When Nintendo announced that their next portable device was heading towards the realm of 3D, I was quite the skeptic.  Even though I enjoy Nintendo’s games and products, they’ve upset us in the past with grandeurs of 3D in their Virtual Boy console.  What I was greeted with was a very pleasant surprise!

No More Tinted Glasses

The 3D that’s offered in the Nintendo 3DS is not the “popping out of the screen” type but more of a recessed 3D; depth is simulated for the on-screen objects to give the illusion of 3D.  And speaking of screens, it’s only on the top screen, while the bottom screen remains as just the touch screen interface.  But essentially, you get the same sensation as you would typically get with 3D movie experiences, except without the glasses and no strange color-tinted offsets.

That being said, there are things I noticed when watching the images pop to life.  In one non-interactive demo, I watched as Mario and Luigi race in karts on Wuhu Island (the same from Wii Sports Resort).  At one point of the demo video, Mario (in the foreground) is ahead of Luigi, drifting on a corner.  From that point, I changed my visual focus from Mario to Luigi, and noticed how Mario was blurred out in my peripheral vision!  It truly gives the proper depth sensation that the objects are right there before your eyes, like a second pair of eyes.

Games in 3D

One of the most popular playable demos was the Pilotwings demo.  In the demo, there were two games to try out: flying a plane through rings, and maneuvering a jet pack to pop balloons.  Both games were wonderful to play with the 3D kicked in, and both gave convincing perceptions of you physically avoiding obstacles that were in your way.  This same 3D technology made playing the Starfox 64 demo even more exhilarating as you lock on and destroy enemy ships while flying through the town.

But what stole the show was the Kid Icarus title that was shown as a video-only demonstration on the floor.  Nintendo spared nothing to make this glorious return of a beloved character shine through in 3D, from the flying levels dodging lasers, or the ground levels with hand-to-bow combat.  The fans waited, and the wait was worth it.

Beyond Games

The tech demos were nothing to scoff at, either.  One of them was a shooter in which you take down 3D-propellor-lifted floating heads of your own face as they fly towards you in their devastating attempt at kissing you to death.  But this is where the motion-sensing comes into play, as you tilt the 3DS to the left and right to follow the moving targets as they seemingly float around wherever you point your camera at, all in 3D no less.  While doing this in real life will certify you as a loon and can be quite disorientating, the demonstration shows off a lot of potential this system can perform.  Even the ability of taking pictures in 3D, while viewing is limited to the system, is awesome in its own regard.

What Nintendo has to do, however, is to do what Sony did with their PSP and UMD movies – give consumers portable 3D copies of their 3D movies to the Nintendo 3DS.  And the market of 3D movies out there is only a handful of the total number of movies that Sony aspired to convert to their proprietary media.  If you combine the popularity of the 3D movies (a majority of which are aimed at the younger audience) with the Nintendo 3DS portability and glasses-free 3D, you have a deadly lucrative profit shark.

Final Thoughts

Nintendo came out surprisingly strong with their Nintendo 3DS.  Almost everyone I talked to prior to checking the system myself only had awesome things to rave about it.  Even I was left just saying “wow” over and over again.  Frankly, the system, with its clearly-amped-up high-res screen just about does it for me already, but to also include 3D on it as well is an added incentive.  Let’s hope that all the third-party support will take advantage of the extra dimension with gameplay and style in mind.