Get the latest Age of Conan news and views at Massively!
GameDaily
Add to: My AOL, MyYahoo, Google, Bloglines
Joystiq presents
Posts with tag rom

Secret Collect. reveals itself on the DS

Just when you think we've established what the Nintendo DS is capable of graphics-wise, homebrew developer Phillip Bradbury comes along and smashes those preconceptions with a Videlectrix port for the ages. If you thought Population: Tire shook the scene with its innovative touchscreen controls, prepare to be brought to your knees by Secret Collect. Epic in every sense of the word, this remake is half Indiana Jones, half God of War The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time:

"The greatest secrets man has ever known have been scattered all over the globe and its [sic] your job to find them."

Homestar Runner's Strong Bad stars in the game, represented by a magnificently detailed, red square. You'll navigate the agile hero through fifteen blocky mazes and collect yellow squares to advance to the next spine-tingling level. Picking up the blue power-ups (also squares) will boost your speed, keeping you ahead of the labyrinths' treacherous monsters -- so treacherous, they're invisible to the naked eye!

The original Flash version is also available online for those of you who either lack the tools to play homebrew games or don't have enough room on your hard drive for the 18KB download.

New Cave Story: DS demo released, pants soiled

With the approval and source code of Cave Story's father, Pixel, homebrew developer RavenWorks has spent the past year porting the indie classic to the DS. We've called the PC title to your attention before, praising it as one the most charming and polished titles we've ever had the pleasure of playing.

The project was originally bound for the GBA, but RavenWorks eventually migrated his code and rewrote the graphics engine to take advantage of Nintendo's new hardware. Current plans for the touchscreen include a map display and a "tap-to-switch-weapons interface" (accompanying L/R weapon switching).

Cave Story: DS's newest demo allows you to explore the game's levels and mess with NPCs, its memorable soundtrack playing all the while. Though scripting, weapons, and many other features haven't been included yet, we're just happy to see that progress is still being made on the port. Make sure to download the demo and let RavenWorks know that his efforts are appreciated!

If you don't have the homebrew tools necessary to test this early build, we have a few screenshots for you to preview in our gallery. You can also disguise yourself with a Mimiga mask and sneak past the post break for some shakycam video we dug up.

Gallery: Cave Story DS

Continue reading New Cave Story: DS demo released, pants soiled

Toys "ARRRR" Us: Piracy in the Philippines

Pirated video games in the Philippines is certainly nothing new -- we remember seeing counterfeit Famicom carts being sold there back in the day -- but its ubiquity in the Southeast Asian country is startling. GameOPS' John Phillips Bengero sent us some pictures to illustrate just how dire the DS and GBA bootlegging situation is. Far from being confined to Manila's seedier markets, these shots were taken at a recently opened Toys "R" Us branch in TriNoma mall! Bring a pocket full of pesos past the post break for the photos.

Continue reading Toys "ARRRR" Us: Piracy in the Philippines

Give the Sudoku grid a new look

http://www.dev-fr.org/index.php?topic=251.0The Nintendo DS is rife with Sudoku releases, both commercial and unofficial. Dress them up with mini-cakes or martial arts if you want to, but it's getting harder and harder for these games to keep us interested with each passing week.

Leave it to homebrew superstar Mollusk to add some life to the number puzzle. As its name implies, Skinz Sudoku allows you to customize almost every visual detail of its interface. Dropping a PNG template into the game's included PAFS.bat file spits out a unique Skinz Sudoku ROM with your graphics. Jump past the post break for some examples of the different themes.

Think of the possibilities! Design your screens with lightning bolts! Replace all of the numbers with Pokémon heads! Scan in a photo of your secret crush with a word balloon that says, "I luv u! Plz date me!" Just don't let anyone catch you locking lips with your DS after staring into his or her eyes for too long. Seriously guys, that's weird.

Continue reading Give the Sudoku grid a new look

Motocross Challenge loses publisher, passes savings onto you

Developer DHG Games poured its heart into completing Motocross Challenge. The small studio built the GBA title from the ground up, hoping to one day see the game on store shelves. Despite months of negotiation, however, Motocross Challenge's planned publisher backed out of the project, citing declining GBA software sales. After having invested three years into creating Motocross Challenge, DHG found itself with a finished game and no way to commercially release it.

Not wanting to see its hard work go to waste, DHG has made Motocross Challenge available to the public, offering the GBA ROM for FREE to anyone who will play it. We've already put a couple of hours into the racing game, and it plays a lot like an updated Excite Bike or Motocross Maniacs. There's a slight learning curve with figuring out how to land, managing your boosts, and memorizing the tracks, but it's all worth it when you start hitting ramps at full speed and racking up points with mid-air stunts.

The fact that Motocross Challenge's publisher dropped the game says nothing about its quality. If you are a fan of motocross titles and want to support independent developers who slave over a project for the sake of making a great game, it won't cost you anything but a few minutes to try this one out. Head past the post break for a trailer of the different tracks and game modes.

Continue reading Motocross Challenge loses publisher, passes savings onto you

The easiest homebrew solution yet

Hot.We've reported on the surprisingly well-established homebrew community on the DS; there's a whole wealth of wonderful applications you can coerce your DS into performing. To most, however, the prospect of "hacking" the DS is "scary", and despite some of the easier methods out there, it still seemed a little much.

Well, we no longer think it could get any easier. The newest device to come out of haX0r-land, the sillily named DS-Xtreme, is nothing more than a DS cartridge. It works as a simple mass-storage device ... simply move the applications or files to the cartridge using a USB connection, and poof, instant homebrew. It comes with a built in MP3-playback app, and it has two bitchin' LEDs for good measure (check out the embedded videos after the jump). The downside? It only contains 512 MB of memory, and it can't run anything built for the Game Boy Advance. Still, for the fence-sitters out there, this might be enough to push you over the edge. Check it out.

[Sillily is so a word.]

[Thanks, Gordon!]

< Previous Page

Features
Another Week in ... (42)
DS Daily (458)
DS Fanboy Lite (38)
DS Fanboy poll (41)
Friday video (66)
Game Night (141)
Metareview (53)
Promotional Consideration (52)
Show and Tell (57)
The DS Life (51)
What are you playing? (86)
Bits
Accessories (131)
Downloads (58)
Fan stuff (1381)
Features (261)
GBA (126)
Hacks (80)
Homebrew (199)
How-tos (66)
Imports (840)
Interviews (143)
Meta (115)
News (2995)
Nintendo Wi-Fi (180)
Reviews (177)
Sales (180)
Screens (851)
Video (619)
Rumors (170)

RESOURCES

RSS NEWSFEEDS

Powered by Blogsmith

Featured Galleries

Romance of the Three Kingdoms DS 2
Pokemon Platinum
Last King Of Africa
SmileRecipe's DS cases
Ten uses for that old DS
Pop Cutie
Taito paddle controller
Tornado
Johnny's Epic Escape Campaign

 

Most Commented On (14 days)

Recent Comments

Weblogs, Inc. Network

  • Autos
    • Autoblog
    • AutoblogGreen
    • Autoblog Spanish
    • Autoblog Chinese
    • Autoblog Simplified Chinese
  • Technology
    • Download Squad
    • Engadget
    • Engadget HD
    • Engadget Mobile
    • Engadget Chinese
    • Engadget Simplified Chinese
    • Engadget Japanese
    • Engadget Spanish
    • Engadget Polska
    • Switched
    • TUAW (Apple)
  • Lifestyle
    • AisleDash
    • DIY Life
    • Gadling
    • Green Daily
    • Luxist
    • ParentDish
    • Slashfood
    • Styledash
    • That's Fit
  • Gaming
    • Joystiq
    • DS Fanboy
    • Massively
    • Nintendo Wii Fanboy
    • PS3 Fanboy
    • PSP Fanboy
    • WoW Insider
    • Xbox 360 Fanboy
  • Entertainment
    • Cinematical
    • TV Squad
  • Finance
    • BloggingBuyouts
    • BloggingStocks
    • WalletPop
  • Sports
    • FanHouse Main
    • NFL
    • NBA
    • MLB
    • NCAA Football
    • NCAA Basketball
    • NASCAR
    • NHL
    • Golf
    • Fantasy Football
  • Also on AOL
    • African-American Culture
    • Cars
    • Games
    • Maps
    • Money
    • Movies
    • Music
    • News
    • Radio
    • Sports
    • Television
    • Travel

Other Weblogs Inc. Network blogs you might be interested in:

PS3 Fanboy
  • InFAMOUS not due until 2009
  • More potential gamer profile pages revealed
  • Yahtzee takes on Solid Snake and loses
WOW Insider
  • Resto4Life interviews Druid artist Andrige
  • Meet Coren Direbrew, dispenser of awesome trinkets and brewmaidens
  • Poll: How many 70s do you have?
Xbox 360 Fanboy
  • Why wait? Application allows Netflix to Xbox 360 streaming
  • Free WoW Guitar Hero III DLC on its way
  • Florida Anti-Tobacco Ad rooted in games
Nintendo Wii Fanboy
  • Digital comics coming to Japanese Wiis
  • Song used in GameCube commercial spurs lawsuit
  • Major Minor's Majestic March screens parade in
PSP Fanboy
  • PSP Phone rumors resurface
  • Koller promises more first and third party games, less ports
  • Square Enix to release PS1 classics, begins with Xenogears
Big Download Blog
  • Big Download Interview: Shattered Suns
  • American McGee talks Grimm
  • Capcom picks Unreal Engine 3 for "unannounced European project"
AOL Sports Blog
  • Joe Alexander Would Make More Money if Picked by the Bucks, Which Seems Weird
  • NBA Draft Crystal Ballin': Portland Trailblazers
  • Call Chicago Bears' Olin Kreutz a 'Serial Jaw Breaker' if You Must, but Say It to His Face