Can the bottom screen of the DS do 3d?

StoOgE

First tragedy, then farce.
I keep hearing that the bottom screen is for 2d and the top for 3d games.. I dont get this.. Is it somehow impossible to display 3d images on the bottom screen? i.e. is one processor for the top screen and the other for the bottom? Seems kinda limiting to me if this is the case.
 
Correction: borrowed from Meijilan's post
Both screens can do full 3D independently AND at the same time. However, if only 1 screen is doing 3D, then that screen can do it better.
 
Both screens can do 3-D at the same time. If you look at Samus' character model before a multiplayer game in Metroid Prime: Hunters. There is also a video that you can unlock that pulls 3-D on both screens at the same time as well.
 
Both screens can do full 3D independently AND at the same time.

However, if only 1 screen is doing 3D, then that screen can do it better.
 
Both screens can display 3D. There have been screens showing both displaying 3D simultaneously even. It's up to the programmer to do what they want with the CPU power they have.
 
Oni Link 666 said:
Feel the Magic uses both screens as one while displaying polys in a lot of it's games.

which is what I could have sworn.. but I keep hearing that the top screen is the only one that does 3d. Thanks for disproving an urban myth.
 
StoOgE said:
which is what I could have sworn.. but I keep hearing that the top screen is the only one that does 3d. Thanks for disproving an urban myth.

This was once suspected in the early days of the NDS, after its unveiling but well before its release. It wasn't rumored that only the top screen could do 3D, to my knowledge, but that only ONE screen at a time, could do it.
 
also um.. besides the fact that Mario 64 uses the bottom screen for 3D almost 100% of the time, i have no clue where that rumor would have come from.
 
Uhhh, I think the Samus model in Hunters is just a video, and both screens can play vids no problem.

In Feel the Magic, only one screen is usually doing true polygon graphics; the opposite screen usually waffles the effect with an animated sprite. Of course, it's done so well that you usually can't tell, but I have yet to see a game with an extensive use of 3D (not just rotating mode 7-style effects) on both screens.
 
No there has been a game that shows off 3D on both screens, it was that mobile phone remake, where you slash the enemies with the touch screen. It had a dragon that took up most of the space of both screens. I can't remember what the game was though, can anyone help me out?

EDIT: Found it, Deep Labyrinth DS.

RPG...jpg


EDIT2: Also, does anyone know if the Pacman ball on the bottom of Pac n' Roll is fully 3D? It looks like that from the videos, but I can't be sure.

pac-n-roll-20040527032255606.jpg
 
umm.. isn't a screen just a screen? Unless there's 2 cpus? I haven't read too much into DS structure but it reads a bit funny. I understand that the lower screen is touch sensitive. I think that's the difference. I'm sure a developer could easily do dual screen 3d ifs they want to. Maybe somehthing llike PACMAN 3d via both screens?
 
Odnetnin said:
umm.. isn't a screen just a screen? Unless there's 2 cpus? I haven't read too much into DS structure but it reads a bit funny. I understand that the lower screen is touch sensitive. I think that's the difference. I'm sure a developer could easily do dual screen 3d ifs they want to. Maybe somehthing llike PACMAN 3d via both screens?

There are 2 cpus :)
 
Speevy said:
I'd imagine so.

?

and I heard this in the fake Smashbrothers thread... I suggested it might just be a PS of the N64 game and someone said that the gameplay screen should be on the top.. then someone else pointed out Castlevania had gameplay on the bottom and someone else said that was because it was 2d... so I really am not making this up.

I do however suspect putting fully 3d graphics on both screens would cut the quality of those graphics by a ton.. and since most games have no use for the second screen except for a map and as a crappy analog control substitute I guess its not worth it most of the time... I just thought it was odd that it wouldnt let you put 3d graphics on whatever screen the dev wanted.
 
Odnetnin said:
umm.. isn't a screen just a screen? Unless there's 2 cpus? I haven't read too much into DS structure but it reads a bit funny. I understand that the lower screen is touch sensitive. I think that's the difference. I'm sure a developer could easily do dual screen 3d ifs they want to. Maybe somehthing llike PACMAN 3d via both screens?

I was always under the impression that each screen got one of the ARM CPUs, but they have different speeds (ARM5 versus ARM9, I think). You can change which screen gets which ARM on-the-fly.

Theoretically, if you drew your model/scene with the lowest-powered ARM's spec in mind, you could have it spreading across the two.

Or maybe you could have the processor render to some huge frame buffer and then just split it in half? I dunno, I've never touched a DS dev kit.
 
Sho Nuff said:
Or maybe you could have the processor render to some huge frame buffer and then just split it in half? I dunno, I've never touched a DS dev kit.

That's how it read in the spec sheet that went around awhile back IIRC.
 
I believe there are two reasons why Konami is making the bottom screen the primary gameplay screen for Aria of Sorrow 2.

1.) To contain (and ultimately defeat bosses) you'll be drawing magical spells right in the midst of the actual combat, on the main action screen.

2.) It's quite natural for most of us Metroid / Metroidvania fans to want to look towards the top of the screen for the mini-map. Looking up towards the top screen for the map isn't much of a leap from there.

That said, Aria of Sorrow 2 does seem to have some 3D elements and trickery for special effects and whatnot, right there on the bottom screen. Sure, it's not full 3D, but still. Certainly disproves the theory that the bottom screen is incapable of 3D.

Edit - Sho Nuff, the DS is powered by an Arm9 and an Arm7. The weaker of the two, the Arm7 is essentially the same CPU that powered the GBA, only THIS Arm7 is clocked at 2x the speed of the GBA's Arm7.
 
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