Due to Nintendo's repeated firmware updates and security measures, homebrew on the 3DS and Wii U has been stifled a great deal in comparison to the previous generation. It's the preserve of enthusiasts willing to keep their portable offline, but nevertheless there's still a small community that experiments with the 3DS in order to test out their coding skills, or simply to try and do something neat.
This qualifies as a relatively pointless but clever achievement, as a homebrew modder has successfully turned a 3DS into a PC remote desktop, essentially streaming a PC and its functionality to the portable. In the videos below this is shown off, with the second showing the wonders of World of Warcraft through the portable. As you can see the performance and framerate is pretty horrendous in these tests; we said it was neat, not useful.
It's highly unlikely this will ever go beyond being clever but unworkable - the project has been quiet since its earlier days in February - but shows what determined modders and hackers can do. Some may optimise their networks for smoother performance, but the limitations of the 3DS and its low resolution screens make this an intriguing curiosity and little more.
[source eurogamer.net]
Comments 26
Interesting, but meh. I wouldn't see a need to do that in the first place. As the article stated, pointless.
If they can get it to run in reverse - top screen of 3DS games to big screen monitor - I'd be interested. (Yes, I know resolution would be horrible blah blah blah)
Cool, but yeah, pointless. Screen resolution and size is way too low for there to be any point in streaming, plus the GPU is too pathetically weak to handle any kind of streaming.
@rjejr Why do people want this? The resolution would be lower than the 3DS screen.
@CrimSkies97 - Bigger is better.
I've played several GBA games on my 52" 1080p TV. I honestly have no idea at all what the resolution of those games are, but if you can convince me that 3DS games will look a whole lot worse than those - Advance Wars is beautiful - then I'll stop asking or it.
Looked it up - GBA screen resolution is 240 x 160.
3DS - top screen resolution 400 x 240
So why would the 3DS games look bad on my tv if the GBA games look good?
@rjejr 3DS screen resolution in 3D mode is 800x240 and 400x240 in 2D mode. If you're playing on a larger screen, not only will the image be blown up, but the bigger screen won't have the 3D function and therefore cannot access the higher resolution of 3D mode.
I quite like this messing around to see what can be done. Nintendo has to shut things down though because no matter what anyone says homebrew does get ripped off and used for piracy. A bit off-topic, but there's a very funny discussion on some of the forums about how the developers of illegal flashcarts "don't care" about their customer base, leaving them hanging for updates to make their consoles work on the latest firmwares. Go complain to Trading Standards and see how far you get then with enforcing your consumer rights! Everyone knows those cards are used predominantly for piracy.
Neat lots of potential there
All I can say is wow.
This seems pretty cool, though it does seem pretty pointless if it's going to have framerate issues.
@rjejr Totally agree, I love the upscaled look of handheld games on big TVs. 3D graphics sort of look awkward upscaled and more jagged but it still doesn't make the game unplayable.
@icedude545 The GBA(for the most part) doesn't render 3D graphics.
I'd love it if a WOW type game came to any Nintendo hardware.
this was released like.... 3 months ago.
this would be cool for other games like playing hacked ds games or like gba games as they should be played on a handheld and it would feel more comfortable.
"Slightly pointless"....?
Looks at the Wii U
I'm still waiting for a hack that allows us to the Wii U GamePad as a screen and a controller on a PC.
I am sure the PC streaming capability of the 3DS can be improved.
Its just a matter of working out the best streaming protocol and knowing the inner workings of the 3DS.
After all, Nintendo have improved the 'downloading' capability of the wi-fi in the New 3DS models, and Youtube online plays videos quickly in both 2d and 3d formats.
This article should also have mentioned the 3DS being used as a game controller too.
https://gbatemp.net/threads/3ds-controller.375443/
Interesting! As a long time Wow player, I would love for the 3DS or Wii U to have a serious mmorpg to play. Is Dragon Quest X coming to NA? haha.
cool
I'd bet the controls are a laggy mess. Plus, you can do this in Smash Bros already, without hacking/modding...
You can play illegal copies on latest firmware but you cant use homebrew.
Nintendo logic.
Has anybody messed around with the software that emulates a Wii U Gamepad using a PC.
Portable WoW... I'm kinda glad this isn't a thing 😅
This is basically just a tech demo to show that Nintendo has been holding out on us regarding what the 3DS is capable of.
@rjejr If you play old console games on a TV screen, either legitimate "virtual console"-style or through less legal means, the image you're seeing very often has a default level of screen-level post-processing applied.
There are a number of very good interpolation algorithms out there, and they're especially effective when you're dealing with 2D sprite-based titles like Advance Wars. They're far less effective with low-resolution 3D titles.
I'm not sure how you're playing the game, and what I'm saying might not be valid in your case, but that might be something to consider.
I might start playing PC games on my 3DS if somebody released an officially licensed app like this.
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