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F84 GAMES BEGINS DSI DEVELOPMENT
Sunday - 9/6/09
DSi

F84 Games is upgrading to the Nintendo DSi! The time has finally come to purchase the new DSi devkits. We will first be developing DSiWare titles and then moving on to retail DSi games. This week I have been working on upgrading our in-house DS engine to take advantage of the DSi's new features. 

We have 4 times as much RAM now! 16 megabytes may not sound like a lot, but in the world of the DS, it opens up a whole new set of gameplay mechanics for us. We can now have smarter AI and better sound assets. The ability to preload more assets in memory means that a game level can be larger and more complex.
 
The iPhone is a great system because we can make a concept into a game within a week or two. Unfortunately the fact that no specific amount of memory is guaranteed is quite frustrating. Mail and Safari may result in your app starting with 2 MB of RAM! We've solved this problem in our apps with a technique that forces the system to shutdown Mail and Safari, but the OS is still able to take RAM away from us when a phone call comes in or for whatever other reasons it may have. 

With the DS/DSi, you know exactly what you are getting down to the byte. Every little detail of the system is known to you and you have insane control over it. This is the only way that large games could ever be made with 4 MB or RAM. This control also means that development time is increased, but it definitely can be worth it.

Overall, I am excited to be working with the Nintendo DSi and am looking forward to developing innovative games for it!

Frank
frank@floor84studio.com