Nintendo

Being lovers of style, comfort and technology, you've doubtless already decked your living room out with a multimedia sofa and a recliner with a built-in sound system. Perhaps you've even gone to the trouble of hiding your plasma TV behind a nice art print or surrounding it in a home-theater-like frame. If you're now a tad underwhelmed by that functional, but otherwise rather dull, coffee table, then we may have something to bring a smile to your face. Furniture maker Charles Lushear has supersized the brick-like controller from Nintendo's iconic 8-bit gaming system launched in the mid-1980s, swapped the cold plastic for the elegance of wood and positioned some mid 20th century legs underneath to make a fully operational Nintendo Controller Coffee Table. Read More

Let's face it, the audio tours in museums could use a technology upgrade. While listening to the facts and stories behind each exhibit read by a D-list celebrity is still a mainstay of any noteworthy museum or art gallery, the average cell phone today has more features than most of the audio devices visitors are given to carry around. It makes sense then that the Louvre in France, the world's most visited museum, is replacing its usual audio guides with a decidedly 21st-century gadget: the Nintendo 3DS. Read More

Disappointing battery life was one of the flaws indicated in Gizmag's review of the Nintendo 3DS, back in June. Encased in a gamepad-shaped silicone housing, the Nintendo 3DS Deluxe Power Grip from New York-based manufacturer CTA Digital aims at overcoming the battery life issue by offering an extra power supply, while doubling as a stand. Read More

In an article last month, I assumed that news of the PS Vita not hitting shelves until 2012 would have left Nintendo executives feeling as if they'd dodged a bullet - I was clearly mistaken. On August 12, Nintendo dropped the price of the 3DS to US$170, leading to a 260% jump in sales. A month later, just when you thought it was safe to buy a 3DS, Nintendo officially introduces the 3DS Slide Pad - which adds a second analog joystick to the 3DS. Read More

In an industry obsessed with polygon counts and frame rates, Nintendo's Wii console and DS handheld were the proverbial knives at a gunfight. They were grossly underpowered compared to the competition, meaning Nintendo could sell them at a profit from day one. Their innovative control methods ensured they still sold like hotcakes. An animated GIF of Nintendo's Shigeru Miyamoto and Satoru Iwata holding a DS that printed money became the go to picture to run alongside quarterly announcements of Nintendo's gargantuan profits. If a disheveled man emerged from a time-traveling DeLorean with tales of a near-future Nintendo struggling to sell its latest handheld, I'd have been more surprised about the Nintendo thing. So what on earth happened? Read More

Nintendo's 3DS has been in the wild for a while, but now that the hype surrounding the device has died down a bit we decided to cast an eye over the console that promised to revolutionize portable gaming when it was released earlier this year. The 3DS follows the clamshell form factor Nintendo first introduced on the Game Boy Advance SP back in 2003 and the look and feel of the console will be pretty familiar to anyone who has used any of Nintendo's DS line, but the 3DS sees a couple of useful design changes in addition to the headline-grabbing 3D capabilities. Read More

Nintendo has announced that its Wii U gaming console will not feature a Blu-ray drive, and will instead stick to a proprietary disc format. Patent fees related to the technology are too high, the company explained. The Wii U will, however, compete with existing consoles in terms of hardware - it is equipped with a customized CPU from IBM and a GPU from AMD, and is rumored to be 50 percent faster than PS3 and Xbox 360. Read More

Nintendo took the wraps off its new Wii U console at E3 today, sporting a controller as unique as we've come to expect from the company that brought us the Wii and the DS. With a 6.2" touchscreen, dual-analog sticks, D-pad, four face buttons, four triggers, front-facing camera, microphone, and motion controls (gyroscope and accelerometer), it's safe to say we'll see some innovative game mechanics invented to make full use of this thing. Read More

Nintendo will show a playable model of the next-generation Wii gaming console at E3 Expo in June. The company confirmed the reveal date in a short statement earlier today and although there's still no official word on exactly what the successor to the Wii (codenamed “Project Cafe”) holds in store, the rumors are gaining momentum. Read More