The Nintendo DS Lite was a necessary refinement back in 2006. Contributing to around 94 million of the DS family's 154 million sales, this slimline variant proved highly successful, but 15 years later, we didn't expect to still be finding out about unused features.
Outlined by the Lost Nintendo History team – which consists of “people aiming to uncover and restore the secrets of Nintendo’s software and hardware” – they discovered the DS Lite's SoC (System-on-Chip) can let players output the top screen of DS games, directly to your TV.
It was discovered last year, but only recently highlighted by Beta 64 on Twitter. If you're curious to directly try this, you can find full instructions at Lost Nintendo History. Just be warned though, that require hacking your DS Lite and additional hardware, so it's not a straightforward task.
Why Nintendo never used this feature remains unknown, but it bears a striking resemblance to the Switch's hybrid concept, meaning it could've been planned for a long time. It's a shame we'll never know Nintendo's reasons but, nevertheless, this is certainly a major find.
Would you have used this feature back in 2006? Let us know in the comments.
[source techradar.com, via twitter.com]
Comments 60
I would have loved that!
PSP had this functionality too which wasn't disabled, just not widely known. You could buy the necessary cables fairly easily though. I used it a few times but it felt weird.
Nintendo was always ahead of its time.
Article is about the DS Lite but proceeds to show photo of DSi. lol
Yeah I’m not surprised by this Nintendo is always thinking ahead usually they have ideas that are good but cannot be brought to market until the time is right. The switch is a good example of that.
I thought the Wii U was kool but maybe they were too over confident because of how well the Wii sold.
It probably was disabled because it was only the top screen which may break the game depending on which one you're playing. Obviously for Mario kart it would've been fine though.
Before the GC GameboyPlayer I modded my original GBA to get TV output. That machine had a hard life - I put an Afterburner backlight in it too, but my rubbish soldering skills fried the dimmer wheel so it was forever washed out and too bright!
Just a thought, but couldn't this be a feature just intended for dev hardware?
@Skunkfish
My thoughts were similar. It was more than likely an SoC feature that they would enable for modified DS Lite systems designed for display kiosks or capture solutions, like for gameplay footage in trailers or such.
A variant modal with a different production process for such a purpose, really.
It would have been a cool feature...but DS games didn't look great on the original console. Not sure if making it huge would have helped.
My psp did this. Sony were so ahead of the time
A good find tho
this seems cool but what if your supossed to use the touch screen
do you need a 2nd tv?
The 3DS demo units in the Nintendo World store in NYC used to use a feature similar to this.
Until the DS line Nintendo always gave some way to play handheld games on tv. I feel like if the wiiu had been a commercial success then they would have taken advantage of the gamepad to push a DS to console option. They were already testing with VC for dS on that console. Oh what could have been...
@Skunkfish
It was and also for retail kiosks.
@JohnnyC Someone noted that it might of been used for Dev's to be able to see everything on a bigger screen
If only the top screen was output, then the thing sounds more like a Wii U precursor. Not that it's a bad thing - I've always perceived Wii U as an attempt to bring dual screen gameplay to home consoles.
Having a video out on a portable device wasn't new when the Switch arrived. Hell, people have been docking laptops (or connecting VGA cables) to see them on a monitor for decades. I thought what made the Switch a 'hybrid' was the ability to also unclip the controllers and connect them together to make a wireless controller. And to use other wireless (or wired) controllers with it too (most handhelds are limited to single player). Playing on a handheld with a video cable hanging out the back is rarely comfortable.
Would’ve been dope to have that as an option. But if any of you have downloaded a DS game on the Wii U Virtual Console, I’m sure you’ll agree that they don’t look great on big screens
Or maybe, the chip was available at a reasonable price so Nintendo didn't feel like spending money on a different chip so that's the SOC they used w/ no intention of ever using the TV out capability?
Not saying that's what happened, but I think it's reasonable. 🤷♂️
I play the PSP like this from time to time
I would have killed for this feature on the 3DS (not the mods)
I'm pretty sure starting with the 2000 model the PSP could do this too so that's pretty neat
I hope the Switch Pro launches handheld only with ability to cast to a smart tv and ability to plug into older docks to charge / play on the TV
Nintendo has been planning this concept since the Super GameBoy days.
Reminds me more of the Wii u to be honest. I get it's portable like the switch, but the TV and off TV screens man ...
@Kimyonaakuma well back then TVs were common to be smaller and not so huge like today. So it would have looked fine.
Feels more like a Wii U functionality: bottom screen in hand, top screen on the TV.
Still an interesting find though.
@JohnnyC The PSP 2000 and 3000 had the ability to output to a TV, but not the first PSP released (the PSP 1000).
I’m shocked that no one is mentioning the Super Game Boy and Game Boy Player. We have been able to play handheld games on our TVs for decades already.
@Lone_Beagle I got the 2000 and upgraded to the 3000 for the better screen. Missed out on the 1000. Great little console with a lot of great games.
The Sega Nomad has been mentioned, surely...
Nintendo had the cable and the dev tools to always do this. How do you think the dual screen adverts were made? They got direct feed from the hardware, not taking pictures of the poorly lit screen.
The tools let you pick which screen, or both.
As many have said the PSP actually had this commercially, with the cable costing about £30 (U.K). Sony wanted UMD movies to be more popular, so using the PSP to play the movie on the big screen TVs was their idea to try and make that happen. UMD movies never really took off, however, so the cable's were rarely produced.
Edit: side note, used to use my Gamecube with a portable screen. I'm sure if there was a power pack for it, it'd have been fun to take camping.
It could also be a remnant of development hardware.
You didn't think the developers actually worked on portable games by staring at the tiny screens all day?
All Nintendo portables were made with dev hardware that let it output to a TV.
(and in the case of the DS, it is reportedly that they also had an official emulator available)
@FargusPelagius Unfortunately Sony kind of messed up that feature. At least the games I tried, the PSP TV-output cable would scale the OS screen but gameplay would only output at original resolution on the TV. If they did the same with UMD movies (which seems logical, never bought any, as I imagine many people can say ), that would really suck.
"Hey guys, let's all gather around and watch this movie?" "Why's it the size of a postage stamp in the middle of the screen?"
I watched a review from some guy who bought a knockoff cable from China with a zoom feature to fix that.
This goes to show Nintendo may had some sort of DS Player (similar to Game Boy Player) add-on in the planning at the time but because the Wii doesn't support a second screen they never got the chance to implementing it. The closest we got to a DS game on the big screen is Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles - Echoes of Time and that was done poorly as it was just a straight port using a DS emulator for Wii.
Guess inspirations of the Super Gameboy and Gameboy Player continued into the DS generation after all. Imagine that. Too bad it wasn't utilized. I'm glad the Switch solved ALL of these conundrums in one fell swoop.
@KingMike fairly sure UMDs played at 576i, which was standard TV resolution in 2004. There were 720p HD ready TVs but they were expensive and wouldn't have shown much difference.
Edit: yes gameplay was limited to PSP screen res. UMD s were not, hence the cable being more for using PSP as a UMD movie player.
The resolution wouldve looked weird on a tv
@JohnnyC was thinking the same thing. On the psp go you could connect a ps3 controller via bluetooth. I only tried it twice and I recall it not even being full screen.
I sorely missed the ability to play my DS and 3DS games on my TV. I was often playing my Game Boy Pokemon games on my TV via Pokemon Stadium and then my GBA games via the Gamecube. I think this is just a dev kit function or designed for kiosks, not for consumer use.
@Ultrasmiles I'm sure if they made an adapter for it they would had filter options that solve that issue. The only thing is it wouldn't make the games look any better but at least they'll run smoothly.
@matdub PSP Go looked good but seemed impractical to me, so I stuck with the 3000. Definitely one of the best-looking handhelds ever though.
Wish they had enabled this feature. Would have been great. I wonder why they kept it hidden?
@Ryu_Niiyama I remember them releasing Brain Training which I presume was emulated from the DS version, and it being hot garbage it was either the touch screen not keeping up with the on screen prompts or the microphone bits that really killed it from memory, I can only assume Nintendo (wisely) put that one to bed thereafter.
Now I know what to do with that DS lite I have lying around with a broken connection to the top screen. :3
Seems like something (as others have mentioned) for internal use. I imagine it's for bug testing and other development purposes...though the idea of playing on the go AND at home has clearly been on Nintendo's mind for a long while.
The Playstation Vita had planned functionality even closer to the Switch than the functional PSP feature, in terms of function and capabilities. The feature was removed more or less at the last second of development so they could sell the Playstation TV as a separate device. As evidence of exactly how "last second" they were in removing the feature, the port on the top of the Vita, originally intended for the HDMI output, has no hardware attached to the motherboard and is effectively purely cosmetic.
@FargusPelagius I had a portable screen for my Gamecube too. It was pretty terrible, small and blurry. When it got hot after a short time the picture would start to roll and it even melted the adhesive holding the plastic over its surface. I think I played it on a train once...
i mean sega did this in the early 90s with gamegear and later (1996/1997) with the SEGA nomad. THEY were always ahead of time nintendo often copied and made those features well known in the public haha. but sega did it often first
They were probably testing the concept back then
@Blister crikey that's pretty awful. Mine was pretty decent, good enough for the GBA player and also the second screen Gamecube games (using the GBA player too). It held up "okay" for Mario Kart DD too, but more than two players was a bit of a strain on the eyes.
@FargusPelagius I guess you win sometimes and lose others! 3rd party peripherals were and can still be a bit of lottery!
To echo other comments, my PSP did this and I used the feature often. Even better, my PSP was easily hacked to run a wide variety of retro console games, effectively turning it into a solid retro games machine that could be portable or docked. Pretty sweet little system.
My God, what a missed opportunity.
That's would've been cool...
Shortly after I bought a DS, I bought a 40" HD tv. I'm pretty sure taking a low res DS game and blowing it up on a 40" tv would have looked like hot garbage. It would have been an interesting feature as far as "gee-wiz" factor, but not very practical. As far as the origins of the hybrid concept, I'd give that to NEC and their TurboGrafX and Turbo Express. While the console and handheld were totally separate hardware, they used the same game cartridges. So the Turbo Express was just one connector port away from being a true hybrid.
I think it was originally meant for testing purposes and perhaps for promotional use as well, not intended at all for the retail version so is not too surprising it is disabled for it likely was never meant to be use by the players at all.
@Zochmenos
You're probably right. The feature has probably been there from before they actually attached a second screen to every R&D iteration of the system.
And it likely stayed around for use with the demo kiosks, where the top screen was displyed on a TV simultaneously with showing on the sytem.
It's pretty clear hybrid was where they eventually were going. I think the Switch was the sweetspot where portal horsepower was good enough to finally look nice on a TV. Love my DS and 3DS... but that would have looked awful on a big flatscreen.
@JohnnyC it would have been so much better if you could pair a PS3 controller to it.
Tap here to load 60 comments
Leave A Comment
Hold on there, you need to login to post a comment...