All over the United States the Nintendo DS has been highly anticipated and on November 20 th 2004 gamers all over waited in line for various hours some short as 4 hours to as long as 20 plus hours waiting to be the first to get their hands on the Nintendo DS. Crossing from the " Entertainment Mecca " - Nintendo.com ) in California to the Empire State , New York gamers wasted no time getting there game on. As the doors swung open cash registered kept ringing for the entire day until most stores simply sold out. An unexpected surprise as many felt that the Nintendo DS would do well but not at this rate. Having already shipped 1 million units to the United States , expected sell outs of the system were inevitable, as retailers would have to order more units before the first batch even arrived.

I witnessed GameStop on 33 rd and Broadway in Manhattan New York sell out of their units in less than 1 hour, and they were given extra units prior to launch. A line waited outside for quite sometime and the gamers showed great appreciation for the system, as it gave a better impression upon purchase as oppose to what they were told by media online and in gaming magazines that underrated rated the system. This "Evolved" GameBoy Advance with dual screen crushed shoppers at Toys' R Us as three different floors of the "Toy Giant" featured the system. With kiosk and a virtual Mario talking to the children that were playing the system; people had an option to try out the system just to find out that they loved it and immediately proceeded to go down stairs to purchase it. Lines crowed as people started to pick off the shelves the last of the DS games that launched with the system, from Mario DS, to Madden 2005. 

The games launching with the Nintendo DS was no where near as great as one could expect, but at the same time no where near as bad as one could imagine either. Known hands down as the best title for the systems launch, Mario 64 DS is a great update of the timeless classic first played on the Nintendo 64. Electronic Arts Sports Madden 2005 football game while lacking in the high expectation of innovation that was thought to be used for the franchise on the Nintendo DS, was short coming altogether; however it was a solid title for hardcore Madden fans. Asphalt Urban GT gives you the standard arcade like racer which proves to be more like a systems demo to show what early power the Nintendo DS can push rather than an inspiring racer that it could be. Spider-man 2 made an impressive graphical debut on the Nintendo DS, but suffers from "the attempt to want to design and inspiring level to play in." Feel the Magic is the type of game that is more like Wario Ware and Incredible Crisis; using a combination of style and gameplay the game comes across more as a "train ride game." Finally you have the Urbz: Sims in the City which is arguably the best game on the system currently. Being that you manage your character and the use of the second screen is best used in this game more so than the other five that also launched with the Nintendo DS. 

Not to far from Toy's R Us, the Pokemon Center USA stood with the first to be sell the system as they had it demo available for the Public two weeks in advance for gamers to get a hands on experience with it. Much like all other retailers a line formed outside of the store long before the time of its launch. I made sure that I was the first to be there to get all the feed back and to be the first to get a copy of mine. Gamers holding Nintendo shirts in support of the product were happy to wait for various hours for the newest handheld Nintendo had to offer. When the time came and they got their hands on the system they were more than happy to take pictures and rip into the box to get their system. Most couldn't even wait to go back home as they used the Pokemon Center as lounge to open and play their Nintendo DS. From girls to boys, men to women of all ages, and culture once again the reach of the demographic of gamers showed no boundaries. With Pokemon Diamond and Pearl , and Zelda DS on the horizon look for the Nintendo DS to be the new standard in handheld systems and a legitimate successor to the GameBoy Advance; something I doubt Nintendo saw coming. 

As for the System itself, the Nintendo DS features the Pictochat which has a built-in wireless connectivity with support for 802.11 and a "proprietary communication protocol." Starting from 2 to 16 players can all connect to a single local network. Nintendo has stated that the DS local network has a wireless range of 30-100 feet. The Nintendo DS can also connect to a wireless Local Area Network, which will be available in the future. Nintendo has yet to reveal how to actually create this future connection publicly, but as more and more DS are in use the demand will require an immediate answer. The Nintendo DS hints that online play is foreseeable in the future, but I've only been able to test the multiplayer modes for all the launch titles over a local DS network. By years ends we should see a significant change in that, as 2005 will have a brighter outlook on connectivity issues with the Nintendo DS. Ranging from anything like link cables, backward compatible wireless connections; i.e. Game Boy Advance, (SP) to Nintendo DS, to Nintendo DS link cables to the Nintendo Game Cube. Third party companies like "Pelican" and "Dream Gear" will be sure to support the Nintendo DS accessory gap as they have always done for the handheld giant in the past, so gamers have nothing to worry about. Rest assure what you need will be available in the immediate future. 

The Nintendo DS went farther than just sales, appearing on G4 Tech TV, the theme of the program used the Nintendo DS look - alike system as a feature to show both gameplay footage on the bottom screen while simultaneously the hosts were on the top screen. This experience replicated the two-screen features of the Nintendo DS. It was called "Cinematech," an experience with allowed viewers to see view the program in a Nintendo DS manner. The Nintendo DS was even named after the show: "Nintendo DS Day." The ground-breaking platform in its initial release proved to be more than the sum of its parts at E3 as its reception was taken in beyond its previous expectation. Even I was slightly amazed at how well it was received. Although I personal always knew that it would do better than most had thought. "It's a evolved handheld with backwards capabilities, what were you expecting?"

TheeTriforceGameMaster.