14 DAY TRIAL // Piracy is a huge concern for the gaming industry these days as it isn't limited to the PC platform, where it reached the highest levels, but to almost all platforms, including the Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii or the PlayStation Portable.
Nintendo's small handheld, the DS, made no exception as pirates easily found that inserting an R4 flashcart into the dedicated slot was everything you needed to do in order for the device to run pirated software or homebrew applications.
With the latest version of the device, the DSi, Nintendo aimed at preventing such a phenomenon by removing the slot for the R4 and implementing regular firmware updates in order to prevent workarounds from being found. And it seems to have worked because for six months, since its release in Japan, the device remained piracy-free.
But the past tense is correct now, as Supercard has released the DSONEi, a flashcart that can enable the DSi to run pirated and homebrew applications seamlessly. In order to prevent the new firmware version from disabling this solution, the team at Supercard will release their own workaround, after each new update to the DSi, thus keeping things going for those who want to run pirated or homebrew releases.
Overall, it seems that no matter what console companies make in order to prevent piracy and their systems from being cracked, people will still find a way around these protection measures and make the device run whatever they want.
Let's hope that the next DS will be a tougher nut to crack for hackers and that it will stay piracy free for a much longer time than the DSi. Until then though, Nintendo's handheld will see a lot of its game sales drop by a certain amount in the future.