To be honest I've never been bothered by portable battery life ever since having a rechargable battery became standard; but then again, I rarely play them outside the house. Still, the 3DS sounds less appealing every time I hear about it: high price, low battery, 40+ msrp for games, etc etc
I lol'd hard when, after months of LOOK AT OUR NEW CHARACTERS GUYS they killed off like every new dude in Gears 2.