, There’s No Motive Why Nintendo Can’t Convey Again Its Finest Handheld

Nintendo doesn’t usually let followers in on its {hardware} plans, however for those who’re the kind of individual to identify developments, it’s clear the Switch 2 will change into the Mario maker’s every little thing console. Nintendo has began providing extra {hardware} particularly tailor-made for enjoying its previous, defunct consoles. The inevitable subsequent step is for the corporate to allow us to return to its hottest handheld ever, the Nintendo DS.

At this time, Nintendo determined it was time to deliver again what is probably going its least standard gaming {hardware} it ever launched. The $100 Virtual Boy for Switch 2 revives Nintendo’s first use of stereoscopic visuals and the odd bipod-mounted headset for enjoying them. That modernized system is a relic—a blast from the previous—that makes use of the Change handheld {hardware} because the display screen. Whereas Nintendo has been releasing new controllers routinely for its Nintendo Classics checklist from the NES all the best way as much as the most recent revitalized GameCube controller, that is the primary occasion of a particular machine to really feel genuine—as for those who’re thrown again to 1995 and enjoying the bizarre 3D console for the primary time.

See Nintendo Switch 2 at Amazon

See Nintendo Switch 2 at Walmart

The DS was Nintendo’s best-selling machine

Whereas the Digital Boy was Nintendo’s worst-selling console ever—solely managing to maneuver 770,000 models in its lifetime—the corporate’s top-selling machine continues to be MIA from the Nintendo Classics checklist. The Nintendo DS first launched in 2004 however hit its stride with the DS Lite in 2006. Over its lifespan, Nintendo sold 154 million models. The corporate’s next-best-selling machine, the unique Change, has bought 153.10 million.

Again in 2023, Nintendo filed a patent with the U.S. Patent Workplace that gave us a glimpse of how a supposed machine with a big display screen may connect to a handheld. Final month, Mike Odyssey on X noticed that Nintendo had up to date the patent for 2025. The connected display screen can be positioned at an “incline,” in response to the patent, and doesn’t describe a hinge system for the highest display screen to fold down onto the hand held, so this attachment would should be eliminated and transported individually for those who had been to take the Change 2 on the highway.

Patents don’t counsel an organization will really make the product, solely that they’re exploring concepts and need to defend them. Even when Nintendo is engaged on a dual-screen add-on for the Change 2, that doesn’t essentially imply the completed product would look something like this proposed design. Now that Nintendo has gone again 30 years to its strangest console, it opens the potential for winding again the clock to each occasion of its previous {hardware}. The one lacking piece, past the Wii and Wii U (a minimum of Tremendous Mario Galaxy is getting one other remaster), is the Nintendo DS and the less-popular 3DS.

Nintendo must beat the emulators

The Change 2 has extra capability for these peripherals because of its high and backside USB-C ports. A transfer towards extra Change 2 retro peripherals makes extra sense once you perceive why Nintendo retains publishing its traditional library for Change house owners. Retro emulators, which recreate older consoles as software program, are rising more and more standard with the era of avid gamers who grew up with Nintendo’s older consoles. Nintendo can also be one of many few corporations that rails hardest in opposition to emulation in its campaign to fight piracy and defend its mental property. Nintendo has taken down multiple Switch emulators, together with Ryujinx, Citra, and—particularly—Yuzu. Nintendo has hindered GameCube emulator Dolphin from a full launch on Steam. The corporate provides its personal emulation via its Nintendo Classics checklist as a substitute for the legion of gamers leaping on the burgeoning retro handheld scene.

And it couldn’t come quickly sufficient. Whereas gamers have an excessive amount of selection for Recreation Boy-like units, the DS and 3DS are nonetheless new territory. In the previous few months, Ayaneo showed off its Pocket DS, a dual-screen Android handheld made for enjoying DS video games. Fellow handheld maker AYN announced its Thor dual-screen machine as effectively. In the meantime, Retroid crafted its personal $69 dual-screen add-on for its horizontally oriented handhelds to play two-screen video games. Nintendo will take its time to launch much more {hardware}. The corporate rolls out its video games over time, so these eager to return to the DS glory days must look forward to one thing official.

See Nintendo Switch 2 at Amazon

See Nintendo Switch 2 at Walmart