While Nintendo has established a long history of releasing new versions, designs and models of its hardware, it's now entering dangerous territory with the Nintendo 3DS . Inside a year of its release, the system is seeing a peripheral that can and will fundamentally change the way companies approach game development.

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The market for the Nintendo 3DS will soon be fractured, split in a way that the GBA SP, Game Boy Color and DS Lite never were. This peripheral is, of course, the circle pad expansion. A, but now Nintendo is faced with a critical choice – relaunch its system or fail to truly keep the peripheral viable in the long term.Nintendo's lack of foresight in packaging the 3DS with a second circle pad is a critical failure on the part of the company. Virtually all modern games require a second analog input, and movement and touch-based solutions are inadequate replacements. Moreover, the PlayStation Vita features two sticks and is more powerful. Although it's (now) more expensive than the 3DS, it could still potentially prove more alluring than the 3DS if Nintendo doesn't fix its error. That the publisher is attempting to do this now is certainly reassuring, but the fact that Nintendo has to do it speaks volumes about how it approached this system in the first place.A number of poor choices have plagued the 3DS since its launch, and in some respects the system's first year will be remembered as one of Nintendo's roughest ever. The question now is what to do about it. A price drop, expanded content and a functioning eShop go a long way, and certainly, but the circle pad is a fundamental product feature unlike any of the other "upgrades" Nintendo has provided. It changes how games are made. Now the company faces a tough choice – support the add-on full force and accept the consequences, or watch it fade into oblivion, giving its competitors a significant advantage in accepting ports and remakes of modern titles.If Nintendo wants developers to support this extra circle pad, the first model of the Nintendo 3DS must be replaced immediately. It cannot remain on store shelves, because its continued presence furthers a splitting of Nintendo's marketplace. Developers will be forced to either support a platform of millions with only one circle pad or a platform of few with two.That's the biggest problem the company faces – convincing developers to start over. The current system is just now gaining steam,after its price drop. For Nintendo to introduce a seismic change to its system's control interface could potentially undo all of its progress thus far. For all intents and purposes, the 3DS would be starting over, barring some sort of massive recall or free distribution of the expansion device. Quite obviously, both of those would have huge financial implications.Of course this is to say nothing of consumers. Millions have already invested in Nintendo's 3D world, many at the system's original $250 price point. This is, of course, the danger of even suggesting a relaunch or uttering the words "3DS Lite." No doubt many gamers were holding out for a revision to the system's hardware, particularly considering the portable's rather anemic battery life, but many were willing to be early adopters. Now the other shoe drops. Not owning a new 3DS model could potentially cut existing 3DS owners out of a whole range of titles. Attempting to keep the existing version results in an awkward attachment that at best resembles a prototype still in development.