How I think Nintendo's decision on their online system went down...

[Dark Jaguar]

<img src="http://www.dilbert.com/comics/dilbert/archive/images/dilbert20080146683111.gif">

[A Black Falcon]

Perfect! :D

Sounds totally believable...

[Great Rumbler]

Their internet infastructure and integration works just fine, it's the part dealing with "friends" that's a pain.

[A Black Falcon]

No, the system is pretty fundamentally flawed.

(I don't often have online access on my DS, but once in a while I'm somewhere that can support it and have played a few online games of the DS games that I have that go online... Metroid Prime Hunters, Zelda PH, Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin...)

[Great Rumbler]

What's fundamentally flawed about it?

[alien space marine]

Is the wii good?

[lazyfatbum]

Did you just ask that? Did that just happen

[Dark Jaguar]

Not sure. Let me check.

"Reads former posts in thread."

Well according to ASM's post, number 6 in this thread, he did in fact ask the thing he asked. I have to conclude it did happen.

[A Black Falcon]

You log in, play a game or two against a random opponent (or opponents), and leave. That's all you do. "Online"... not outside of the actual gameplay it's not, and good AI would be the same. Just toss in a random internet-style name generator and you're done. That is not competent online play, and since Nintendo's system is built from the ground up for that design, it is fundamentally flawed. To fix it they'd need to start again from the basics and completely rework the entire online interface...

[Dark Jaguar]

This is pretty much true. Their servers won't need to be replaced but they would need to code pretty much from scratch, further the new system would need to be backwards compatible.

[lazyfatbum]

XBL's "Even the old shit gets online MP" needs to be on the VC.

I think Pokemon Snap and its shared pics is a clue in to Nintendo's direction.

You dont have to re-work anything, keep the codes. Just make it so that when you do a random you can voice chat/IM and add them to your roster permanently. No biggie as far as reworking any code.

[Dark Jaguar]

Well actually that's the thing. I wanted it networked BETWEEN games. Meaning, I don't want a different friends list for every single game. I want one friend's list, shared across all games, and to see other people in other games, and invite them in real time during a game from the game they are playing to mine.

That's the part that'll take some big overhauls on the server. In fact it's the sort of thing that more or less will require them to ditch friend codes anyway. I mean sure they could use "new" friend codes but why?

[Great Rumbler]

You log in, play a game or two against a random opponent (or opponents), and leave. That's all you do. "Online"... not outside of the actual gameplay it's not, and good AI would be the same. Just toss in a random internet-style name generator and you're done. That is not competent online play, and since Nintendo's system is built from the ground up for that design, it is fundamentally flawed. To fix it they'd need to start again from the basics and completely rework the entire online interface...

What exactly do you want here? Leaderboards? Voicechat? Because Pokemon DS has voicechat and so does the upcoming Advance Wars, which suggests that it's going to be a permanent part of their online plan.

And there's no substitute for playing against real people.