Photography! That's all anyone ever thinks about when the DSi's dual cameras come up. It's not all that unreasonable, I suppose, considering that most DSiWare we've seen uses the cameras for exactly that. Customize a profile with a photo of yourself, manipulate images via the native camera utilities, use realtime video of yourself to flail wildly in what Nintendo tries to pass off as a Wario Ware title, etc.
The real potential of the DSi's cameras, though, lies beyond the realm of traditional photography. Consider that the cameras are basically the DSi's eyes. It has native visual awareness of its surroundings. If we assume that the software is up to snuff, there are some pretty amazing things that could be done.
If you think of your DSi as having eyes, anthropomorphization isn't an unreasonable leap. Stick a pair of eyes on the top screen, a mouth on the bottom one, and you've got yourself a living handheld staring you right in the face. If you're a bit unnerved by that notion, imagine something like Dr. Kawashima in the Brain Age titles—a character that addresses you directly and helps you out in whatever quest you happen to be on.
What the DSi offers is the ability to "show" things to our little helper character here. Maybe he asks us a numerical question, so we hold up a number of fingers. Maybe he asks us to describe something we've seen, so we have to turn the DSi around and point his face towards a similarly shaped object in our home. (Sure, you could use the outside camera for that, but you aren't really "showing" him the item in question, are you?) This kind of implementation definitely requires software that's sophisticated enough to identify shapes and objects, but if developers are up to the task, there are plenty of possibilities.
Who says you have to even know that the camera is on? Call it voyeuristic, but secretive implementation of the camera could pleasantly surprise a lot of people.
Say we have a cryptic puzzle in a Zelda game that hints to a solution involving happiness. Unbeknownst to the gamer, the camera is waiting for them to smile. Maybe the camera could even get "used" to what it typically sees while you're playing game, and react to changes: like altering something when you turn away from the screen, calling out if you put the system down, or characters being "jostled" if you move around a lot.
Camera use could also be more subtle and ambient. An in-game locale could be darker or lighter based upon the light levels the DSi's cameras sense. Perhaps similar changes could be based on color-sensitivity.
Remember the GBA e-Reader? It let you scan specially-produced barcodes into GBA titles, unlocking or adding new material. With the DSi camera, it might follow that Nintendo could reproduce that kind of functionality. You could buy cards with a barcode-esque emblem that DSi titles could decode via the camera into unlockables. Nintendo could stick these emblems on all sorts of things, maybe even on inserts in Wii or DS titles, to encourage DSi interactivity.
Who knows, maybe the DSi cameras could actually emulate the e-Reader itself, adding functionality from your old e-Reader cards to GBA games downloaded via a theoretical Virtual Handheld service.
If we consider that the DSi can use its cameras to keep track of what it's used to seeing, could it use similar functionality to track its own movement? Theoretically, analysis of consecutive frames could indicate that the DSi is moving in various directions. It would likely be thrown off it it's looking at items that are moving on their own, but this is an avenue that could produce interesting results.
Wii connectivity isn't something to be scoffed at. By adding cameras to the DSi, the Wii basically just got its own intelligent camera peripheral. Most of the ideas mentioned above could be used to enhance compatible Wii titles. Imagine video chat during multiplayer gaming, a Tingle-Tuner-esque helper assisting you through a console experience, or a general light sensor offering various gameplay possibilities.
The DSi is basically self-aware. It can see, it can hear, and it can feel. Leveraging all three of these functionalities in tandem could make for pretty crazy experiences. I can't wait to see what kind of software the development community puts together as the DSi starts to build up its own exclusive library.
The real potential of the DSi's cameras, though, lies beyond the realm of traditional photography. Consider that the cameras are basically the DSi's eyes. It has native visual awareness of its surroundings. If we assume that the software is up to snuff, there are some pretty amazing things that could be done.
Your DSi can see you
If you think of your DSi as having eyes, anthropomorphization isn't an unreasonable leap. Stick a pair of eyes on the top screen, a mouth on the bottom one, and you've got yourself a living handheld staring you right in the face. If you're a bit unnerved by that notion, imagine something like Dr. Kawashima in the Brain Age titles—a character that addresses you directly and helps you out in whatever quest you happen to be on.
What the DSi offers is the ability to "show" things to our little helper character here. Maybe he asks us a numerical question, so we hold up a number of fingers. Maybe he asks us to describe something we've seen, so we have to turn the DSi around and point his face towards a similarly shaped object in our home. (Sure, you could use the outside camera for that, but you aren't really "showing" him the item in question, are you?) This kind of implementation definitely requires software that's sophisticated enough to identify shapes and objects, but if developers are up to the task, there are plenty of possibilities.
Surreptitious camera use
Who says you have to even know that the camera is on? Call it voyeuristic, but secretive implementation of the camera could pleasantly surprise a lot of people.
Say we have a cryptic puzzle in a Zelda game that hints to a solution involving happiness. Unbeknownst to the gamer, the camera is waiting for them to smile. Maybe the camera could even get "used" to what it typically sees while you're playing game, and react to changes: like altering something when you turn away from the screen, calling out if you put the system down, or characters being "jostled" if you move around a lot.
Camera use could also be more subtle and ambient. An in-game locale could be darker or lighter based upon the light levels the DSi's cameras sense. Perhaps similar changes could be based on color-sensitivity.
Call it the i-Reader
Remember the GBA e-Reader? It let you scan specially-produced barcodes into GBA titles, unlocking or adding new material. With the DSi camera, it might follow that Nintendo could reproduce that kind of functionality. You could buy cards with a barcode-esque emblem that DSi titles could decode via the camera into unlockables. Nintendo could stick these emblems on all sorts of things, maybe even on inserts in Wii or DS titles, to encourage DSi interactivity.
Who knows, maybe the DSi cameras could actually emulate the e-Reader itself, adding functionality from your old e-Reader cards to GBA games downloaded via a theoretical Virtual Handheld service.
Can it see where it's going?
If we consider that the DSi can use its cameras to keep track of what it's used to seeing, could it use similar functionality to track its own movement? Theoretically, analysis of consecutive frames could indicate that the DSi is moving in various directions. It would likely be thrown off it it's looking at items that are moving on their own, but this is an avenue that could produce interesting results.
Wii camera
Wii connectivity isn't something to be scoffed at. By adding cameras to the DSi, the Wii basically just got its own intelligent camera peripheral. Most of the ideas mentioned above could be used to enhance compatible Wii titles. Imagine video chat during multiplayer gaming, a Tingle-Tuner-esque helper assisting you through a console experience, or a general light sensor offering various gameplay possibilities.
The DSi is basically self-aware. It can see, it can hear, and it can feel. Leveraging all three of these functionalities in tandem could make for pretty crazy experiences. I can't wait to see what kind of software the development community puts together as the DSi starts to build up its own exclusive library.