The Nintendo DS turned 20 this week. Of course, such an anniversary prompted us to think about the unstoppable flow of time wonderful dual-screen again, and more than a few of us dusted off our old clamshells to take a quick look at some of our favorites.
But being the needy gamers that are always desperate to pay £50 for a quick hit of nostalgia, the weekly reruns have reminded us just how many classic titles are still trapped on the handheld of days gone by. Original Professor Layton trilogy, Rhythm Heaven, Phantom Hourglass and Spirit Tracks, a boatload Mario & Luigi RPG, the list of DS locked titles goes on. Heck, even Nintendogs stuck on the DS, and that was one popular pooch!
Of course, the reason so many of these beloved classics were left on the old system for developers is because of that annoying form factor. Many DS games are, unsurprisingly, designed for the DS. That means two screens, precise touch controls, a microphone, and a handful of other features that range from useful to downright essential for gameplay. And, if you haven't noticed yet, our faithful switches can't deliver all of them.
That doesn't mean the developers didn't try. The Switch has hosted a handful of excellent DS ports with great success, but that's still a relatively small number of notable titles compared to, say, the Wii U library (which presents an easier porting problem thanks to how rarely the GamePad was used, but you get our point).
The DS docks that succeeded solved the central dual-screen dilemma in different ways. Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective pushed the action onto a single panel and swapped touch controls for more precise analog inputs. Pokémon Istery Dungeon: Rescue Team DX has moved the top screen map to the in-game menu and your team's statuses to the top corner. Castlevania Dominus Collection comes with a number of different display options so you can zoom in/out the screens to your liking. Rune Factory 3 Special didn't do… anything, really.
Look, the Switch made a good stab at the DS games it managed to attract… but surely 'Switch 2' can do better.
A few weeks ago we saw a YouTube Short from @BigShirtGames where it ran DS games on the Switch in 'Tate Mode' — remember that portrait function the Switch used all… twice [Shmup fans gonna be gunning for you, Jimbo – Ed.] — with your Joy-Con attached to the Flip Grip.
Admittedly, this required a hacked Switch running an emulator and a good portion of accessories, but we couldn't help but wipe the drool from our chins as we watched two screens reimagined on a single OLED with touchscreen capabilities. Mmmm, pixels.
Since we've seen it in action, it seems like a no-brainer feature for the 'Switch 2'. Give us the ability to slap our magnetic Joy-Con on the X-axis, stick a microphone somewhere on it, stick a handful of DS games into the console-specific NSO library, and you've got the attention of dual screen generations – and probably a tasty influx of sales – without even a whiff of the new 3D Mario.
While we're spitting, what if there was a way to connect your old Switch screen to your fancy new one and completely replicate the classic dual-screen approach in the process? What if it is the real purpose of the mysterious USB-C port on top of those alleged 'Switch 2' designs we saw a few months ago? Nintendo wants to put more Switch into every household, and we're scrambling to figure out a safer way to make sure more screens stay together than the promise of a new way to play Kid Icarus: Uprising. Just us? Possible, but imagine!
