Nintendo DS details to emerge at October 7 conference

The launch date, price and software line-up for the Nintendo DS in Japan look set to be confirmed early next month, with Nintendo president Satoru Iwata set to take the stage at a press conference in Tokyo on October 7th.

The company chose to eschew a presence at the Tokyo Game Show once again this year, leaving third party developers to fly the flag for its forthcoming handheld at the event next weekend, but had been expected to announce details of the DS around the time of the show.

Instead, it will now hold a major press conference in early October, where full Japanese details of the console's launch are expected to be announced. The company has however started advertising the DS on Japanese TV - with a new advertisement featuring popular Japanese singer Hikaru Utada promoting the virtues of the system's touch screen.

Iwata will be joined on stage at the press conference by Nintendo's game design legend Shigeru Miyamoto, who is expected to demonstrate some of the first-party titles which the firm has been creating for the new hardware.

The Nintendo DS is expected to launch in North America within days of the Japanese launch, but the price point of the console remains under wraps for now. Most retailers are taking pre-orders at around $199, but it's widely expected that the console will launch at a lower price than that - with $179 and $149 both being touted as likely prices by different sources over the past few months.