Together in past times

We do love the occasional rumour here at Nintendo Life, and the latest has emerged from French website nintendo-master.com, courtesy of its very own unnamed source — we love that guy/gal, we really do. In any case, the rumour is that an old DS patent is going to be revived which will allow a cartridge and Circle Pad Pro to combine and enable a 3DS to function as a Wii U controller.

This isn't beyond the realms of possibility, of course, as the Learn With Pokémon: Typing Adventure DS cartridge apparently has a wireless device within the cartridge — probably Bluetooth — to communicate with the keyboard peripheral. It's possible, therefore, that a chip could be placed in a cartridge that links with a Wii U, allowing the inputs of the handheld to work in the same way as a Wii U Pro Controller.

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While it's a fun idea, there are some reasons why this is doubtful. From a practical perspective, the gamer would have to own the cartridge and a Circle Pad Pro — which isn't even available for the XL model at the time of writing — a double expense; we'd also assume the 3DS would only work as a secondary controller (like the Pro), as streaming the GamePad content to a 3DS touchscreen seems like more effort than it's worth. In addition, we find it unlikely that Nintendo would willingly encourage anyone to not buy additional Wii U peripherals, but instead offer a 3DS option that would possibly confuse plenty of consumers — let's not forget, for example, that a number of people are still unsure of the basic difference between a Wii and Wii U.

An enjoyable rumour, definitely, and many scoffed at the tales of a Circle Pad Pro before it arrived in all of its chunky glory, but this one seems like a stretch. What do you think: is this likely, possible or a load of old nonsense?

[source pocketgamer.co.uk, via nintendo-master.com]