And that’s kind of where we leave ourselves with today’s announcement from Nintendo. The 3DS is set to hit American shores this weekend, introducing glasses-free 3D to the portable gaming market. The trouble is that not everyone can see the 3D-ness, forcing them to put that slider all the way down to 2D for the games to make any sense.

So, what does Nintendo do? Hideki Konno, the Nintendo 3DS producer, says that they are “moving away from any stance that says if you don’t see the 3-D functionality, you can’t play the game.” What this means is that the 3D is even more of an aesthtetic gimmick, rather than an integral part of the game. You don’t need 3D to solve the in-game puzzles, because the games don’t rely on that perspective.

I guess this is both good and bad. In my brief experience with a 3DS demo, I started to suffer eye strain and a mild headache after only a few minutes of Pilotwings Resort. If I needed the 3D to be on all the time to play the game at all, I don’t think I could ever really play a 3DS… but that’s like buying the Wii just so you can play Mario Kart with a GameCube controller.

[Ars via Wired]

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To be fair, the headline for this article is the combination of two confirmations that have come by way of Rovio head honcho Peter Vesterbacka. That said, it’s not completely unheard of for these two confirmations to really combine with one another.

First, Rovio has indeed confirmed that they are “working on” a version of Angry Birds that will be making its way onto the (now Nokia-backed) Windows Phone 7 platform. Seeing how the game has already made its way onto just about every other smartphone OS, I don’t see why not. Vesterbacka blames the Microsoft lawyers… after all, they’re the same folks that are so tough on third-party Xbox peripherals.

Second, a 3D version of Angry Birds is also in development. They’ve “built a lot of 3D games before,” so “it’s not like it’s a lot of learning in order to recreate the technology with Angry Birds.” They didn’t specify a platform, but there aren’t too many handheld 3D gaming platforms. You’ve got the LG Optimus 3D with Android and then you’ve got the Nintendo 3DS. Maybe a 3D version for the PS3?

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If you’re a fan and thought last year’s Myst App download was bloated, then get a load of this year’s 1.01GB version.

Developed by Cyan Worlds, they give potential downloaders fair warning that:

“Riven for iOS is a VERY, VERY large application… so PLEASE BE PATIENT – download times and syncing times can be longer! It’s possible on slower iOS devices for the downloading/syncing to pause FOR 10 OR 15 MINUTES.”

The Developers add that they highly recommend using iTunes on your computer to download the app first and then move to sync with your iDevice of choice.

Managing to compress Riven from it’s original DVD size to a mere 1 GB is no small feat so Cyan Worlds has to be commended for that and by all accounts they’ve already won the award for the largest app available. Sitting right now with a full 5-star rating on the App store it appears users don’t mind waiting a little bit longer for a download to get their Myst fix.

We think the publicity associated with the heavy weigh-in will probably help Cyan Worlds given that the game is ringing in at $6, which is a pretty high premium by app standards, but likely a price most Myst-lovers won’t mind shelling out.

[iTunes]

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