According to the Wall Street Journal, Nintendo Co. has issues a press release that warns against young children playing the three-dimensional games on the highly anticipated new 3DS handheld game console. Possible health risks have been cited as concerns about the new 3-D technology. The portable console is due for release in Japan in February.
On its website, Nintendo says that children under the age of 6 shouldn’t play 3-D games on the 3DS hand-held game machine. The company says that looking at 3-D images for a long period of time could have an adverse effect on the eyesight development of young children.
The 3DS is different from movie theaters and high-end television sets that deliver 3D media, in that it claims to be among the first products to not require wearing specialized glasses to deliver 3-D images.
It is unknown what prompted the warning from Nintendo. Some insiders speculate that it was a prospective effort to fend off litigation. It remains unclear whether the 3-D devices that don’t require glasses carry any more risk than the common devices that use glasses. Sony Corp’s Platstation 3 carries a similar warning, although it requires glasses to view 3D.
A Sony spokesman said thatthere is no medical evidence of any negative effects from 3-D. They issued the warning outof concerns for children since their bodies can be sensitive.
This isn’t the first time that issue have come up about 3D technology. Dizziness and nausea have been reported among some users since the earliest days if 3-D movies. And even though we’ve moved past the paper glasses with read and blue colored filters, some viewers still report problems with watching 3D despite the improved technology.
Charlie Scibetta, a spokesman for Nintendo’s U.S. division, declined elaborate on anything beyond the company’s health disclaimer that is posted at the bottom of it’s Japanese-language website.
Nintendo said parents should use a parental-controls feature to block access to the 3-D mode of the device. Younger players can still play the device in 2-D mode.
Samsung Electronics Co., Sony and Panasonic Corp. provide warnings on their websites about the possible risks of viewing 3-D images for children. Panasonic offers that it follows voluntary safety guidelines set out by the Japan-based 3D consortium, an industry group of major Japanese electronics companies. The guidelines say that young children’s eyesight are still developing, but do not specify the age at which they can start looking at 3-D images.
And Toshiba Corp. announced in October a new line of high-definition, 3-D TV sets that don’t require glasses. They have a footnote that warned, “Due to the possibility of impact on vision development, viewers of 3D video images should be aged 6 or older.”
The Wall Street Journal translated the press release from Nintendo and posted a portion of it on their website. The excerpts that they present follows:
(Excerpts, translated from Japanese)
For people who will experience Nintendo 3DS
Below are the points we would like you to be aware about 3-D images or stereoscopic view on Nintendo 3DS.
The way 3-D images appear varies among individuals. Please be aware there could be times when some images cannot be recognized as 3-D depending on physical conditions, types of video pictures, surrounding conditions and so on.
If you are exhausted or not feeling well, please refrain from playing. Also, when you start feeling ill, stop playing immediately.
Watching 3-D images for an extended time could result in adverse effect on eyesight development in the case of children under 6 years old, therefore we highly recommend a switch to 2-D display.
The warnings may simply be a safety precaution. Eye specialists say there’s no proof that 3-D images seen in movies and in games could harm a child’s developing eye. They have not found the use of glasses or not to have any different effects.
Steven E. Rosenberg, a pediatric ophthalmologist at the New York Eye and Ear Infirmary, said that 3-D images on a screen, with or without glasses, work the same way to present images to the eyes, which the brain then combines into a 3-D image. He offers that there’s no reason to believe their effects on the developing eye would be different.
Howver, Kristina Tarczy-Hornoch, director of the Vision Development Institute at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles says that it’s possible that a lot of time spent looking at 3-D images might have an impact on the development of normal binocular vision. She and other physicians said there’s no clear reason why Nintendo has picked a cut-off of six years.
At this early stage, glasses-free 3-D technology has been limited to smaller screens rather than the giant screens in many living rooms. The Nintendo 3DS has a 3.5 inch 3D screen, and Toshiba’s new glasses-free television sets come in 12- and 20-inch varieties.
The Nintendo 3DS, due out in the U.S. and Europe in March, is the company’s most-anticipated hardware since the Wii console in 2006. The company has had more success than its competitors with adolescents and younger children, though it is unclear what age group the company will target with the 3DS.
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