Well what could Nintendo add that would be regarded as High Tech when it infact is not(or atleast not as expensive as one might think)?
3D cameras.
- To my knowledge are simply 2 cameras at a set distance away from each other and angled to replicate the view from human eyes. The effect is mostly handled in software as it blends the pics together to be viewable with the use of a 3D screen and/or glasses. 2 sets of 2 cameras(or just 2 swivel cameras) on the inside and outside of the 3DS shouldn't be too expensive. I mean you can buy a 10MP camera for less than $100 and that's with the the ~3 inch screens, SD card readers, cases, buttons, battery, packaging... (2x 3MP cameras in a massive bulk order shouldn't cost much on a per camera basis)
Motion Control
-Depending on how this is implemented, it can be very cheap. Accelerometers and gyros have sold tens of millions of units already and Nintendo currently has a contracted supplier for both of those parts. The only way I see it being expensive is if the motion is squeezed into a stylus like some people have been speculating.
Motion Tracked Stylus
- This could be done with a magnetometer and/or an led/infra red light at the tip of the stylus. This would require some sort of battery or cable to be attached to the stylus though, so that could be more expensive. Once again, depends on how it's implemented. An Infrared LED at the tip of the stylus with a micro battery at the other end of the stylus would still be small and inexpensive.
Touch Screen
- Very cheap, over 125 million in the DS alone and 100's of millions more in all the cellphones, the real trick is combining that with the 3D screen and whether or not it will be capacitive, resistive or infrared touch screen.
3D Screen
- I would assume that the cost of these screen has either hit a very affordable place since they've been around for a while, or Nintendo used some market positioning weight to get a really good deal on a bulk order that guarantees the supplying company profitable record books for years to come.
Shrunken GC tech or Tegra/II
- This is already sunken cost if this(shrunken GC) is what they are using. The massive R&D spending could have been because of the rumored shrinking of the GC chipset that was supposedly going on over at Ati/AMD before they shut down their mobile department(which might have nothing to do with a shrunken GC chipset). But that is cost that would have been spreadout for the last 9 years since they finished the GC chipset to begin with(2001).
- Licensing Tegra/II I would assume would be pretty cheap considering Nvidia is looking for a profitable way into the SoC/mobile/GPU market since ATi/AMD has handed them their ass as far as putting a 2010 product on the shelf this year.
*But rumor has it that we will be surprised at who is supplying the chips for the 3DS*
**and that we will not be disappointed with the graphics when we see them**
Onboard Flash
- Memory is cheap. Flash is cheap. I can get a 4GB flash chip for under or around $10 on a single order so I know that if I were Nintendo and ordered 5million to start I could probably get them for atleast $6 a piece if not cheaper. Nintendo wouldn't even need the plastic casing and the packaging, so they might get it even cheaper than that.
Anything else you guys can think of that could be included (that would be considered "High Tech" for Nintendo) but probably shouldn't be expensive?