Will The Nintendo 3DS Do Video Chat?

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Nintendo’s president Satoru Iwata set off a hornet’s nest of speculation when mentioned to Forbes that the Nintendo 3DS may be capable of 3D video chat. We already know that the 3DS will have improved internet connectivity compared to the original DS – but is video chat out of the question?

Speaking to Forbes, Iwata-san said:

Technologically speaking, a variety of different things are possible with the 3DS, for example, 3D video chat.

What’s strange about this is that the Nintendo 3DS shown at E3 didn’t have a 3D front-facing camera. It had three censors, two on the back, set up stereoscopically for 3D and one on the front. Nintendo was clear to reiterate during the E3 show that this was not the final 3DS hardware. Will we see a 3D camera added to the front of the device? It’s possible.

Video chat has been out on mobile phones for years, specially from Nokia devices, but Apple includes it on the iPhone 4 and you’d think that it came to Steve Jobs one night in his sleep. Video chat will surely be a hot feature in the future, and 3D video chat would be pretty cutting edge stuff.

Do you even want video chat on your DS? Would you video chat in 3D with a friend?