Nintendo reports it has sold more than 100 million handheld gaming machines since its late 2004 launch of the Nintendo DS, which inaugurated a new era of portable gaming by introducing touchscreen and voice-recognition capabilities.

The second-generation Nintendo DS Lite, which is backward compatible with the Nintendo DS and arrived in North America in June 2006, features touch input from a stylus and Wi-Fi connectivity. Both handhelds are popular among gaming aficionados worldwide.

As of year-end 2008, 83 software titles for the two devices have shipped more than one million units globally, and seven have topped the 10 million mark, Nintendo said. The company hopes to keep gamers flocking to the platform by releasing its third-generation handheld early next month in North America and Europe.

A Pair Of Eyes

Called the Nintendo DSi, the new device sports a number of improvements, including the ability to record, manipulate and play sound files, and even allows gamers to personalize their portable playing experiences. However, the most noticeable change comes from two new cameras that serve as the DSi’s eyes: One on the outer shell and one inside that becomes active when the user opens the case.

“The outer camera is there so you can take pictures of other objects or persons as you usually would with a digital camera,” said Masato Kuwahara, a member of the Nintendo DSi engineering development team. “The inside camera is for taking pictures of yourself while you play. That’s why there are two.”

The new cameras only feature 0.3-megapixel resolution, but Kuwahara says that’s equivalent to 640×480 pixels, sufficient for the gaming tasks at hand. “You can capture images at a resolution 2.5 times that of the length and width of the DS screen,” he said.

Recession Resistant?

The sound quality of the DSi has received a boost in comparison with the DS Lite by an upgrade to the IC responsible for the new machine’s sound output. The handheld, which was introduced in Japan last November, also features an SD slot for memory cards and sports a slightly thinner form factor than earlier models.

Nintendo also has increased the size of the device’s liquid-crystal screen from 3.0 inches to 3.25 inches. “If you see it on its own, it isn’t easy to tell the difference, but if you’re someone who’s used to playing the DS Lite, and then you take the Nintendo DSi system in your hands, you’ll realize it immediately,” Kuwahara said.

The Nintendo DSi aims to help keep the company’s gaming growth on an upward trajectory at a time when most other consumer device makers are struggling to stay afloat in a recession. According to comScore, the second fastest-growing online sales category during last year’s holiday season was video games, consoles and accessories, which grew 14 percent.

More recently, NPD Group said gaming sales in January rose a robust 17 percent year-over-year. The 510,000 sales of the Nintendo DS were exceeded only by the 679,000 Wii consoles shipped during the month. Additionally, NPD Group said combined video-game software sales in 2008 in the world’s three largest gaming markets rose 11 percent year-over-year to 409.9 million.