ARTICLE BY GAMESINDUSTRY.BIZ

The price point and release date for the forthcoming Nintendo DS handheld console in Europe won't be unveiled until early in the New Year, according to comments made by Nintendo UK general manager David Yarnton last night.

Speaking at an event held in London to introduce the console to the media following its launch in North America, Yarnton told the assembled press to look forward to an announcement of launch details in early January.

Speculation about the price point for the DS has pegged it at around UKP 129.99, which has not been commented on by Nintendo but has attracted criticism from some quarters for being significantly more expensive than the US price point.

Software prices for the unit, meanwhile, are expected to come in at around UKP 25 at launch - significantly lower than the price of Game Boy Advance titles, and notably, also lower than any of the price points being discussed by Sony for PSP software.

In his speech last night, Yarnton acknowledged that "there's a bit more competition in the market this time around," but alluded to Nintendo's history in the handheld console market, which has seen the company successfully repelling almost ten serious challenges on its dominance of the sector.

He also couldn't resist taking a veiled swipe at the PlayStation Portable's widely reported battery life problems - commenting that not only is the Nintendo DS ideal for train journeys, but that its battery will actually last for an entire journey as well.

Nintendo DS launched in North America earlier this week, and will appear in Japan next week, with over three million pre-orders thought to have been placed by customers in those territories. The firm expects to sell through four million units of the DS by the end of its financial year in March 2005.

The following is taken directly from the authors website:

This is a port of Genesis Plus 1.2 to the Gamecube using GCLIB. Genesis Plus is an open source Sega Megadrive/Genesis emulator.

What's new in version 1.1:

• 2 player support is now working. To enable a 2nd controller, go to the controller configuration screen and press start on the second controller.
  

Features:

• Genesis/Megadrive emulation
• Sound
• Reconfigurable controller buttons
• Game Genie code support
• 2 player support (Press Start on 2nd controller in Control Config screen to enable)
  
• Runs as a standalone DOL file

Known Bugs:

• Music in most Sonic games is slow
• Game Genie code screen has control problems when using a wavebird controller.
• Win32 DOL creator only works from Command Prompt.

Things emulator does NOT support:

• Saving
• Savestates

(Quote)
A World's first for GC, a Developer's Module which allows you to boot Homebrew applications, BIOS' or loaders directly from it's flash memory. The Viper GC has just four wires to solder, and an input/output connector to enable potential control of the lid sensor connected to the GC drive, should developers decide to create a BIOS to take advantage of this potential. This could lead to advances in booting Homebrew code from the GC drive. The Viper GC Module will allow users to run their own amateur coding efforts directly from the Viper GC, or flick back to the original BIOS by simply disabling the Module via the onboard DIP switch on the Viper GC Programmer Module.

The Viper GC is bundled with an FFC cable and Viper GC programmer module, allowing users to send code directly from their PC's Parallel port to the flash memory onboard the Viper GC. The attractive PC application GUI provides easy navigation and execution of code.

Previous solutions have relied on the BBA and PSO combo to execute code via a loader, this will no longer be required since the Viper GC can run code without the need for the BBA device. This opens up a whole world of possibilites for developers to experiment with and we're sure this will advance the legal Homebrew community a lot. Given that there has already been significant contribution to the amateur coding scene, we're sure that the Viper GC will lead to rapid advancements and convenience for those already contributing to the NGC Scene.

Viper GC is more than a BIOS replacement, it offers the unique possibility through special hardware commands, to run the original BIOS after the user's loader or Homebrew BIOS has been executed. A high security complex FPGA by Actel provides enhanced security and enough flexibility for us to include all the features we could possibly think of. The Viper Team are the pioneering force of the GC Scene, we're sure that GC sceners have a lot to look forward to. (/Quote)

64 Scener has been informed by a source close to the development of this chip that a flash BIOS will be made available which will facilitate playing of GameCube games from mini (8cm) DVD-R. About bloody time!

Source: http://www.xbox-scene.com/xbox1data/sep/EEpEFFyykEaZtHhjfS.php
Picture: http://64.191.55.7/4/vipergc/vip04xs.jpg

Slightly Late in reporting it but neverthee less, a few days ago Nintendos offical USA site ran a poll asking how much they would be willing to have an adapter to use there n64 cartridges on there gamecubes.

- Very interested, and would pay up to $39
- Very interested, and would pay up to $49
- Very interested, and would pay up to $59
- Not interested at all, and don't own an N64
- Not interested at all, although own an N64

Will be Intresting to see how this one pans out.

Madden_NFL_2005_USA_NGC-UBD_INT
NBA_Live_2005_USA_NGC-UBD_INT
Metroid_Prime_2_Echoes_Pal_Multi_Gc-GCP
Tales_of_Symphonia_Pal_MULTI5_NGC-GP

A couple of years ago, the GBA Xploder was released but did never quite catch on, thanks to the far superior Action Replay GBX by Datel.

Now Fire International and Blaze are back with an enhanced version of the Xploder, the press release goes like this:

The GBA Xploder Live takes handheld cheating to a whole new level! Packed with over 10,000 codes for 100's of GBA games, the GBA Xploder Live brings a whole new element to your favourite cheat device – online connectivity! Unlock the secrets of your Gameboy games – hidden levels, weapons, vehicles, characters and much more thanks to the awesome cheat power of the GBA Xploder Live. Also included are Mega Cheat Saves, powerful codes storing game save information already cheated to the max to open up the game with the minimum of fuss. As if all this wasn't enough, there's even an X-Link cable and PC software included so you can keep your cheats database fully up-to-date by downloading the latest codes from www.xploder.net and transferring them straight to your GBA Xploder Live.

"The GBA Xploder Live for the Gameboy Advance brings a whole new dimension to providing cheats for hundreds of games. The included X-Link cable enables unique internet functionality when used in conjunction with the provided PC software." says Jason Cooper, MD of Fire International Ltd.

The Xploder GBA Live is packed with exciting features:

• Unique tin packaging
• Packed with over 10,000 cheats for hundreds of GBA games
• Mega Game Saves unlocks a games full potential
• X-Link cable and PC software included
• Fully updateable – download the latest saves and Xploder software updates from www.xploder.net
• PC connectivity lets you store and swap saves on a PC – free up room on your Xploder cartridge for new codes!
  
  MSRP £29.99

System requirements

• Nintendo Gameboy Advance/Advance SP console
• PC (minimum Pentium III) with 64Mb RAM, 20Mb free hard drive space (for games save and cheats storage), Windows 98/SE/ME/2000/XP. CD-ROM drive and one free USB port also required.

SNES9x and XMame ported to the cube!

http://voidpointer.org/gc-linux/

Ever wanted a 2-in-1 Nintendo64 copier and Nintendo64 console in one? Here's how it could be done... odd but cool :-)

http://www.motherboardfaqs.com/cube64/

More software updates, this time it's the ECUBE copier software which has been updated to version 2.0. The following info is taken from the euthors website.

• File Drag and Drop support
• Backup Original Game support
• Add checkbox for multi-game operations, including delete, backup save, update save
• Add link-logo while in link mode

Amendments:

• Must update after change name
• For operations from right click popup menu, checkbox doesn’t affect. You have to left-click the game item on game list to operate that game including delete, change name  

EZ3 MANAGER V1.01

A couple of new tools has been released for the EZ-Flash 3 copier, one being an update of the flash writer software, now being v1.01.

The news are (taken directly from EZ Groups website):

• Improved ROM compatibility
• Added a notice when write a ROM bigger than 128Mb into EZ-DISK
• Press A button is hardreset, Press L+A is softreset. it will get more compatibility
• Fixed some bug when write txt,html files into EZ-DISK
• Fixed TXTViewer halt bug.
• The loader is updated, please use "Write EZ3 System" first.

The software can be downloaded from EZ' website, or by using the direct link, here... http://www.ezflash.cn/zip/ez3managerv11.zip

EZPDA ROM BUILDER SOFTWARE

A tool I know I wanted when making our review of the EZ-Flash 3. The following description is taken from EZ's website.

Usage: This tools can customize the inteface of EZPDA, and make your GBA more personality.

• There has a original ROM core located in "res" folder, it's name is RomBuildPro.rom, it 's the core system of EZPDA, when we update the EZPDA, you must download the new version of this file to keep your version up.
• You can choose where the exported file to save, please put the exported file into "Sysbin" folder of EZ3Manager, and rename it with "loader.bin"(please back up the original file), then write the EZ3 system in EZ3Manager.
• Don't put nonuse files into "/res" folder, it will make loader.bin bigger, The filesize more than 4MB(32MBit,4194304Bytes) can't be written on EZ3.
• All the skin pics are located in "/.shell/bmp" folder, You can replace them with 24bit BMP pics which has same filename/filesize/picture size.
• Please notice the Background color when you change the icon.
• The background color of Clock Setting is depend on the color of the first pixel of Clock picture.

Once again, the software can be downloaded from a direct link here... http://www.ezflash.cn/zip/ezpda_rombuilder.rar

We'll try to have the software available on 64scener tonight as the download speed from ezflash.cn is quite slow.

It's amazing how much the Nintendo DS has been hyped, so much that there's a worldwide shortage, mostly due to the fact that only the American version is available sofar and everyone of course wants to get the unit first.

LikSang reported earlier today that most of their orders will be shipping within the next few weeks, but all orders made after November 13th probably won't be processed until January 2005.

Success Compu has a very limited ammount left, but you'll also be paying a bit more for the unit, US$271 incl. Mario 64 DS and plus shipping.

Mat_Hoffmans_Pro_Bmx_2_PAL_GERMAN_NGC-DEATHCUBE

And a missed release from earlier this month:
GT.CUBE.JAP.NGC-EXP

Right now Easybuy2000 has a great offer, another $10 discount on the X-ROM 512Mbit GBA copier, so the price is now US$89, and with the record low value of the dollar, the price is quite good.

Check out 64scener's review of the X-ROM ( here )