@MantisDragon:

Such is the intention of a good number of flashcart owners. I personally discourage pirating DS games, and the amount of homebrew out there is pretty good. You can do all sorts of things, like an organizer (DSOrganize), Google Maps/Earth, AIM, YIM, MSN, Gtalk, IRC, Twitter clients, plenty of great emulators (Lameboy, nesDS), and fun stuff like Colors and animanitee.

I'd really like to see more people develop homebrew for the DS. I think it has a lot of potential that just hasn't been unleashed yet.

LocalToast

PSP CF FTW!!!!!!!!

Rojovenom

It's funny that the R4 is going up in price--it is a pretty dated card. The CycloDS is a much better cart; with an EZ3-in-1 you add rumble, extra RAM (for DSLinux or web browsers or whatever), and GBA booting capabilities. The R4 was so amazing for its day that the buzz around it is incredible, and people who are not usually in the market for these things are picking them up like crazy. But it's not the best DS flashcart available by a long shot.

alaren

Amazingly enough, a whole lot of the Japanese students at my university have R4s not to pirate but to run homebrew. Apparently one of the best Japanese to English dictionaries for the DS is a homebrew app. I got to take a look at it a few months back and I was pretty impressed.

MantisDragon

@Jonn:
Yes, because everyone who uses an R4 is a pirate. Besides you know what they say about arguing on the internet. I swear if anti-pirates used all the brainpower and processing power they're using to think up and type up and send the arguements they churn out, they could come up with a amazing way to end piracy forever.

M-26-7

@SanjiX: I hear the EZ flash 3 in 1 works well, but I want something more than 256 mbit. At least 512mbit :x

jookie

Higher price due to Nintendo increasing notice and demand.
R4's future update bricking the fake ones.

Fun times we live in for homebrew areas. Oh and pirates who make Nintendo mad in the first place, but they be daft anyroad.

Kenofthedead

@Marios_shadow:
Yeah, I noticed that when I tried other things besides playing DS ROMs that it kept requiring a slot 2 card. Though, i'm satisfied with my R4 until I finally get down to hunting for a decent Slot 2 cart.

SanjiX

@SanjiX: I agree with you there, however, the best Slot-2 cart out there will always be the M3 Lite Perfect. =P

The only thing I liked better about my R4 is the way it displayed icons, on the bottom screen in the gray box, like it would in the DS menu.

The Acekard has the icon by itself to the left of the ROMs filename.

Marios_shadow

@syafiqjabar:
No. People get desperate. If you had to pay $55 to never buy a DS game again then you probably would. Then again, if the R4 does really die this time, i'm sure people will just go on to the next thing... as always. And i'm sure Nintendo will be there to sue them as well. =)

SanjiX

Ah, I see. Thanks for the info.

And I apologize for letting my noob show....

AcidCrownie

At least they're doing something other than just throwing a lawsuit. Dragon Quest V is said to have a special chip that makes it unplayable on the current-gen R4, as do Doki Doki Majo Shinpan 2.

Will we see a workaround soon? Probably. Will it matter? Probably not, since most titles in Japan instantly get sent to the used-game shops and get recycled endlessly. The bigger the title release, the greater the initial sales and the greater the bargain-bin-effect (which is the exact same thing that happened to MGS4).

muu

Oh Nintendo is so devious. They're legal action was just to increase the price of R4 all along. soon it will be too expensive for anyone to buy.

syafiqjabar

@SanjiX: "I'm sure each card has its pros and cons."

Yes, that's why it's kinda hard to pick a new card these days. People just want simple things, so that's why I see them going after the R4/Simply (well also, cause of the fact that they probably never heard of a slot-1 device)

Keanu

@Marios_shadow:
You know i'm seeing a bit of cycle here...
M3 -> Big hit, very cheap
2 Months later -> Sold out
6 Months later -> Overpriced, hard to find
1 year later -> Nonexistent, rare

Repeat this with R4, DSTT, etc and it seems the pattern just keeps going. You stop one, another starts. I think the reason why the R4 got so much popularity was because it just had more time to shine than the other carts. Plus, alot of people say "It's better than M3, DSTT, etc" which usually gives it more popularity.

Btw, i'm just going by personal experience from my failed attempts to buy one, to reading forums, and watching YouTube videos, I never actually owned one until a few weeks ago. I'm sure each card has its pros and cons.

SanjiX

@AcidCrownie: Pretty much, but there are some that won't work with the device.

@physalis925: Yeah, going from Simply to a M3 Real in a few days. Hopefully I'll enjoy it (even though I read a few things that were pretty iffy with a Real)

Keanu

@AcidCrownie: its basicly a ds cartridge that has flash storage for homebrew stuff, but you can also toss roms on it if you are into that sort of thing

kommanderk

i gots me a m3 real 6 months ago and i don't think i've taken it out of the slot once

physalis925

What exactly does the R4 do? Just copy the files of a game and store it?

AcidCrownie

@Jonn: Will do.

Keanu

Piracy advocates, just assume I deconstructed your fallacious arguments in an extensive, sardonic, and humiliating fashion. I'm too tired for this.

Jonn

Now is this higher demand from people who knew nothing about it, and all of a sudden learned the existence of R4 because of N's crackdown on it. Or is it simply people buying up as many as they can before they stop existing, allowing for some reselling-at-a-profit goodness?

Most likely a mix of both

Laho

people are still gonna buy r4 no matter what the cost. i wish i had one though

dipsetboy17

Yeah, I just bought one a couple of days ago. Before Nintendo's legal action, I didn't really know what they were. A couple helpful youtube videos later I bought one.

Your-Friendly-Neighborhood-Atheist

The R4 isn't even that great of a cart nowadays, there are better carts with more features out now.

The Acekard 2 is only $20 USD on Dealextreme. XP

Marios_shadow

Get em while theyre hot, get em while theyre legal.

Altima NEO

lol, glad I had mine before all this... For back-ups of course.

Keanu

@muu: i just played these games on my R4

Unlustigbolt

I tried emulating and it doesn't work well (Buggy) and can be really frustrating if you're new to emulation so I went with a R4 but the emulating seems to be shaping up so if you wait a bit you wont even have to buy a R4.

Weepee

@Captiosus: Addendum: "the myriad of NON-MOD CHIP addons for the original PSX", that should read. The old devices that plugged into the port on the back and used a spring to let you operate the console with the lid open. That sort of thing.

Captiosus

@Laho: I'd have to agree with you.

To be honest, I didn't even know Slot-1 microSD cards existed until this R4 hooplah came about, and now I find myself wanting to pick up a CycloEvolution DS.

This reminds me of when Sony cracked down on the myriad of addons for the original PSX that bypassed the bios and allowed for the playback of burned CD PSX games and imports. None of my friends knew about it until that news and within a week most of them had one, along with a spindle of blank CDs...

Captiosus

A lot of people are wondering why R4 sells so well when it's basically extremely outdated.

The answer is simple, really - it's just most well known. DS flash carts aren't just used by computer whizzes anymore, you see girls and kids using them all the time. The word got out that R4 is extremely intuitive and that's all. It happens in every market.

Easy to use + catchy name + well known = it will sell.

Just ask yourselves why the Wii is doing so well when it's clearly the least capable of the three consoles. :)

Fuck, imagine what would happen if Oprah started pimping these.

DeLoRtEd1

@Gouki146: I prefer the CycloDS Evolution because of the real-time save and in-game guide viewing (so you can read walkthroughs on the screen without quitting the game). GBAtemp.net has some good reviews, they helped me a lot.

sinkhead

CycloDS is generally regarded as being better. There's some good reviews of all different types of flashcarts at GBAtemp.net, I found them very useful. Personally I prefer the CycloDS Evolution because of the real-time save, in-game guide viewing (so you can look at walkthroughs and stuff in-game) and the awesome support team. It's just a shame that it's a bit more expensive than the others, but it's worth it.

sinkhead

Which would be better then? M3 Real or CycloDS?

Gouki146

@sinkhead: Thanks, very good and informative site. I just purchased a cycloDS. Dealextreme already stopped selling R4's due to the company not producing anymore.

Gouki146

@sinkhead: Wait wait, the CycloDS has real-time save? Damn. Where were you when I bought my M3DS Real. I guess I'll have to justify my purchase with a nonsensical argument.

Damn cheat! Game makers didn't put real-time save in their games for a reason!

umiman

@Keanu: Yeah right...

mtora83

even if the price went up to \50000 it would still be worht buying because thats the price of 10 ds games and i have more than 10 on mine. Also you can deny Nint\endo money!! That makes me happy!

but what circuitry does the cart contain? i thought it was all in the software code you had to sneakily find elsewhere.

kenesu96

I paid 10,000円 a bit over a year ago each for a couple.

Breetai

I bought mine ages ago. I wish it supported 4gb+ SD cards though like I believe newer ones do. Great little device though. Worth every penny spent on it.

ƒox

@sinkhead:

I prefer the EDGE, because it's a cheaper CycloDS Evo:

[www.monroeworld.com]

Koztah