Nintendo: DSi won't immediately replace DS Lite in U.S.

by Griffin McElroy on Oct 5th 2008 2:00PM

While there's been a fair amount of excitement and buzz over the recently announced, camera-equipped upgrade to Nintendo's best-selling handheld, it seems that the big N doesn't want American gamers to neglect the DSi's older, lensless sibling. In a recent interview with Game|Life, Cammie Dunaway, Nintendo's VP of sales and marketing (and world-renowned snowboarding expert), explained that the DS Lite has "huge, untapped potential" in the U.S. -- potential that the company hopes to tap before replacing the Lite with the new shutterbugish model.

Dunaway explained Nintendo's hopes to bring America's DS Lite sales to a level the company has come accustomed to in Japan, where one in every two households owns the handheld. While the DSi isn't due out in America until "well into 2009", Nintendo hopes to bolster Lite sales by allowing the two versions to "coexist for some period of time". Hey, as long as the DS Lite doesn't go all Macaulay Culkin in The Good Son, we're cool with it.

Source

Tags: cammie-dunaway, DS, dsi, dslite, nintendo

Reader Comments (62)

There were plans for a Good Son video game? Huh, learn something new every day...

What's up joystiq? Lately it seems most of your news is like a day late. You're like 20x better then kotaku, what's wrong joystiq?

Weekend...

During that time, they don't bother to write up many news so we're down to six/day at most.

On these days, I wish they did as little as directly copy-pasting from their sister sites like 360,PS3,Wii and DS Fanboys.Hell even(in fact ESPECIALLY!) Big Download since they had some interesting news this weekend...

Griffin stays up all weekend with a bottle of Tequila in one hand and a pipe in the other.

It's not his fault there's too much news for him to do!

Theres a long way to go untill dsi is released, possibly till next summer.

American consumers in other words "hey here is somthing better but buy this product that is like the same but not as good". No thanks I will wait till you bring the new DSI. DS Lite "now Dead"......

Well, you don't get a GBA slot on the DSi, so the 'superior' product is for you to decide.

The argument doesn't work.
Everyone that would follow this logic already has a DS lite.
Everyone else has no idea it exits.

Does anyone know if you can import this thing and change the language to English?

Cammie did say she sees no reason you couldn't... Still DSWare might be region locked though.

It's been confirmed DSWare is region locked.

If Nintendo didn't say this they'd be pissing off Activision more than they probably already are. I can't see the Lite staying around for much longer personally.

I could, if only to do something similar to what MS is doing with the Arcade

DSi being the high-level model that costs more, DS Lite being the low-level model that costs less

And its more appealing in DS's case, because the online store, photo, and music playback functions are more superfluous to the actual DS experience than having a hard drive is to the 360 experience.

The 360 doesn't require a HDD to play games though, and it can always be bought seperatly later.

But is it cost effective to manufacture two completely different devices?

"High-Level Model" stops being a "revision" and becomes a "successor" as soon as there are games that become hardware-dependable on it.

Considering that it's 100% certain there are Camera-based Games being developed as we speak, I also don't think Lite will last much longer unless Ninetendo brings out Music Player/Camera/SD Card addons for GBA Slot.

@Jakka

Oh man, if there are games that are DSi-only I'll be seriously disappointed. Okay, to be honest I haven't touched my DS Lite in months, but I'd still be disappointed!

Jakka: The likelyhood of any RETAIL DSi exclusive games is slim to none with the install base of the DS/DS Lite.

GBA slot camera addon that could work I guess.

But things will definetly become much more complicated for a lot of people, between the DS models, addons etc.

This is very close to pulling a Sega. It could easily turn to that if consumers get confused or just don't care about the DSi. Just have one DS and leave it at that.

P.S

By consumers I mean people who don't read gaming blogs and get up in arms about a simple comment.

I think we should differentiate in some way between the two, like 'they' are consumers, but we are devourers.

Two words: Price cut?

When you announce the coming of a new, better, product with more features, you've already killed the old one. The people you sucker into buying the soon-to-be-obsolete model won't be so trusting in the future. The greed of Nintendo of America is shameless.

Yeah because Microsoft and Sony so totally don't do that.

OH WAIT..

When you look at how Nintendo of Japan operates vs NoA, I think it's a more valid comparison.

@Shogan

What are you even talking about? Don't all companies do that? Apple releases new versions of their ipod and Sony releases a new version of the psp even though it's the same shit. Most companies are greedy, not just Nintendo.

I'm 100% fine with a new product. It's the reason NoA wants to delay the thing that's bugging me.

"The greed of Nintendo of America is shameless."

Doesn't every handheld manufacturer release revisions of hardware every few years or so?

What's this!? The comment system didn't put my comment where I had intended it to go? WHAT A SHOCKER

Hardware revisions that are actually improvements, yes... The DSi is a step backwards, IMO. You don't take away functionality, add something completely unneeded, then jack up the price... Especially not on a third version of the same device.

It's a slap in the face, really.

@Dragod

Perhaps the same can be said for Micrsoft and Sony as well.

Nintendo exec1: OK, we're going to make the DSi, but we need enough supply for Japan, and oh, what should we do with all these old DS lites?
Nintendo exec2: Just dump them to the US. Let them buy up the old stuff while we play with the DSi.

I would have bought one... If it had both GBA and GB/GBC compatibility. I was sad to learn that, for some stupid reason, the DS Lite can't play my old Gameboy and Gameboy color games.. That was a deal breaker for me, and I ended up keeping my Phat because I feel it is better in almost every way.

I would have probably bought the DSi, if it had complete backwards compatibility and the cracking of the screen hinge from the DS Lite was fixed.

But honestly, without a GBA slot, this is a definite pass.

Maybe they will include Gameboy, Gameboy Color and Gameboy Advance games via DSiWare.

I'm sure that's what their plan is... I LOVE PAYING FOR GAMES TWICE!!!!

Well... according to Nintendo, the prices for DSiWare will be from 200 to 800 points. I don't have any GB or Gameboy Color game...

I will gladly pay 200 to 400 points for GB and GBC games.

I would gladly pay $10 to rebuy Pokemon Blue. I lost my old cart. :(

"the cracking of the screen hinge from the DS Lite"

I honestly have never heard any reports of this other than right in the very beginning, at launch. I was under the impression that it was fixed long ago.

And seriously dude, just get a GBASP+.

I have a GBC, GBA, GBASP, and DS... Should I have to carry around two or three devices just to save fractions of an inch in thickness on one device?

It had better never replace the DS Lite, since even plenty of DS games need that GBA port.

This really isn't much different than when they released the GBA SP and said it couldn't play Gameboy games anymore.. no big deal really.

GBA SP? Do you mean GBA Micro? I believe the SP did play older games..

No, the SP did away with it, as well did the micro I believe..

Let me just through in here:
The SP can and will play anything you through at it, all the way back to the big grey doorstop.

Does it have a built in Web Browser like the PSP? I think that the DS could easily be a great little internet-thing, but that Opera Browser add on thing sucked eggs. The Touch Screen would be a million times better than the select-a-letter thing like the PSP.

It does and its faster.

I can't believe some people are still going on about the frickin' GBA slot. Do you actually still play those shitty old graphical and gameplay inept titles or do you just want some to moan about?

I'm guessing it's the latter.

What about games like Pokemon, which require the old GBA games to access a lot of the content, or things like Guitar Hero, which require an attachment that usees the GBA or slot?

And that's not taken into account the boat load of really great GBA games, which I still play very regularly on my DS.

You scorn the GBA?

How dare you, sir?

"...which I still play very regularly on my DS."
Problem: DSi doesn't play GBA games, DS does.
Solution: Don't sell DS.

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Nintendo: DSi won't immediately replace DS Lite in U.S.

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