Gamespot condenses an interview run in the
April edition of Nintendo's Japanese online magazine in which Kazuo Yoneyama and Tomoyuki Sakiyama comment on their
choices that came to be the DS Lite we know today. Kazuo, a seasoned vet with the company, got his beginnings designing
Donkey Kong arcade machines with Shigeru Miyamoto. Tomoyuki, who hasn't been with the company long, has
contributions in the GBA Micro and original DS.The interview sheds some light on the design decisions that combined to create the DS Lite, with each explaining the reasoning behind weight and the new screens. The two speak of how the DS Lite's top screen needed to be sturdier, yet fit in the overal smaller package the team was aiming for and when no pre-existing piece of hardware met their criteria, they partnered with a LCD manufacturer and went into test mode, putting several variations of the top screen through a rigorous testing regimen. The final outcome, which some of you already know, is one brilliant piece of technology.
[Thanks Retro_X!]
[Update: Fixed a spelling error. Thanks greatslack!]
