New DS Software/Application from Nintendo

Shikamaru Ninja

任天堂 の 忍者
According to the Sankei Shimbun, Nintendo is developing a new software which includes features such as a virtual dictionary and touch-screen translator which will feature English-Japanese, English-Chinese, Japanese-Chinese. Word games and mini games and several other features will be included.

President Iwata quotes, "Although it is practical as a dictionary, it has several functions." Iwata hopes to target this product next year for sale by junior and senior high school students.
 
Would have been awesome if it was built into the system. Maybe if they make it downloadable to the unit itself
 
Hmm, I was wondering why Chinese and Korean weren't supported in the DS. Guess this explains Chinese.

Oh, and a virtual dictionary is nice indeed. :D
 
This is just a ply to get people to buy two DSs. One to play the superior Mr. Driller Drill Spirits JPN and the other opened with this app to translate the quest mode!

IM NOT FALLING FOR IT!
 
scola said:
This is just a ply to get people to buy two DSs. One to play the superior Mr. Driller Drill Spirits JPN and the other opened with this app to translate the quest mode!

IM NOT FALLING FOR IT!

Good IDEA... now I can import :)
 
Once a PDA application comes out, the DS will be a purchase for sure, and will be used to copy down readings I have to do in certain classics. Definitely.
 
Anyone who's read my screeds against "non-gaming" functions in VG products, will realize I'm being a giant hypocrite, when I say...


I SUPPORT THIS DECISION. (ISTD)


Screw the purity, I wanna use my DS as a palm-pilot! :)

Secondly, a nice new market could pop-up with apps developers releasing neat little programs take advantage of the 2 screens, WiFi, and touch-panel. I'm thinking simple apps, that do one or two things, but do them very well. i.e. StarGazerDS, Coaches Playbook DS, and my dream-app.....GraphMakerDS! *faints*
 
Gahiggidy said:
Anyone who's read my screeds against "non-gaming" functions in VG products, will realize I'm being a giant hypocrite, when I say...


I SUPPORT THIS DECISION. (ISTD)


Screw the purity, I wanna use my DS as a palm-pilot! :)

Secondly, a nice new market could pop-up with apps developers releasing neat little programs take advantage of the 2 screens, WiFi, and touch-panel. I'm thinking simple apps, that do one or two things, but do them very well. i.e. StarGazerDS, Coaches Playbook DS, and my dream-app.....GraphMakerDS! *faints*



:lol :lol :lol
 
scola said:
This is just a ply to get people to buy two DSs. One to play the superior Mr. Driller Drill Spirits JPN and the other opened with this app to translate the quest mode!

IM NOT FALLING FOR IT!
Quad screen, baby!
 
JoshuaJSlone said:
Quad screen, baby!
in_focus_nintendo_bs.jpg

:D
 
Imagine two people who don't know each other's languages conversing to each other using their DSs. Write a question for your new foreign ladyfriend. Push "send". Immediately she gets the translated message into her language. She types in "Da/Hai/Oui/Ja/Haji/Ii/Sí/Hai/etc." and you are in business!

Foreign Poontang Get! :)
 
Hmmm...

If they allow voice input (a-la Talkman) and also allow for scribbling in Hirigana (Katakana as well I guess) then I would definitely be sold. I wouldn't buy it since I have no use for it but I'd definitely support an ambitious project like that.

Built in support (or as an upgrade) to Picto-Chat would be an awesome bonus. Not necessary but I'd think it'd be nice.
 
[troll] So basically this is a half-assed attempt to provide a function that Talkman does a hundred times better and with nine languages? [/troll]
 
Amir0x said:
[troll] So basically this is a half-assed attempt to provide a function that Talkman does a hundred times better and with nine languages? [/troll]

Damn it don't take Snapty's line!
 
GaimeGuy said:
Damn it don't take Snapty's line!

But seriously speaking, Talkman does do everything better based only off of the feature lists. More languages, voice input support, dictionaries, games based on your knowledge of the different languages, fantastic visuals...

...that's pretty great. As I am going to own PSP (I already own DS), I'm going to use the program that works best :P
 
Well, I talked about it a while ago, but I don't thing electronic translation software nor voice input technology is that good, ATM. Whatever. Zeeky Boogy Doog. *boom*
 
GaimeGuy said:
Well, I talked about it a while ago, but I don't thing electronic translation software nor voice input technology is that good, ATM. Whatever. Zeeky Boogy Doog. *boom*

Come on, GaimeGuy. You can do it. You can say it...

"I admit, the Talkman seems vastly more appealing. I know it's on a Sony system, but it's true."
 
Amir0x said:
But seriously speaking, Talkman does do everything better based only off of the feature lists. More languages, voice input support, dictionaries, games based on your knowledge of the different languages, fantastic visuals...

...that's pretty great. As I am going to own PSP (I already own DS), I'm going to use the program that works best :P
Touch interface would allow writing integration though, that's something PSP can't really offer (unless we see that keyboard released, and even then it'd be less intuitive and limited).
 
Amir0x said:
But seriously speaking, Talkman does do everything better based only off of the feature lists. More languages, voice input support, dictionaries, games based on your knowledge of the different languages, fantastic visuals...

...that's pretty great. As I am going to own PSP (I already own DS), I'm going to use the program that works best :P
\

I'm going to use BOTH...

Yet I still have no idea where you got such an elaborate review of Talkman?
When does it come out?
 
jarrod said:
Touch interface would allow writing integration though, that's something PSP can't really offer (unless we see that keyboard released, and even then it'd be less intuitive and limited).

I agree, but since the PSP Talkman has voice capabilities... if it works well... you can use voice to have it done for you. Of course that's never going to be as exacting as writing, but we'll see how it comes together.

naz said:
I'm going to use BOTH...

Only any need for one. Unless both end up having major advantages over the other... in which case I'll use both too...

naz said:
Yet I still have no idea where you got such an elaborate review of Talkman?
When does it come out?

That's not an elaborate review, that's me shooting off the feature list (according to Sony) and looking at the pics and videos we have of Talkman (to discuss the visuals).
 
Shikamaru Ninja said:
.... translator which will feature English-Japanese, English-Chinese, Japanese-Chinese.....
Hah! Seeing that choice of languages makes me suspect this software's origninal purpose was so that NCL, NOA, and its Chinese manufacturer's could do business with each other more easily.... as intended for internal use only.
 
Amir0x said:
I agree, but since the PSP Talkman has voice capabilities... if it works well... you can use voice to have it done for you. Of course that's never going to be as exacting as writing, but we'll see how it comes together.



Only any need for one. Unless both end up having major advantages over the other... in which case I'll use both too...



That's not an elaborate review, that's me shooting off the feature list (according to Sony) and looking at the pics and videos we have of Talkman (to discuss the visuals).

You have not really seen any real feature list of what Nintendo is working on we just have some tidbits here of what the software is and yet to see any images... So it is a bit unfair to jump in and judge SONY Talkman the best.

-Knowing that my purpose is to learn new languages I will use both sources at my tools to do so. I'm just very happy to see that Nintendo is working on something like this, they are very good at making things FUN.
 
Amir0x said:
I agree, but since the PSP Talkman has voice capabilities... if it works well... you can use voice to have it done for you. Of course that's never going to be as exacting as writing, but we'll see how it comes together.
Sure, but Nintendo's translator also has the potential to include voice capability as well... and wouldn't demand an extra hardware investment to do it. I think we need more details before you can claim Talkman as the superior product.
 
naz said:
You have not really seen any real feature list of what Nintendo is working on we just have some tidbits here of what the software is and yet to see any images... So it is a bit unfair to jump in and judge SONY Talkman the best.

-Knowing that my purpose is to learn new languages I will use both sources at my tools to do so. I'm just very happy to see that Nintendo is working on something like this, they are very good at making things FUN.

Hey, I agree to that last part!

But, anyway, yes... I was basing it on these tidbits. But from these tidbits, we already now know for a fact that the PSP Talkman has way more languages. Since this is PSP, we can assume that anything the DS puts out visually speaking won't exactly be on the same level. The PSP has a dictionary and the DS has a dictionary so that's 50-50. And the one advantage the DS has (so far) is the touch-screen translation feature. That's a nice advantage, btw. And both have many games, so that's another 50-50 so far.

So I'm not exactly talking out of my ass, I'm just weighing both games based on features. Of course, I'm sure once Nintendo expands on the idea we will have some information about voice capabilities which I bet Nintendo will add to this.
 
I want TALKMAN to be a very ambitious and a killer product, from what I read I am hyped.
But SONY has a way with hype and delivery - the delivery is what I am hoping stands up to the original hype, I want this to be effective and useful
 
naz said:
I want TALKMAN to be a very ambitious and a killer product, from what I read I am hyped.
But SONY has a way with hype and delivery - the delivery is what I am hoping stands up to the original hype, I want this to be effective and useful

I with you man. Actually, I hope both products are awesomely awesome so that I am forced to buy both.
 
jarrod said:
Sure, but Nintendo's translator also has the potential to include voice capability as well... and wouldn't demand an extra hardware investment to do it. I think we need more details before you can claim Talkman as the superior product.
Complex translators and voice recognition softwares, due to their complex algorithmic nature, can easily be expected to perform better on the hardware packing the more computational power and available RAM.
 
But will the DS have a beautifully 3-D rendered Bird talking to you? I don't think so.

*here's hoping it's Mario or Olimar*
 
vysez said:
Complex translators and voice recognition softwares, due to their complex algorithmic nature, can easily be expected to perform better on the hardware packing the more computational power and available RAM.

Haha, you have no idea what you're talking about. Voice Recogntion and Translation is anything but complex.
 
lockii said:
Haha, you have no idea what you're talking about. Voice Recogntion and Translation is anything but complex.
Er, ok, let me rephrase my claim, if you didn't understand what i exactly meant the first time, voice recognition and translation software quality is tied with the complexity of the algorithms and data strutures used.
In other word, expecting a more poweful hardware to deliver a better job (Quality/speed) at the task is not a completely inaccurate or crazy assumption.
 
But PSP cannot do anything related to a touch screen! Say you are in China, and want to read the characters on a building. How are you going to speak it into the PSP for your translation? How are you going to look it up? DS probably will let you draw the character and pop up the closest matches for it. Remember, DS also has a microphone so speaking into that might allow you to do the same thing as the PSP.

Nintendo also has better mascots for the program. A bird wtf!? :)
 
Amir0x said:
Hehehe. I haven't even heard of that.

March 12, 2001 - Sure, the system's got "game" in its name ? but that's not going to stop companies from trying to teach kids on the Game Boy Advance. Keynet's ready to make Japanese children learn English on the Game Boy Advance with a six volume adventure series called EZ-Talk. This is one of the first games developed by the Nintendo/Dentsu collaborative company, NDCube Co. LTD. who is also responsible for the Game Boy Advance edition of F-Zero: Maximum Velocity.

EZ-Talk puts you in the role of a little school boy by the name of Jay. You must go about your day to day tasks, from waking up to getting dressed to feeding the dog ? but you must listen to commands that are given to you and follow them to a T. The designers of the game recommend players use headphones, since the game makes heavy use of the Game Boy Advance's sound capabilities ? digitized voices will tell you what you need to be doing, and will praise you quite vividly when you properly listen to the English clues and perform the right task. It looks like the designers intentionally minimized the amount of Japanese in the design to reinforce the absorption of the English language.


This package is incredibly lengthy, spanning six entire Game Boy Advance cartridges. But all this comes at a cost ? the stand-alone version of EZ-Talk will retail for 36,000 (a little more than 300 dollars) yen when it's released on March 21st. A full EZ-Talk kit, which includes the six volumes as well as a Game Boy Advance system, will retail for 45,800 yen (approximately 400 bucks).

Don't expect a US release of EZ-Talk, as the series is heavily tailored for Japanese students. But it's good to know that the Game Boy Advance is being used in more versatile ways, eh?

Ign had more info.
 
0wn3d said:
Nintendo also has better mascots for the program. A bird wtf!? :)

Birdo. Everybody's favourite transsexual-egg-spitting-thing is a perfect mascot for translation software.
 
Whoa, how did I forget to post in this thread?

This is a fantastic idea and there's an excellent chance I'll buy it at launch. I do have a Canon WordTank but it's not one of those snazzy stylus-based ones I've seen around. I want to be able to look up a kanji by drawing it, gosh darn it!

By the by, this isn't built into the system because Nintendo is going to have to license kanji dictionary software from some publisher or another, which is going to cost them for every unit sold.
 
lockii said:
Birdo. Everybody's favourite transsexual-egg-spitting-thing is a perfect mascot for translation software.

I dunno. Birdo doesn't say much. Nintendo's most chatty charactes are the Star Fox team. :lol :lol :lol

Meowth wouldn't be a bad mascot for it though. Cat VS bird! They could also add a Pokemon<->Japanese, Pokemon<->English, and Pokemon<->Chinese translation to it! Match that PSP!
 
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