This week noticed the Nintendo DS flip 20. Naturally, such an anniversary has received us eager about the unstoppable passage of time pleasant dual-screen as soon as once more, and various of us have dusted off our previous clamshells for a fast blast by a few of our favourites.
However, being the needy avid gamers that we’re, ever determined to pay £50 for a fast hit of nostalgia, the week’s replays have reminded us simply what number of basic titles are nonetheless trapped on the hand held of days passed by. The unique Professor Layton trilogy, Rhythm Heaven, Phantom Hourglass and Spirit Tracks, a boatload of Mario & Luigi RPGs, the listing of DS-locked titles goes on. Heck, even Nintendogs is caught on the DS, and that was one in style pet!
In fact, the explanation why so many of those beloved classics have been left on the ol’ Developer System is due to that pesky type issue. A variety of DS video games have been, unsurprisingly, designed for the DS. Meaning two screens, exact contact controls, a microphone, and a handful of different options starting from helpful to downright important for play. And, if you have not observed but, our devoted Switches cannot ship on all of them.
That is to not say builders have not tried. The Swap has hosted a handful of wonderful DS ports to nice success, nevertheless it’s nonetheless a relatively small variety of important titles in comparison with, say, the Wii U library (which poses a better porting drawback because of how sometimes the GamePad was really used, however you get our level).
The DS ports which have made it over have tackled the central dual-screen dilemma in quite a lot of methods. Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective squeezed the motion onto one panel and substituted the contact controls for extra correct analogue stick inputs. Pokémon Thriller Dungeon: Rescue Workforce DX relegated the higher display screen map to an in-game menu and your group’s statuses to the highest nook. Castlevania Dominus Assortment got here with a number of various show choices so you may enlarge/shrink screens to your liking. Rune Manufacturing unit 3 Particular did… nothing, actually.
Look, the Swap has made stab on the DS video games it has managed to draw… however certainly ‘Swap 2’ can do it higher.
Just a few weeks again, we noticed a YouTube Quick from @BigShirtGames the place he was operating DS video games on a Swap in ‘Tate Mode‘ — keep in mind that portrait performance that the Swap has used all of… two occasions [Shmup fans gonna be gunning for you, Jimbo – Ed.] — along with his Pleasure-Con hooked up by way of a Flip Grip.
It, admittedly, required a hacked Swap operating an emulator and serving to of equipment, however we could not assist however wipe the drool from our chins as we watched the 2 screens reimagined on a single OLED with touchscreen capabilities. Mmmm, pixels.
Since seeing it in motion, it seems like a no brainer characteristic for ‘Swap 2’. Give us the flexibility to whack our magnetic Pleasure-Con on the X-axis, stick a mic on it someplace, stick handful of DS video games in a console-specific NSO library, and you have the eye of the dual-screen technology — and presumably a tasty gross sales inflow — with out even a whiff of a brand new 3D Mario.
Whereas we’re spitballing, what if there was a technique to tether your previous Swap display screen to your swanky new one and completely replicate the basic dual-screen method within the course of? What if that is the true objective for the mysterious USB-C port on the highest of these supposed ‘Swap 2’ designs we noticed just a few months again? Nintendo needs to hit a number of Switches in each family, and we battle to consider a extra surefire approach to make sure that a number of screens stick round than the promise of a brand new technique to play Child Icarus: Rebellion. Simply us? Presumably, however think about it!
