As IJD can attest, I agree with you on that one. The GBA's layout was innovative; the SP was a step backwards from that (although the fold-over was a good idea). The Micro would be the perfect compromise if it could play original GB games. I still adore mine, but it really annoys me that I can't play older games on it. I don't have an SP, so that leaves me no backlit option for those games.

Sad to say, I never really considered backlighting the end-all-and-be-all key criteria for evaluating a system. Stuff like gameplay and battery life had higher priorities. After all, you can always add an external light, but if the ergonomics stink, there really isn't a way to fix that.

They have these things called 'books' now, though they're quite new - they've only been around for the last two-and-a-half-thousand years or so. Still, whenever I take a long trip I make sure to take at least two with me, though evidently I am something of an early adopter of the technology in this regard.

Hey, you know what the perfect compromise between a book and a game is? *points to 14th post*

I have an SP. One of those old ones that's frontlit. Also, a DS Phat. I intend to get a DS Lite around the time I get Pokémon Diamond and Pearl, because I want to trade 'em with myself and my mum would never let me stick a Pokémon game into her DS.

Well, she probably would after some weaseling, but then I'd be left with no excuse to spend more money for shiny shiny.

PHJ, I've got an English major (specifically a creative writing major). I'm about 3/4 finished writing my first novel. I intend to write many more. You won't find many people these days who read as much, or who lament the declining interest people have in books as often as I do.

That said (and I'm really not aiming this at you), I really get pissed when intelligent people get grumpy about video games and their popularity. I love books. I love movies. I love music. And I love video games. And I feel very strongly that all can exist in the same intellectual sphere without infringing upon eachother's relative importance. It's been long enough that our society has accepted film as an artform and placed the cultural significance of movies at the same level as poems and novels in the past. But video games are a newer art (yes, I said art), and they've yet to fully mature in this respect. Still, it's quite an interesting journey and I'm enjoying the maturation the video game industry is going through. Sooner or later it'll be on the same level and the older folks will be lamenting some newer, hipper upstart. Mark my words.

Until then, any critical belittling of video games, or any assertion or implication that books are inherently superior just strikes me as cultural snobbery.

Ahem. Sorry. Rant over.

And for that matter, I plan to bring along books as well. This flight is the first flight I'm going to be taking since buying a DS, and before that I always brought a few books with me. I don't see why that should change.

Normally on flights I take along books which I've already read and which are easy reads so the constant interruptions and general fatigue I get from long flights don't make the reading a chore. A videogame would also provide a useful distraction without being too taxing. Even outside flying there have been many times when I've found myself too asleep to properly pay attention to a book, but still awake enough to play a videogame. And videogames are normally engrossing enough that I can ignore my sleepiness for awhile. Certainly a useful benefit on a long flight.

By the way, my defense does not mean I didn't enjoy your satire, PHJ.

DS Phat. :)

But we are all clear that the DS rules? I mean it has Two screens for crying out loud! Two Screens! And Sonic and Mario, on the same system! Plus with a wireless network and the right hardware....it can go online! I was online the other day..... on the toilet!

Hello?

Hello?

Where did everyone go?

No, we are not clear, Burt. And you don't want me to explain, because the rest of the forum will mob you if you ask. :)

Nate, you almost had me with the no backwards compatability argument before. It's sorta weak, but it's about the only legitimate gripe I can think of with the system.

The fact that you already own a GBA completely obliterates that complaint. So now... I'm really at a loss.

But whatever. Truthfully, the only real loss is yours.

The DS is the finest Nintendo system in years.

Gasp! Did you just diss the Revolution? ;)

LET US NOT START THAT ARGUMENT UP AGAIN.

Having said that, I'm still slightly bitter that the DS doesn't support GB/C games. I'd suggest an add-on that goes into the GBA slot that contains the older processor and whatnot, but why should the Phat get the Lite's overbite?

No. I just dissed the Wii.

I added the winking emoticon specifically to avoid mass panic.

And I just wasted my caps lock for nothing. *weep*

There, there. I'm sure you'll get plenty of chances to do other bits of shouting.

Obscure reference! Have at it!

Hey, bottom line is the DS has about a gajillion awesome games worth playing on it. The Wii has threeish. That will certainly change in time, but for now the DS wins simply because it is far more established.

Won't publishing a book printed entirely on blocks of cedar prove rather expensive?

But does an "amazing" library negate the fact that backwards compatibility was the obvious way to go, and they chose to not go that way?

Could somebody explain the cedar block thing?

Nobody knows why cedar. It just is.