Nintendo reserves the right to brick your 3DS if piracy detected | Hacker News Reader

Nintendo reserves the right to brick your 3DS if piracy detected

geek.com

31 pointsukdm25 comments

This is (apparently) wilful misinterpretation of the translation of a retailer's warning, here:

http://www.gonintendo.com/viewstory.php?id=152082

Key passage:

"In case if you use equipment which is illegal or unapproved by Nintendo or if you do customization which is unapproved by Nintendo, there is a possibility that Nintendo 3DS become non bootable by system update."

This is what Nintendo has been saying for years about Wii system updates. This is because past Nintendo Wii updates have damaged modded systems, not because of any particular malicious intent on Nintendo's part, but because the mods changed the system in ways that Nintendo didn't expect. On the other hand, Nintendo could probably test that its updates work properly against the top few system modifications -- but it's hard to fault them for not doing so.

Exactly. I remember a few years back there was a bit of an outrage at Apple for "doing" the same thing.

But really, if somebody messes around with their own hardware, do they really expect Nintendo/Apple/etc to have tested against that? Of course not. They've got more important things to test and support.

Well, internet connected, always on, multi-player game consoles will not go back to the way things used to be. I bought the most recent SFIV for PS3 and it wouldn't let me play it until I did a system update, but that system update wanted to delete my Linux partition. We pay more money for toys that in the end own us and try to keep us in their sandbox. Just imagine if car makers and insurance companies colluded to detect that you're driving into a high risk neighborhood, your rates go up. Piracy is becoming a term describing plain disobedience to overly strict rules.

Yes, the catch-all use of 'piracy' is becoming as much a problem as the 'piracy' itself.

> Just imagine if car makers and insurance companies colluded to detect that you're driving into a high risk neighborhood, your rates go up.

Or worse, that your car simply stops working if you make any aftermarket modifications to it. Try to add a sunroof and your car spontaneously gets cinderblocked.

I could see them justifying this by saying "We cannot guarantee the safety of this car due to modifications and will require X dollars to re-certify it"

> We pay more money for toys that in the end own us and try to keep us in their sandbox.

Speak for yourself. I've never paid money for hardware that controls me.

It becomes harder and harder not to, isn't it?

Nintendo needs to be careful. I'm not sure they realize just how dire their situation is, especially in the handheld market.

Apple is already in danger of making the 3DS (and other handhelds like the PSP) extinct. The iPod Touch is a serious threat to every other handheld "console". Yet Nintendo and Sony both (in separate ways) continue alienating their fans.

The A5 processor has (allegedly) 9 times the graphics power of the A4, which is already capable of playing some pretty decent games, even 3D games (eg Infinity Blade, Dungeon Defender, Rage).

Just how long do you think it'll before Apple makes the Apple TV a gaming console?

Now this is a fundamentally different model than the touch model their current devices have. The importance of this can't be overstated but Apple has an huge user base and all the distribution infrastructure it needs for this.

Nintendo has proven that you don't need bleeding edge graphics to sell consoles (like Microsoft and Sony provide). There is (IMHO) absolutely a market for Apple to extend the iTunes ecosystem into console gaming.

There's also an untapped market for using the iPad (or similar devices) for multi-player in-one-room games. E.g. you could have a poker game where each player's iPad displays their cards, and where betting, dealing cards, blind levels, etc are handled by the computers, so that the game mechanics flow a lot faster than is usual in face-to-face poker.

Or e.g. with monopoly where the iPads handle all the game mechanics.

Scrabble for iPad already does this in part (tile rack on your iPod/iPhone). It's a bit pricy yet but this is obviously a thing which is coming.

Every time family comes over, we play multipong, wurdle (yes, works great for groups) and battleheart (again, 1p but works well with multiple fingers).

This is a very interesting untapped market, but how to make a breakout hit in this market is still not clear to me.

The Kinect has a tremendous potential here as well.

Apple are never going to become a major player in the videogame market, for one simple reason: They refuse to have any buttons. Finger touchscreens are immensely sub-par for gaming; there's a reason the most popular iOS games are all simple, casual affairs like Angry Birds.

>>Nintendo has proven that you don't need bleeding edge graphics to sell consoles

That's true, but you do need a deep and enjoyable gaming experience to be successful - something which I don't think the appstore model of pricing around 99cents is going to bring out soon. So, the DS and PSP are here to stay.

tl:dr deep and fun games > graphics power

This explains why nintendo has been so cocky about the piracy issue with the 3DS. They think they can arbitrarily nuke the systems of 'pirates'.

Of course, this will also nuke homebrew completely, as they generally rely on R4 carts or similar.

This is just another shot in the war about who owns your hardware. I look forward to the class action lawsuits. I will refuse to buy a DS until this comes to a head. I am a game developer and I like messing around with hardware when I can. I won't buy a 3DS if I run the risk of bricking it by being curious.

If this handheld works offline the battle is already lost. Same goes for the PS3 and the wii, if you disable the system from calling home you can easily open it and do whatever you want with it.

These companies should instead focus on creating enough value and reason for gamers to be online. Like Steam, introduce social incentives to create a game collection and interact with your friends and half the battle against piracy is won.

There will always be piracy, these companies don't seem to understand that most pirates wouldn't even buy your console if they wouldn't be able to hack it.

On another note, wouldn't it make sense for Nintendo to pull a Sony at this point and create a Nintendo store for Android? In a year or so a good amount of Android phones will have glasses free 3D.

> Enterking also asks that customers format their system before bringing it in to sell. This suggests that Nintendo actually keeps a record of any illegal activity on the 3DS which it can then analyze on a firmware update and react to.

Is it just me or is that an extremely paranoid interpretation?

They've been doing this very thing (bricking modded consoles via firmware update) with the Wii for quite some time now. People will always find a way around these things, but I think the whole region-lock nonsense that Nintendo insists on is equally ridiculous.

Is there precedent for this? I can recall stories about getting cut off from a service if modding is detected but not about this sort of thing.

Not for completely disabling hardware, no. The closest would be the risk of bricking your PSP but putting on custom firmware, but generally that was just a software issue or a user screwup, not a systemic attempt by a device manufacturer to screw the customer.

The closest is as you say, Xbox Live cutting you off from service if your console is modded.

Valve's subscriber agreement says that they can close your Steam account (cutting off access to all of your games, even single-player ones) if they catch you cheating in certain multiplayer games.

And apparently the Blu-ray scheme has the ability to stop non-compliant players from playing new movies.

I hope someone figures out how to set off the bricking process on other people's systems. That way, there'll be a huge controversy which will put this procuedure in question.

Nintendo can make some great games, but their business decisions have a habit of being borderline tyrannical. They have this attitude that they're doing everyone a favor by existing.

If this link is accurate, then it should be as simple as popping your R4 cart in and booting a game, then quitting.

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