Opera Web Browser on Nintendo DS - Pictures

Here's a bit of news that might have passed you by over the last week - the first screens of the Opera web browser running on Nintendo's DS. SPOnG has to admit that we had some lingering doubts about the viability of browsing the web on your DS's miniscule screens, but these are starting to clear up from looking at these first screens.

Providing the handwriting recognition works without fault, it's easy to imagine that accessing the Interweb via your DS might actually be a viable option for doing any non-secure web stuff on the go. This means that one of the few times we don't have the Internet at our fingertips (i.e. when we leave the house) will soon be Internet-ready time. This will have one of two effects; one negative, one positive.

Firstly, it could mean that our better halves finally give up on us. Let's face it, it won't take long for them to realise that even when we are away from our desks we are still spending all our time on the Internet - instead of talking to them about dresses, hoovers and other domestic chit-chat. This would be a bad thing (not the lack of chit-chat, but the giving up thing).

On the other hand it may mean that, instead of lugging a laptop everywhere trying to freejack unsecured WiFi hotspots in order to do some work, we can merely do it on our DS inbetween bouts of Metroid and New Super Mario Brothers - wherever we are in the world (well, providing it's nearby to a Nintendo WiFi hotspot - which does offer pretty damn good coverage - see here).

Both the Wii console and the DS Lite come bundled with the Opera web browser, so it's going to be interesting to see how Nintendo incorporates this into gameplay. More news on Opera on Wii and DS, as well as Wii/DS connectivity/online features, as we get it.

(source: Ubergizmo)