WLM: This was posted here before it was on Spymac, so you may shut your hole.
Luigison: I enhanced the contrast on the image and I still don't know what the things on the bottom are... there's a small rectangular hole right next to the headphone jack, and on the other side there's something that *might* be some sort of slide control, but the part that might slide is in the whole, making rather hard to slide... so if it does indeed slide then there might be a piece of plastic missing that goes above that ... maybe Nintendo made it so dark because they didn't want people to see that part yet (just as they have released no images of the back ports yet). There isn't any volume control labelled in the picture, so it's likely to go down there somewhere. I don't know if the top is the power button... it would make more sense for it to be a light button, but there are no details regarding this. David noted sharp aliasing around the buttons, which means these pictures might just be mockups. Another weird thing is the two holes on the front opposite of the one hole marked MIC. I really don't know what that might be...(if it's a stereo mic, then why are there two holes on one side). The little metallic looking things on the top part look like they could be magnetic to hold the case shut better, but there's nothing to substantiate that.
More thoughts... The GBA/expansion port on the bottom might be trouble for devices like cameras because of the awkward way you'd likely have to hold it. The larger, more round buttons are a big plus... they look more like Super Famicom buttons rather than N64 C-buttons now. I'm also gald they took out the indentedness of the controls to give full space for the thumbs; that was something I really disliked on the GBA SP. I do have concerns about the new screen design... the two screens are styled differently from each other, which might draw focus in the wrong direction... the black "stripe" of the old design was better in that case instead of the indented lower screen. With the new style, I think the bottom corners could be a little more rounded so they won't dig into the palms. I also think the top is slightly more susceptible to breakage and definitely scratching... hopefully they'll make it available in solid colors instead of painted-on platinum... In all, I think the new design is much better than the "brick" that was the first. It's too bad they didn't add an analog "nub," but then they probably would have had to add two... I still don't know how well 3D games will play with a digital pad, though...
Oddly, the first design looked pretty similar to the Sharp Wizard, and the new design looks more like the Sharp Zaurus. Of course, people have noted that the new design looks suspisciously like the
Lambourghini Countach... Finally, there still remains the question of PictoChat... there are good indications that this will be built into the device and you can switch from a game to it while utilizing multiplayer. Hopefully, they'll also add built in GB/GBC emulator, and of course, Mario Bros.
Edited by - MEGAߥTE on 7/28/2004 7:31:03 PM
