3DS to foil the pirates

It’s a problem that has caused the DS market to collapse” and seen software sales drop by 50 per cent in Europe over recent months, but one publisher reckons Nintendo will finally thwart the pirates with its upcoming 3DS handheld.

What excites me even more than 3DS games is that there’s technology built in that device to really combat piracy,” THQ’s executive VP of global publishing Ian Curran told CVG.

The problem with the DS market in the last few years, particularly with the DS Lite, is that it’s just been attacked by piracy. It’s made it almost impossible to shift any significant volume.

I actually asked Nintendo to explain the technology and they said it’s very difficult to do so because it’s so sophisticated. They combated the piracy on DSi, which they don’t believe is cracked yet – but they know they’ve been hurt across the world and they believe the 3DS has got technology that can stop that.

Therefore the opportunity for people to invest more in product development and bring more 3DS products to market comes out of that. It’s going to probably cost us more to do it all in 3D so we want to make sure we get a return on our investment when we do it.”