The big news for us videogame lovers is not the United States presidential election but the launch of the Nintendo DSi on the Japanese market. The new Nintendo made handheld is supposed to represent an evolution of the DS concept. The main draw of the console is that it adds not one but two cameras to the device, as well as upgrading the screens and other hardware components. The Game Boy Advance slot is also gone and replaced with an SD card.

The official launch date in Japan was November 1 and it seems that in the first two days, the console managed to move 170,000 units, according to the data offered by Japanese market watcher Enterbrain. Apparently, the first batch of Nintendo DSi consoles, which cost 18,9000 Yen or around 179 dollars, sold within minutes and Nintendo was forced to quickly send out another batch of 100,000 units that also sold very quickly.

One of the big draws of the new model of the popular handhled is that it can directly access the Internet in order to download music and programs. People will be able to use Nintendo Points in order to make their purchases and browse the web.

The handheld will apparently be out in Europe and in North America before Christmas 2009, if statements from Nintendo representatives are to be believed. Until then, we will have to look to Japan to see how the Nintendo DSi performs and how quickly videogames created especially for it appear. The PSP-3000, a hardware revision of the PlayStation Portable, which was launched in Japan earlier in the month, had strong initial sales but since then, some screen problems have surfaced, limiting its sales success. Nintendo must be hoping that the Nintendo DSi is problem free.