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My thoughts on the 3DS (after about 10 minutes of play). And 999.

by mooseymcman

So, yesterday I found out that a friend of mine who lives down the hall in my dorm building bought a 3DS (and several games). And he let me try it out! Here are my thoughts! Build Quality. Much like everything that Nintendo makes, the 3DS felt pretty solid. It was a lot smaller than I was thinking. I think that's just because I've spent more time using my sister's DSI XL than my DS Phat over th...

So, yesterday I found out that a friend of mine who lives down the hall in my dorm building bought a 3DS (and several games). And he let me try it out! Here are my thoughts! 
 

Build Quality.

Much like everything that Nintendo makes, the 3DS felt pretty solid. It was a lot smaller than I was thinking. I think that's just because I've spent more time using my sister's DSI XL than my DS Phat over the last six months or so, but it still surprised me.  
 
Most of the buttons feel nice, and I LOVE the new control-stick-dealy. It's much better than the one on the PSP. But the problem is that it's so nice that I wish there were two, and it makes the d-pad on the thing seem kinda weak (I was also not a fan of the d-pads on the post-Phat DS's).  I do think that having a widescreen on top and a not-widescreen on bottom is kinda weird, but not bad or anything.   
 

The software.

Aside from the AR Games and Face Raiders (both of which were kinda fun, and made great use of the system's cameras and motion sensors), my friend also had Rayman 3D (which I did not play), Super Street Fighter IV, and Pilot Wings.  
 
SSFIV played like Street Fighter. Which is to say I wasn't great at it and I didn't like it much. It sure looked nice though. 
 
And I flew around for a couple minutes in Pilot Wings. You can totally do barrel rolls by double tapping R or L. I will refrain from making the obvious joke.  
 

The 3D.

The 3D seemed a little disappointing to me. I don't know if it's just something weird with my eyes not being receptive to the 3D, or if I was expecting too much out of the system, but the 3D didn't pop as much as I was expecting it to. I could definitely see a difference between having the 3D on and off, but not enough to really change much.  
 
I will say that my eyes felt kinda sore after using it, which they usually do not when I use my DS Phat or PSP.  
  
Speaking of DS Phat, I recently played 9 Hours, 9 Doors, 9 Something Else the other day after having a friend recommend it (and let me borrow it). I have to say, I was kinda disappointed by it. The poking around rooms and solving puzzles stuff was kinda fun, but the story stuff seemed kinda meh, and I got a bad ending out of nowhere and found myself with ZERO interest in starting over and trying to get a better ending. But it wasn't a bad game or anything, I just feel like it could have been a lot better.  
 
So, back to the 3DS, I have to say that I was impressed overall. Sure, the 3D wasn't what I was expecting, but everything else about the system was awesome. If there were better games out, and if the price was lower, I would race out and buy one RIGHT NOW. But as it is, $250 is just too steep, especially with the lack of great software. But I look forward to buying one in the future!