Breaking news, everyone. Nintendo has confirmed that they are releasing the DSi XL, a version of the DSi with much larger screens. Specifically, the screens are 1.9 times larger than a normal DSi, which is 2.85 times larger than a normal DS (unless, of course, my math/sources are faulty). That’s larger than the screen on Sony’s new PSP, as you would expect; Nintendo wants to retain all bragging rights as far as handheld gaming systems are concerned.
Now, according to GameCola tradition, I will explain why larger screens for the DS is a bad idea. I believe a suitably large video from my walkthrough for Phoenix Wright will suffice.
Notice what happens when the game screen is twice as large as normal? Everything becomes pixellated to an annoying degree. And the DSi XL screens are going to be larger than this YouTube video (again, unless my math is incorrect), so the pixelation is only going to be worse. Not a pretty sight.
And that’s why I believe having even larger screens for the DS is not a good idea, by jingo. Let’s hope Nintendo has a pixelation-compensation program in place. If not…well, that’s probably part of the reason why the DSi is not backward-compatible.
