Nintendo DS Roms
The retro-gaming movement continues apace, but some people simply play older games on their computers because their old system has become unreliable or they don’t want to spend the cash for the latest Nintendo DS games. Whatever the reason, roms may be the answer.
Nintendo DS Roms of all sorts suffer from a sort of marginal legality. Essentially, like old fashioned computer games, owning a copy of something you already own breaks no copy right rules, nor does playing a game made for a system you already own. On top of that, most roms have an online license permitting a temporary trial. The difficulty in that games made for Nintendo, Nintendo DS, Gameboy, et al. may simply and easily be copied to a computer with no possibility of verifying whether the copier owns or has even ever seen the system or game in question. The issue becomes even more muddied with the advent of Japanese game translations. Many of these games never were released outside of Japan, which means that technically owning one in the states infringes on international copy right laws, but no other way to enjoy the game exists. For this reason, many rom sites exist in a kind of tenuous no questions asked environment where they carefully mouth the words of the law, while actively pursuing agendas at least tangential to the spirit of the law.
This can make searching for roms a dangerous proposition as unsavory individuals uninterested in the well being or preservation of society sometimes promulgate bugs, viruses, and malware. Before looking for your favorite Nintendo DS games, check out the best in firewalls and anti-virus protection, lest your computer become terminally ill.
Homebrew DS, without the BS
Whether you’re new to Nintendo DS, or have been playing one since it first came out in 2004, you may think you’ve seen it all. The Nintendo DS is the fastest-selling handheld game console of all time, with 20 million units sold in the United States by 2008. Sure, NDS games are fun, but you just can’t help but feel like you’re missing out on something. If your current games and applications just don’t seem to be cutting it, it’s time you turned to the homebrew community.
Homebrewing isn’t a new concept; it’s been going on since the age of Atari. Basically, un-licensed games made by amateur programmers are written onto third-party cartridges. Homebrewing is the hidden link between playing the same recycled, commercial material, and owning something unique and personalized. Homebrew applications range from PDA Organizers to advanced web browsers or movie players.
There are two devices that are first needed before you can run any homebrew applications. The first is a Flash cart. Flash carts are adaptors that plug into the GBA slot, and allow you to use media from a flashrom or insertable flashmemory. There are two kinds of flash carts. A Slot-1 cart plugs in where the DS game normally would, and acts as an all-in-one device, eliminating the need for a booting tool. Slot-2 carts are the older, more supported storage carts. They plug into the GBA slot and have either built-in flash memory or a memory card slot.
The next thing you need to set-up a homebrew system is a booting tool. Every time something is programmed and manufactured by Nintendo, it is “authenticated.” When you try to play something made by a third-party programmer, authentication is required. A booting tool is a device containing a code that will allow you to authenticate NDS homebrew applications. Booting tools are inserted into the NDS slot, and don’t contain any media. If you are using a slot-1 flash cart, the cart acts as its own booting tool.
So now that you’re wired for homebrewing, where do get the games? A majority of homebrew games are downloaded from the internet for free, or if you’re experienced with the DS you could program your own. Using DS homebrew has raised some questions on ethics and legality. Is it legal to program your own games for the Nintendo DS? It’s a grey area. Modifying the actual hardware is illegal, but homebrew doesn’t technically modify the DS console, you’re only bypassing the software. Most homebrew applications are free, so all you’re doing is sharing programs-no business attached. Downloading a cracked version an official Nintendo game for free, though? That’s illegal.
Homebrew is an excellent opportunity to experience what is out there, beyond the clutches of corporate marketing. And since homebrew doesn’t have to be just games, you can download a whole host of interesting applications, from instant messengers to e-books, thus expanding the usefulness of your handheld gaming device. As Nintendo said, “Touching is good”, but re-touching is even better.
What you need to know before you Download DS Games
If you want to download DS games you will need to buy an SD card. This way you can easily transfer them from your computer to the gaming console. While there are some other methods you can explore, this is the one that is going to give you the best results. It is also the easiest so that you can rely on the games you are trying to get for your own entertainment.
Before you start searching the internet though to download DS games you need to be aware of a few things. Some of the sites out there including P2P and Torrent have been linked with spyware and viruses. This means you may be bringing those things into your computer while attempting to download various games. Parents need to be well aware of this before they give their children permission to download from such sites for DS games.
You will find that the biggest problems come from the free sites out there. While they don’t charge you to download DS games, they have plenty of advertising on their sites. Not all of these advertisers are on the up and up even if the provider of the materials is. This is why you can end up with Adware or worse after you download from them. That is also why it can take two or three times longer than it should for you to download each of the DS games.
Another common problem is that you can waste all that time to download a DS game from a free site. Then when you go to play it, nothing happens. Another scenario is that it may work for a short while and then freeze up. That can be very frustrating when you were in the middle of enjoying that particular game.
A better option that is going to protect your computer is to consider a site where you pay a monthly membership fee to download all the DS games you want. One that is excellent is PocketDownloadCenter. The monthly fee is very low and you will be able to quickly download what you are after. New DS games are added all the time. The cost is going to be less than having to get your computer worked on due to a virus or spyware that you can’t get rid of on your own.
Being able to download DS games without worrying about viruses or spyware is possible if you go to the right place for them. You can also download them in very little time so you can focus on playing them. The quality will be very good too so you can feel good about the games you download for your DS gaming console this way.
