Ah, the Nintendo DS. What can be said that hasn't already been said before about the little console that could? 30 million sales world-wide, Major game developers interest, and more screaming little children than a Catholic priest can shake his stick at. It seems the DS is an unstoppable juggernaut of a hand held, and with the rumor that the DS might see a redesign in the future, the DS seems to be on the high road to success, if it's not already there. But, despite all the love Nintendo is getting, something just seems... wrong... about the whole thing. Let me explain.



#1 - Thumbstick, or lack thereof.
One of the first games I got for the DS was Super Mario 64 DS. When I saw it, I ripped it off the shelf and ran screaming to the checkout line, my palms sweaty with anticipation. But, come to find out I was disappointed hated the game. HATED IT. I liked the extras, yeah. The new characters yeah. New things to see and do, yeah. But, the game handled like a turd in a pond, and the only way to get it, the turd, away from you was to splash at it. But all you did was make it more agitated then it finally jumped up and landed in your lap. I found myself falling off the ledges in those damned levels again and again and again and still, more again. This was the first time I fell for Nintendo's, "Here is the same titled game you loved when you were a kid, only rebuilt to shit and NOW WITH MOAR MINIGAMES!" I just kept thinking to myself as I fumbled with the touch screen control scheme, "if only I had a thumbstick..." And then, like a bolt of lightening from God, it hit me. I said out loud, "son of a bitch!" and quickly ran to my computer to email Nintendo expressing my dismay over their systems lack of a thumbstick.

To those who think that a thumbstick would negate the entire reason why there is a touch screen in the first place, I say, "you pretentious bag of BAWWW." The point of a thumbstick is to better control your character in the 3 Dimensional environment, as opposed to limiting their movements to simply up, down, left, and right in any combination of only two. It would make things MUCH more comfortable to users, and you wouldn't even have to get rid of the original D-pad! Just pull a Sony and add it beneath the D-Pad. There! Now no one won't have as bad of thumb lockups while playing your damn games, Nintendo! Meaning more money and more sales! It's win/win!



#2 - Why redesign (almost)perfection?
There recently circulated a rumor that the Nintendo DS is going the route of the Advanced and undergo ANOTHER redesign. And see, unless it came with a set of tits, I don't think it could get any better (Apart from the thumbstick addition).



However, most signs are pointing that direction. Sales are down in Japan, and the DS is now being outsold by the PSP, however, it still remains the leader in total units sold, so a redesign is expected, despite Nintendo heads denying their intentions to redesign the handheld. It isn't so much something that needs to be changed, more or less that it should stay (relatively) the same. Also, new color schemes are a scheme.



#3 - The Family Friend
Nintendo has always had a reputation to be the more family friendly of all the consoles, ever. But, with this new millennium, they've seemed to make children underneath the age of 5 their prime target. Casual gaming has found it's home on the DS with the new series of Brain Ages and Cooking Mammas. Not to knock them for being anything less than brilliant, the catalogue of DS games is saturated by this constant need to please the children, which baffles me. I am utterly baffled. Because the general statistic of video gamers is that they are generally anywhere from 20-60. We only think it's a younger populated scene because we only hear the bad stories about the kiddies playing. Here's something to think about kids, what if you found out the guy you just fragged in Metroid Hunters is your Granddad? It's happened, but no one will say it.



Now, I'm not saying that Nintendo should drop their family image, because what they have is definately working out for them. But, is it so much to ask to make a kid game that's at least somewhat enjoyable to play through? I have no problem playing through levels that are bright colored and have round corners, but at least make the scissors able to cut something. We all would enjoy going back to kindergarden every once in a while, make us remember why it was fun! (But, leave out Johnny Corntassel. He was a f*cking dick.)

#4 - Pirates can play nice.



Most people now illegally download their music and most people use a common source to download those files. Why couldn't Nintendo take some notes from the past failures of music companies and build on them, make them successful in only the way Nintendo could? With the recent addition of the Demo channel on the Wii, it's definately a step in the right direction, but, why not build on it? Why not take those demo's and have them available for direct download to the DS? Put out a memory expansion, (like the one for the DS browser) that you could slap your newly downloaded games into. Nintendo wouldn't have to put up with store fronts and policies where they have to scare the customer away with subscriptions or reserved copies. Make the DS games downloadable and I would think the sales would jump two fold. Like the Wiiware channel, open up the DS for development by smaller development companies. Make it profitable by charging those small games $5.00 per download. I could go on and on, but you get the idea.



Since my purchase of my DS, it's remained the one system I am always playing. Whether it's the New Super Mario Brothers, Ninja Gaiden, Hotel Dusk, Puzzle Planet, Advanced Wars, Legend of Zelda, Contact, or the World Ends with You, it is my go to system. I am constantly on the look out for the next big thing in the DS, Homebrew or otherwise. The DS is also the first system I bought with my own money, and I am very proud to call it my first bought system. I do love it, I think it's perfect, now change it.