The 3DS, despite being a higher-end piece of hardware than the DS — and, yes, bearing a much higher-end price — still bears the same resistive touchscreen technology as its seven-year-old forebear. Why would Nintendo opt for older touchscreen technology, eliminating the possibility of multitouch and forcing the use of a stylus?
3DS hardware producer Hideki Konno told Joystiq it’s because of that seven-year-old DS screen. “Really, it’s all about the backwards compatibility,” he said during an E3 interview. “We have to play DS games on this and we want to make sure they work.”
Konno said that Nintendo didn’t think there was currently sufficient technology to both enable a more feature-rich touchscreen and accurately emulate the touch interface of the legacy DS. “Now that technology may come out sometime in the future, but when we were making our decision on what kind of touchscreen to implement,” he said, “that was one of the deciding factors.”
That, of course, doesn’t explain at all why the Wii U uses the same vintage touchscreen technology. Unless the Wii U is secretly capable of emulating DS games! We’re totally onto you, Nintendo.*
*We’re probably not actually onto you.
3DS touchscreen tech chosen for DS compatibility originally appeared on Joystiq on Sat, 11 Jun 2011 19:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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