It seems that the new Nintendo DSi, which has just been launched in Japan and will arrive in Europe and North America sometime in 2009, is built so that the usual mod chips that were used with other DS models are pretty much useless. The revelation is good news for Nintendo, which has been wagging a fierce war against piracy, but very bad for those who aim to create and run homebrew applications on their handhelds.

Nintendo says that its console does not allow the R4 or the M3, which are the most popular mod chips, to work. Users are also discouraged from taking any action to tamper with the internal working of the Nintendo DSi, mainly because all warranties will be void. There’s also the possibility of facing legal action if you commercialize any mod chip on the open market. 

Piracy has never been extremely widespread on the previous DS models, with most handheld piracy occurring on the PlayStation Portable from Sony. Some developers have begun avoiding the handheld for this reason.

The bad news for Nintendo is that the introduction of an SD card slot on the fresh model console, to replace the Game Boy Advance slot, means that potential hackers have another avenue through which they can access the Nintendo DSi and open it up for applications which are not approved by the company that manufactures the console. Let’s see how long it takes for new mod solutions to appear and for how long piracy is banished.

The Nintendo DSi, the company’s answer to the PSP-3000, hopes to attract customers with its two cameras and a new virtual store, where Nintendo Points can be used to download games and other software. Initial reports suggest that the console is a big hit in Japan.