Almost 20 years later, does Nintendo DS live up to its name "Developer's System"?

[Wman1996]

TheMisterManGuy said:

IcaroRibeiro said:

Definitely not

It's a system that rely on dual screen and touch controls. It's too far away of the industry standards. Not even Nintendo can port all its games without some compromises

You have to remember the era the DS came out in though. It was released at a time when consoles with custom, bespoke hardware were very common and cross-platform development wasn't as standardized as it is now.

Plus, the DS basically had a full controller layout anyway, so developers weren't forced to use touch controls if they didn't want to.

The Switch is basically the developer's system for the modern age. It has the standard console controller inputs, and full support for modern game development tools.

Yeah, pretty much the only obvious omission from DS was some kind of analog nub like the PSP and 3DS have. There is only one set of shoulder buttons, but that's not really an issue on DS. 

Another good thing about DS is that there was no mandate to use touch controls (like how the Wii didn't mandate motion controls). As a result, plenty of DS games have the touch screen as a map with minimal to no touch interactivity.