Nintendo’s long-awaited 3DS makes its worldwide debut in Japan on Saturday, but we’ve managed to get our hands on one in Hong Kong a couple of days early. As the successor to the incredibly popular Nintendo DS it has a lot to live up to, but I’m willing to bet you just want to know one thing about it: Does it work? Does it really deliver 3D without glasses?
The short answer: Yes.
The long answer: Yes, but it can be frustrating.
As you may have noticed, I'm a bit of a gadget geek. And a gaming geek.
So it should come as no surprise that I bought the Nintendo 3DS as soon as it came out - which, for Hong Kong, was two days before the official worldwide debut in Japan on Saturday.
Unfortunately, I didn't get the day off to play with my new toy. So my impressions here will be a little brief.
What you probably want to know is: Does it work? Can you see 3D images without those annoying glasses? The answer is simply, yes. It works.
Sorta.
It's hard to fathom how a company like Nokia has found itself in the position it now occupies.
It's not just that Nokia is the world's biggest handset maker (it is) or the world's biggest smartphone maker (it is). It's that Nokia used to get everything so right. How did they manage to get it so, so wrong?
There are several people in the CNN newsroom and elsewhere who refuse to accept my cynical standpoint on Christmas. I have grudgingly grinned and borne it, despite the following defenses for my dislike:
But while Christmas has its plus points (family togetherness and food chief among them), I cannot fathom why anyone would choose to celebrate Valentine’s Day. I’m not the cynical one here. The whole occasion is a cynically conceived and cynically executed exercise in fakery.
It started as a cult hit. Then came widespread fame, the lure of a major label, a creative split, accusations of selling out, and finally the break-up.
It's fitting that the story of Guitar Hero sounds like it came straight out of the biography of a rock band. The video game franchise was a rare bright spot for the music industry. But with Activision Blizzard's announcement that it will close the unit that makes Guitar Hero, it feels like the end of an era.
You've probably seen the ad already. If you haven't, stop reading this and watch Volkswagen's Super Bowl commercial right now. Don't worry, I'll be here when you get back.
The ad stars a pint-sized Darth Vader as his attempts to demonstrate the power of the Force. If you don't fall in love with him in the ad, you might during Kristie Lu Stout's interview with the boy behind the mask, Max Page.
Max hasn't seen any of the Star Wars films yet; he's too young. The original film is 34 years old, after all. And yet it remains a cultural phenomenon. Why?