ASCIIpOrtal update video 2 [ASCII Portal, via Offworld]

See, the DS and DS Lite were easy pickings for anyone looking to play homebrew titles or pirate illegal copies of DS games. All you needed was a flashcart - like the R4 - and you were good to go.

But the DSi is different. The R4 won't work in it. Also, because it can update its firmware, every update can - like the Wii - block the latest attempts at circumventing its security. And it's successfully managed to hold out for, oh, a whole six months.

Meet Supercard's DSONEi, a flashcart that is able to get around this by beating Nintendo at their own game. Say you use the DSONEi to play some old Lucasarts adventure games on your DSi. Then Nintendo releases a firmware update, you install it, and your Lucas games stop working.

All you'd need to do is wait for the Supercard team to come up with a fresh workaround for Nintendo's latest update, download new firmware for DSONEi device, and you're back in the game.

Sure, it's not a perfect solution, as you're reliant on Supercard to continue supporting the device. But a flawed workaround is better than no workaround at all if you're a homebrew fan and want to make the most of your new Nintendo handheld.

New flashcart seeks to circumvent future lockouts from DSi firmware updates → [Tiny Cartridge]

The geekiest of romantic gestures used to be limited to those with a knack for assembly and emulation, but thanks to Multiple-Option's Easy Proposal Maker, you too can ask for another's hand in marriage in-game.

As the demo clip shows, simply plug in your marriage request — or any other proposal that might involve a giant ring sprite — fire up The Search Master mini-game and watch in panic as the object of your affection tile-matches. Too precious!

Easy Proposal Maker featuring The Search Master [Multiple-Option via TinyCartridge]

And now it’s, kinda, out of beta. Version 1.00 has been released, and while it’s not technically a finished version, it does bring with it a ton of neat features, like Classic Controller support, the ability to detect all four Wii Remotes and support for Guitar Hero peripherals.

The full list of changes/improvements

• meta.xml now handles all ISO-8859-1 characters properly (you can use either UTF-8 or ISO-8859-1 encoding, but UTF-8 is restricted to the ISO subset)
• Wiimote power button support (shutdown)
• Wiimote rumble honors system setting
• Fixed some crash bugs
• Fix meta.xml UNIX style newline regression
• All wiimotes work now, not just the first one (only one can point at a time though)
• Classic Controller support
• Nunchuk support (scroll only, using the stick)
• Guitar Hero 3 guitar support
• Left and right change pages too
• Hit 1 on Wiimote to retry the network connection (like clicking on the network icon or Z on the GC pad)
• Added information to the installer
• Fixed some networking issues with networking disabled (and possibly other bugs)
• Pushed in some text to avoid overscan crop
• Widened video width to match system menu (”black bars” fix)
• B returns from app screen (unless scrolling with B-hold)
• Try to initialize network earlier (slight speedup)
• Retry network initialization a few times
• Fix a networking issue (libogc problem)
• Reload stub now identifies itself (magic number, for future use)
• Support broken HTTP proxies in update check
• Show IOS revision in main menu
• () -> * (Hint: old-school Wiimote support needed what? Try it both ways.)

Provided you know your way around the homebrew setup, go try it out, let us know how it goes.

The Homebrew Channel: Now With Less Beta! [HackMii]

The Acekard 2i is claimed to be the world's first fully-working DSi flash cartridge with cart mavens Acekard claiming the device supports all of the DSi's new features - including the ability to read and store data on MicroSD cards in the new slot.

This video shows what appears to be the menu system (curiously, the site says "The Acekard R.P.G. utilizes the idea of the iPhone which gives the customer a totally new control experience." which I think is just a fancy way of saying that the menu can use the touchscreen) with a quick segue into a probably not-that-legal version of Castlevania. Never mind, Nintendo. You had a good run at being piracy free for, what, two months?

Acekard2i For DSi Released! [Acekard - thanks to Wraggster for the tip]

The very definition of 'Neat Hack', Ken Moore shows us his DIY Wiimote Theremin with a virtuoso rendition of a piece traditionally associated with the instrument - the theme from Star Trek.

It's not, in actual fact, a real Theremin. Rather than radio frequency oscillations, Ken uses tiny LEDs on the tips of his fingers (hence the gloves) that trigger the Wiimote's infrared sensors. Still damn cool, though and if nothing else takes my dream project of Theremin Hero one step closer to reality.

More Wii Theremin Videos [Ken Moore Design]

The hardware nerds behind the Acekard flashcart reckon they have made some progress towards getting their card working with the DSi.

The above video shows what appears to be a DSi booting from a flashcart and running some decidedly non-homebrew software. Although it may look as though Nintendo's dream of a piracy-free handheld are over, the team say that releasing a cart using their method would be 'almost impossible' to do commercially.

Of course, a couple of weeks ago people were saying that the above video was impossible too, so we shall see.

Nintendo unleashes Wii Menu 3.4, updates ToS and removes save files [Wii Fanboy]

According to this story on DigitalBattle, the new DS model will crash if you try to boot with an auto-booting flash card in the slot. Menu-bootable cards will load, but the DSi will crash as soon as a menu item is selected.

On the one hand this may make a dent in game piracy, but it looks like it will scupper legitimate Homebrew developers too. Hopefully Nintendo will be able to come to some compromise - possibly involving that intriguing SD slot...

Flash Cards No Longer Work on DSi [DigitalBattle]

Thanks to the ever-busy PSP homebrew community it is now possible to link a PC and a PSP together via USB Cable and a little plugin by the name of RemoteJoy Lite. Using the app you can hook up your Windows PC with your handheld and play PSP games on the PC screen.

Truly, we live in a Golden Age.

The video above gives a rough idea of what the app can do. As ever with homebrew software, you are responsible for your own device - don't come running to us if it makes your PSP implode into a nugget of dark matter that ultimately leads to the creation of an alternate universe where your evil doppleganger has a beard.

Wii Recovery Dongle [HackMii]

Quest For Glory II [AGD, via IndieGames]

Nintendo has been far too busy printing money and dreaming up strange new controllers to actually finish that DVD-on-Wii thing it has been promising for the last couple of years.

Happily, the homebrew community has stepped up and put together a Wii channel that will read a DVD disc and pipe it through the open source MPlayer media player.

It's not quite ready for prime time — the audio can sometimes get out of sync, although this is more a 'feature' of MPlayer than the fault of the hack, we suspect. Worth checking out, though, and it might just save Nintendo the bother of building something that nobody has really been crying out for but would be nice to have for free.

Homebrew Enables DVD Playback On Wii [Gemaga.com]

If you're a friend of Robert Pelloni and you're wondering why you haven't seen him for half a decade, here's why. Bob's Game, a title we'll assume is tentative for now, is a top down 2D adventure game built over the course of five years by a single person. Yes, one (obviously mad) developer is responsible for the programming, art, music, story and script required to bring Bob's Game to life.

According to the developer, the homebrew title is a simple adventure game, an RPG-lite sans repetitive battles that looks more than a bit Shenmue-esque. You can learn all about it by checking out the annotated version of the above clip at YouTube. Pelloni is currently seeking a publisher and hopefully sunlight.

"bob's game" for Nintendo DS [YouTube - thanks, Matt!]

Wii Systemmenu hacks [DCEmu]

UPDATE - Crediar dropped us a line this morning to let us know the tool's gone live. Happy hunting.

Prices will be set at 200 MS points for games 50MB and under, with larger games priced at 400 or 800 MS points. Creators will receive 70% of the revenue generated mailed to them via check on a quarterly basis, though Microsoft will be randomly promoting XNA games, for which they will take an extra 10-20% based on traffic generated.

An interesting fact that is pointed out in the FAQ (linked below) is that even big name publishers can submit their games via the Creators Club, meaning a game that might not pass muster with Xbox proper could theoretically make it into the community section. Hit the link below for the full details!

Introducing Xbox LIVE Community Games [XNA Creators Club Online - Thanks Epsicode!]

June 16 Wii update [HackMii]

Wii Menu Update 3.3 kills Twilight Hack [Wii Fanboy]

Twilight Hack [WiiBrew via Maxconsole]