Not because they're sold out. As usual, my perpetually confused Toys R Us had plenty of them, even almost a week later.

A guy at work brought his in. He traded in his DS to get it, and if I were the type of person who used smileys, I would insert a frowny face right here. I imagine you're going to see a lot of pre-owned DSs show up across the nation as folks bail out on Nintendo's latest baby toy in favor of Sony's upscale convergent media device. Rolly-eye face.

But my dear aunt sally is that thing nice.

The screen is shockingly large. The resolution astoundingly clear. It's one of those things that you can't imagine getting any better even though all practical technoledge tells you it eventually will. You understand why it costs $250, simply because it looks like it should. Sony is pricing this right at the iPod demographic, which is something I had heard before but never really grasped until I grasped one. It's another example of the long-accepted Apple pricing argument: if it seems to cost more, it's because it's worth it, so shut up and buy it already.

The PSP's problems (aside from the high price point, which gets even higher if you want to trick it out with a better memory card) are mostly obvious ones. The front faceplate is stupidly shiny and delicate. It smudges like a bitch and gets ugly far too fast. The back of the unit is a nice textured flat-black affair and one has to wonder why Sony didn't build the front out of the same smudge-resistant stuff. I'm slowly coming to realize that this ill-conceived faceplate may be the main reason why I'm waiting before I buy one... because the damn thing is impossible to keep clean. It's like buying a championship poodle, wiping spaghetti sauce on it, and then wondering why it doesn't look as nice. Someone should adjust that.

I'm also severely spoiled by the DS and GBA SP clamshell design, nature's way to protect LCD screens. The PSP's screen, as massive as it is, looks fragile and needy.

The battery life is a well-discussed issue, but happily the PSP has an upgradeable battery bay. So, again, that will likely be tackled in a later model. I don't think anyone is overly excited about the launch unit's oscillating and unpredictable battery life, but I'm not going to worry too much about it since that sort of problem can only get better. I trust the nanotech here. Crappy game load times, on the other hand, don't always get better. It seemed bothersomely long to load Twisted Metal.

MP3s and movies? Who cares. Seeing as the unit isn't exactly sturdy, this is not something I want to hump around to listen to music with. The included storage memory card sucks anyway, so unless you upgrade you're getting, what, one album on the thing? I'd rather hum to myself than risk toting a PSP around just for Fleetwood Mac's Greatest Hits. I already own an iPod, which is 100x sturdier. And there is no freaking way I'm buying a bunch of movies on Sony's dumbass proprietary UMD format.

The analog nubbin is better than I thought, but I can see it taking time to master. It instantly reminded me of the first time I used a PS1 DualShock... you know, before you develop the feather thumb touch and you're jerking the analog stick all over the place trying to control your car/bandicoot/tomb raider. I can definitely see that as more intuitive than what Nintendo did with Mario 64DS, although I think much of Mario's control problems there are due to the camera... which actually seems to open up a huge gaming irony: the PSP is going to run platform games better and the DS is going to run FPS and RTS games better. What a crazy switch.

Because, yeah, the games are the thing. If I picked up a PSP today I would definitely get Metal Gear Acid, I would probably get Twisted Metal: Head On, and I would maybe get Ape Escape out of sheer desperation for something else to buy. $40 a pop on average, but that's not the top end of the scale... TRU had Tiger Woods PSP for $50, which is an insult. I'm annoyed when DS games land at $35; Sony needs to provide a lot of substance for these things to be worth as much as the couch-based games.

Wireless online multiplayer out of the box is a blatantly good deal, though. Nintendo still hasn't delivered on that one, and I'm positively beside myself waiting for it. Unfortunately for Sony, they don't have the particular brands I want to see hit that feature set - Animal Crossing and Pokemon, most notably - but I still wouldn't mind going online with a little portable Twisted Metal.

I'm much more excited about online multiplayer on these portable units than I have been for a while on PC or consoles. The reason is because I suspect it's going to be a lot harder for kids to act like smegheads on these games, when there's no voice chat or easy text chatting.

But would I trade in my DS for one? Absosmurfly not. Where the DS wins over the PSP is with the stylus. The DS's stylus-based games are the most fluid, the most accessible, the most elegant games I've seen. It strips away complexity. There's something pure about Yoshi Touch & Go, WarioWare Touched, Feel the Magic XY/XX, and the Mario 64DS minigames that I really like. It opens up a new demographic. There were very few GBA games I could get Rhonda to play... but I can show her a game controlled solely by stylus and she's in. The DS provides something we don't often get in a modern video game: simplicity.

I like that the DS is floating some new concepts out there, while the PSP is pretty much just PS2 games made portable. Not that I'm saying that's ipso facto baddo; I like great graphics and detailed, multi-layered, complex gameplay as well. But it sure is nice to have both options.

And if they announce a new Fatal Frame for PSP, this frugal attitude is history.