Quote:
Originally Posted by bassplayinMacFiend
I guess my earlier post was expressing surprise that there wasn't a leap in portable gaming power relative to size. I keep hoping for something new in portable gaming and all I see is a rebadged PSP in the PSP Go (no new internals) and now this from Nintendo. Will the next generation of portable gaming systems ever come out?
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No.
I'm sure Nintendo has a DS2, somewhere in their labs. But why would they bring it out now, when they are still making bank on 2006 (I'm being generous) hardware?
The Game Boy went for twelve years before it was replaced.
Even if you count the Game Boy Color as all-new hardware, it still stuck around for nine. In fact, the Game Boy Color is probably an okay analogy. That's what the DSi is. It's not a whole new system, of course, but it does have some technical improvements (more RAM, a new CPU) and we will start to see a few DSi-only games (in addition to existing DSiWare, of course) in 2010. But no, it's not a new generation. Nintendo doesn't really need to release a new generation - they own the "portable game player" market. They just need to make sure it doesn't go the way of the "personal digital assistant" market, or the "global positioning system" market, or the "personal media player" market...
Sony claims to not intend to release an all-new PSP until 2014 or so (with their much-ballyhooed "ten year cycle"). Nintendo tends to release consoles on a five-year cycle, but handhelds...who knows? I think they're just winging it, with the DS.
It's one of those "get out of the way" products, especially in Japan.
They do seem to be settling into an annual October release window, just like Apple's September iPod event.