Nintendo With Possible Palm OS Capabilities 136
Sammy writes "According to GamerCentric, Nintendo has licensed Palm OS software although there intentions are not clear. "Well there seems to be some clues about this. "Nintendo had recently licensed Palm OS based PDA software without any details on why they had done it. Now Nintendo sources have revealed that V-Pocket trademark concerns this licensing. E3 will be the first witness of Nintendo's complete line of personal organizer tools for its Nintendo DS." So there is a possibility that we could see a Nintendo device with Palm OS organizer capabilities."
Slashdot = Rumor Mill (Score:5, Insightful)
All I see is possibility, rumored, without any details etc.
All from as far as we know, an unreputable site.
Re:Let me guess (Score:5, Insightful)
handago, a popular software site for palms
has at
http://www.handango.com/SoftwareCategory.jsp?opti
two thousand, six hundred, and nintey two games for the palm....-- who are they for?
Re:N-Gage (Score:3, Insightful)
Palm Cartridge (Score:5, Insightful)
You will see the DS with Palm OS capabilities, and they will be provided in a cartridge. The DS already has what all other PDA's have, except much better gaming ability.
This is a pretty smart move by Nintendo. Basically, they give you a simple, handheld game system, and then allow you to decide what add-ons you want through carts. Keeps the "I just want a gaming system" folk happy, while appealing to the "everything and the kitchen sink" folk interested.
Of course, I am a Nintendo fanboy, so my view could be a bit biased.
Re:Let me guess (Score:5, Insightful)
Adults use palm.
In their home market, everybody plays video games, not just kids. This could be a pretty good move to get people in their twenties to go for the DS rather than the PSP.
Gross overgeneralization. (Score:5, Insightful)
I have a Palm, and I have multiple Nindendos of different generations. Most of the males from my generation (late 20s) have a better opinion of Nintendo than they do most other consumer electronics companies.
The Nintendo DS has a touch screen on it, that might be useable for writing input -- There comes bundled a little communications package, which accepts 'writing'.
When I first got my DS, I saw how nice it would be to use it as an organizer. Imagine -- being able to claim your nintendo as a tax write-off! [and well, it'd be one less thing to carry with me when I'm travelling].
I'm not much of one for bundling -- I've moved back to an older phone, just so I don't have to wait for java and crap like that to load. But I could see a benefit in this particular combination, provided that the palm wrote out its memory to non-volitile RAM, in case I ever drained the battery from playing games.
And whoever said you'd use them both at the same time? It's possible these days that Nintendo could pack enough memory into one of their cartridges to place the Palm OS on a Nintendo DS cartridge, rather than into the handheld itself.
Although, it'd be rather inconvenient to quit your game, so you could check your address book, it's still a possibility -- but licensing doesn't mean it's going to ever go anywhere. It's good business practice to keep your R&D going, so you can be ready to move in interesting directions. I didn't see anything in the article (which was rather short), saying they were planning on putting it into a specific product, or that we might see it in use in any sort of time frame.
This is clearly aimed at the DS (Score:4, Insightful)
The DS already has a built in touch screen and 802.11b. Once they have the Palm OS added to it, you'll be able to run Palm software relatively easily, which means the DS will gain a web browser, IM client, etc. So, for everyone who's already shelled out their $150 for a DS and gotten bored of Mario 64, this is great news. This unlocks an extra bit of functionality on this versatile bit of hardware. Of course, most kids won't need it, but for those of who game and want to web browser wirelessly on a PDA, it could be pretty cool.
Now, can we please knock off the "Let's play the Graffiti game" jokes?
Re:Let me guess (Score:2, Insightful)
They do not mix. To be sure, I am an adult and I do both. But never at the same time...
Which is exactly why it makes sense to have one device share both those functions.
Re:This is clearly aimed at the DS (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:N-Gage (Score:2, Insightful)
You jumped to this conclusion like Frogger into a VW Beetle.
"So Nintendo wants to turn the Game Boy line into N-Gage."
Then you got up again and jumped into a Mack truck.
Stop it with the heroic leaps of doom already. If everybody in the world thinks adding actual cellphone functionality to the DS would be a bad idea, they probably aren't going to do it. I mean, it's fun to play "I'm smarter than Nintendo," but you have to hit pause on that game at least sometimes, so rationality can kick in. Plus, it's not as easy as "I'm smarter than Nokia." So I'm going to venture a guess that, regardless of whether the DS takes a turn towards PDA functionality, mobile phone functionality is strictly out.
That said, the N-Gage was marketed as a gaming device first and foremost, but hell if it had anything worth playing on it. It was expensive at launch. It also launched with several key design flaws that even huge revisions to the hardware couldn't fix in the minds of gamers, such that even at its current price, almost nobody wants one. And for your purposes of direct comparison, it doesn't even have a touch screen. That puts it in the same boat as other cell phones and the PSP when it comes to functional PDA potential: text input is same-old cellphone crap, and interfaces have to be designed around joypad navigation and multiple key presses. Messy and impractical.
In comparison, the DS has a touch screen and a second screen, which instantly multiplies its potential. Stylus-based text entry (whether via onscreen keyboard or OCR) and cursor navigation are simply better tools for PDA use, something every PDA maker has known since the birth of PDAs - and Nintendo DS is technically capable of all these things. Built-in 802.11x compatibility simply puts it over the top.
If true, this could be a killer app for many people. I would buy a good Palm kit for my DS if it were the right price and included a TCP/IP stack that would enable me to use my DS as a web browser and email client via WLAN. My DS already goes almost everywhere with me (yay for being able to hold a DS game and a GBA game at the same time), so why wouldn't I buy this? It's not like I'd have to switch my cellphone out, or deal with some joypad-controlled monster of a hybrid device. I'd actually expect a DS/Palm wireless hybrid to work very well.