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Hands on with the DS Opera browser; it's everything you thought it would be

4:36 PM on 06.14.2007, Dyson 35 comments

Hands on with the DS Opera browser; it's everything you thought it would be photo
     Handheld gaming

In case you weren’t aware, Nintendo recently released the Opera web browser for their Nintendo DS. Being a person who likes all things DS, and is also one of the five people left on the planet who doesn’t have an Internet enabled phone; I decided to pick one up. After several hours of playing around with the browser, I came to several conclusions that I would like to share with you.

Read on after the jump

I quickly surmised that my purchase was, shall we say, an effort in futility; much like trying to use the Opera browser itself. The assumption that I could prance around the Internet within minutes of popping in the two Opera software cartridges was a fallacy that ended in about thirty seconds.

The Nintendo DS is not a PDA or a Blackberry. This, I understand. But the amount of hoops one needs to jump through just to get to enter some text is ridiculous. With a Blackberry – or a cell phone even – the user is presented with keys or buttons that correspond to letters. To enter information on the DS, you are presented with a keyboard on the ever-present touch screen.

Now, if you’ve ever played a DS game, you would think to yourself that the touch screen interface is a good idea. Not because you’re a button hater, but because the DS has an amazingly good touch screen (which it does). But somewhere along the way, the Opera people decide to screw things up a bit and make the DS’s pixel perfect precision an afterthought.

Worlds Crappiest Typewriter

Not only did I spend an inordinately large amount of time trying to type “words,” I spent an even longer amount of time hitting the backspace icon because the DS couldn’t figure out whether I was tapping an L, or a semicolon. Pure frustration ensued and I nearly threw the DS out the window. The software does allow for the option to use handwriting recognition, but if you’ve ever played Brain Training, you’ll know that this is merely a choice between two evils.

Regardless of the imperfect keyboard interface, the Opera browser does deliver on several aspects. You can check your email with relative ease, and you can access login-required hotspots, previously inaccessible with the DS’s WEP Key-only interface. Thereby allowing your DS to access the Internet somewhere other than a McDonald’s.

As far as appearance goes, the browser allows for image loading (sadly, no Java or Flash), which comes in handy in if you’re looking at Destructoid. Although, the amount of memory that the browser has is so limited, that after loading a few pages it becomes full and needs to be deleted. So, if you’re keeping any hope alive to be able to watch Youtube videos on your DS – don’t.

To be fair, there are plenty of options to speed up the page loading process and to help you navigate pages. Image loading can be turned on and off and you can switch from a regular, web style view, to a SSR (Small Screen Rendering) view. The keyboard screen also has quick keys like .com and .net, to help you type URLs faster.

Unfortunately, with all these features in place to help you, the Opera browser still fails miserably in the most important department: ease of use. The browser, which is really only good for checking emails, is held back by the incredibly frustrating keyboard interface and will, most likely, drive you mad. Which is a shame, because with a little more tweaking, this could've been a fun and relatively useful accessory. As it is now, I couldn't recommend anyone buying one these.


Next page: More DS stories




Riser Glen's Avatar
Riser Glen at 06/14/2007 16:55
Weak. But I can't say I would have bought it even if it was good.
BFeld13's Avatar
BFeld13 at 06/14/2007 17:01
I just got it today. I don't find the keyboard as frustrating as you do, but definitely not worth $30
DJDuffy 's Avatar
DJDuffy at 06/14/2007 17:10
yea I've had it since the fall, and over the months I haven't got much use out of it. No Java and Flash support is a big negative...but I don't use the keyboard input, I find it is much fast to hand-write the letters. I like how it has 2 spots for writing the letters which speeds things up quite a bit by alternating. In the end, it is good for a limited amount of use. Sometimes it works as a nice companion to playing games on the tv as apposed to running back and forth from my computer.
Chad Concelmo's Avatar
Chad Concelmo at 06/14/2007 17:16
Can we record RetroforceGo! on it next week? :)
flaakmonkey's Avatar
flaakmonkey at 06/14/2007 17:28
i have it it is way cool and worth it.
ArrestedDeveloper's Avatar
ArrestedDeveloper at 06/14/2007 17:36
DS = Fingercuff
Dyson's Avatar
Dyson at 06/14/2007 17:42
@ Arrested

You have no idea how close I was to putting Fingercuffs up there.

Rosseh's Avatar
Rosseh at 06/14/2007 18:00
Does it support the same flash as the Wii Opera. I noticed all the main flash video sites have upgraded. Stuff like youtube and even Google Video don't work on it now. Which is pretty much all it was used for.
CypherVR's Avatar
CypherVR at 06/14/2007 18:00
-excluding people who have laptops w/net,and cellphone/blackberry/etc.-
DS web browser is ok, if your net is down or away from your comp.(provided that you are near a internets hotspot)
For $30.00, nah
if it had the ability to load flash and java and other stuff then it might be considerable..>_>
10BobMarleys's Avatar
10BobMarleys at 06/14/2007 18:14
70 bucks Australian to have my Ds DPed..... no thanks. This is the one thing the PSP has over the DS
eakius's Avatar
eakius at 06/14/2007 18:38
does anyone that's used this been able to use AIM or an aim compatable client on it?
jerrt's Avatar
jerrt at 06/14/2007 18:45
arrested.... you win, god that scene from chasing amy always got me freaked out.
TheBrain's Avatar
TheBrain at 06/14/2007 20:14
Yeah, here's hoping for a DS 2 with the processing power for cool auxiliary applications such as a browser. This is like taking an N64 online.
Dark-Dread's Avatar
Dark-Dread at 06/14/2007 20:21
"I quickly surmised that my purchase was, shall we say, an effort in futility; much like trying to use the Opera browser itself."

... What? I use the Opera browser, it's insanely easy to use? You'd have to be, well, internet illiterate not to be able to figure out the basics within 30 seconds of openning it...
BA Chieftain's Avatar
BA Chieftain at 06/14/2007 20:30
Thanks for reviewing this; no one else was reviewing the American version, and I was getting antsy.
Topher Cantler's Avatar
Topher Cantler at 06/14/2007 21:15
The PSP's browser was a miserable piece of crap, too.
rebelcan's Avatar
rebelcan at 06/14/2007 22:08
Still sounds better than the psp browser.
Necros's Avatar
Necros at 06/14/2007 23:29
Wonder if I should pick it up just for the future rarity factor.
ridley80's Avatar
ridley80 at 06/15/2007 01:05
Is it me or is it really effin slow?
Mxyzptlk's Avatar
Mxyzptlk at 06/15/2007 01:15
Eh. No flash, no interest.
Topher Cantler's Avatar
Topher Cantler at 06/15/2007 02:32
I'm with Necros, for 30 gil, I might just buy one from a collector's standpoint and leave it unopened.
dorock's Avatar
dorock at 06/15/2007 07:03
go go homebrew!
Rosseh's Avatar
Rosseh at 06/15/2007 07:14
I don't know how I missed a whole paragraph about flash.

Why did they go with Opera for the deal anyway? I don't know a single person who uses opera. Plus, Gamespy for Wii online? Gamespy is awful. Whoever is in charge of knowing things needs to be fired (I'm assuming there's only one person at nintendo specifically employed to know things)
Elitist_Bastard's Avatar
Elitist_Bastard at 06/15/2007 07:25
Rosseh are you for real?

"Stuff like youtube and even Google Video don't work on it now."

On the Wii? Yes they do.

"Why did they go with Opera for the deal anyway?"

Because they found Opera to be the best browser? The other ones are too bloated to even run on the DS.

"I don't know a single person who uses opera."

And you are the standard all others are judged by?

Opera is the only real mobile browser. If you know someone who browses the web on a non-PC device he is most likely using Opera.

That Opera doesn't have a higher market share on PC has got nothing to do with its quality. It's both faster and more secure than Firefox and IE. It just hasn't had all the marketing of Firefox or the deep pockets of Microsoft.
TheStripe's Avatar
TheStripe at 06/15/2007 10:02
WHAT THE PSP IS BETTER SURPRISE

Yeah, it has an awesome keyboard.
Mxyzptlk's Avatar
Mxyzptlk at 06/15/2007 12:40
Elitist_Bastard is correct on all counts. Opera smokes Firefox and IE in nearly every area. The only current problem is some incompatibility with a very small number of sites, which is the only reason I haven't completely ditched Firefox yet. As far as speed, security, and memory usage goes, it's king. Which is what makes it ideal for non-PC devices.
Holyetheline's Avatar
Holyetheline at 06/15/2007 14:46
You know... I can't even get online with my DS browser... and every time I set a password for something it acts like I didn't and I have to set another one... and that process repeats for eternity... There's like a thing that allows you to access webpages in the settings or something... I don't know... anyway it's all crap and I don't even want to look at it.

I'll just play planet puzzle league and forget about how much that browser sucks.
hansv's Avatar
hansv at 06/15/2007 15:39
I'm going to take a moment to pimp my DS Portal, simply because I think it's relevant.

ds.hansv.com

It's designed to take advantage of the dual screens and help you find a number of things you might be looking for in a moment's notice. I've used mobile versions of websites wherever possible to decrease load times.

Try it! I think you'll like it! (No ads, it's just free :)
Rosseh's Avatar
Rosseh at 06/16/2007 08:41
I guess that wasn't a well thought out sentence when you put it like that haha. Maybe I will try Opera again, I tried it a long time ago and didn't really like it.

I just checked my Wii and you're right about them working. But when I try it on a friend's Wii, the one we use mainly for watching videos, it gives the message "Your browser does not have the plugin required" or something along those lines. It's not just a one off thing either, the problem is persisting. I really should have tested my Wii before I just assumed it didn't work at all.
Still, this is really strange.
Rosseh's Avatar
Rosseh at 06/16/2007 08:54
Plus the know things bit, that was a joke.
Mxyzptlk's Avatar
Mxyzptlk at 06/16/2007 10:22
Does your friend have the final version of the broswer? Maybe he's still got the beta and that's what's causing it. If he deletes and redownloads the software, that should do it. Also, Wii only supports up to Flash 7, because Adobe is a bastard about releasing the SDK for later versions. Youtube and Google Video should work fine, but stuff like Gamevideos not so much.
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