Considering how strong Reggie's emphasis was on their DLC not being on-cart and not being developed until after the main game is considered "complete" internally, I do have to wonder on that one...
But I think the more likely reason is that the Circle Pad Pro isn't just an extra pad; it's also extra shoulder buttons. Unless you go the original Wii Classic Controller route, which I think everyone agrees is uncomfortable and largely useless, it is extremely difficult to have more than two shoulder buttons on a handheld without screwing with its profile. To have a second pad with only two shoulder buttons will further fragment the possible control setups and probably leave a 3rd party dev or two banging their head against the wall. It's also possibly not the best image for Nintendo to include extra traditional inputs as the "default" of their new model that they know the majority of the 3DS's library will ignore them.
And call me a blind Miyamoto worshipper if you must, but I think the man is onto something when he says that the gyroscope when used properly does a fine job in most situations. It certainly made aiming a lot easier in Zelda.
As with the DSiXL, the 3DSXL is meant as an alternative rather than a replacement. It has no additional features such as the DSi introducing a shop, or even the Lite's brightness adjustment. It's just, literally, bigger. Bigger battery and bigger SD card included, but still, just bigger.
Frankly I wasn't impressed with the DSiXL's screens; I thought they were too large and fuzzy for such a small resolution. 3DS being a bit higher res, maybe it would work better, but I'd need to see one in a store demo before I ever considered buying one under any circumstances (I do have to admit, even if I myself don't care much for ballooning my 3DS, a Christmas gift that could net me a NSMB2 co-op partner, that has some merit to it).
One of these days I seriously need to send you my Riivolution music hack for NSMBWii. 'course, I still need to do the fast versions so that your soul isn't crushed by the high-speed bah-bah's when the timer is low.
That is true. having separate hardware would split things very badly.
I did notice some changes.
The Start/Select buttons are actual buttons instead of whatever it is they used in the original. They look much easier to push.
The Power button has a lower profile.
All LEDs are visible from the side and front.
The 3D Slider might be longer.
Moved the earphone jack.
Mic is now labelled.
The pictogram on the 3D slider is now more accurate.
It's clear that while they didn't want to branch the 3DS control schemes, they did put some decent effort into rectifying some problems.