Gateway 3DS DS-scene review
Gateway 3DS: The first 3DS flashcart! |
The Gateway 3DS is the first commercial 3DS flashcart released since the launch of the 3DS. It caused quite the commotion when the team first released their video demonstrating what they achieved. Since then they haven't updated us much on their progress, except for the save functionality video. But now they have the released the cart and people are getting their cart to finally be able to play 3DS backups.
The Gateway 3DS comes in a plastic box bearing the red Gateway logo. The cards themselves come in their own plastic bed.
Features of the Gateway 3DS |
These are the features you have with the Gateway 3DS.
- Play 3DS backups on both 3DS and 3DS XL
- Play NDS backups with the blue Gateway card.
- Saves are stored on the SD card of the 3DS
Out of the box only the blue cart works with the correct firmware. The blue cart is essentially an R4i cart, and as such needs firmware files. The cart pops up as Deep Labyrinth and works up until 3DS firmware 6.1
The red cart is a special case as this one requires no firmware, only that the microSD card is loaded with a game. To enable the red cart, you must first use an exploit based hack. This is done by first preparing the system with a .nds file on the blue cart. After that you must copy the exploit to the SD card you use in your 3DS and go the NDS profile settings on your 3DS. After this process has completed and you are returned to the main screen you can use the red cart to play your games.
When starting the blue cart you will be greeted with a somewhat familiar firmware, that of an R4i. As such not much explanation is needed about the workings of the blue cart. When you have prepared your system for the red cart it will pop up as the game you have loaded on the microSD card.
NDS Game Back Up Compatibility |
These games where tested on the standard Gateway firmware.
Scribblenauts (E): Worked Perfectly
Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days (E): Worked Perfectly
Pokémon HeartGold (E): Worked Perfectly
Pokémon Conquest (E): Worked perfectly
Inazuma Eleven 2: Blizzard (E): Worked Perfectly
3DS Game Back Up Compatibility |
These games were tested with the red Gateway cart. The 3DS was updated to 4.5.x with Luigi's Mansion 2 as this is the highest firmware the cart still works on. Any game released before June 2013 will have a 4.5 update, games after June 2013 will have the 5.x update.
This section will be updated when the Gateway team has released their fix for the firmware problem.
Luigi's Mansion 2 (E): Worked perfectly
Bit.Trip Saga (E): Worked perfectly
Naruto Shippuden 3D: The New Era (E): Worked perfectly
Star Fox 64 3D (E): Worked perfectly
Kid Icarus: Uprising (E): Worked perfectly
Kingdom Hearts: Dream Drop Distance (E): Worked perfectly
Fire Emblem: Awakening (E): Worked perfectly
Paper Mario Sticker Star (E): Worked perfectly
Animal Crossing: New Leaf (E): Not working because of saving method
Demonstration of setup process |
The build quality of both carts is good, they feel quite solid. The blue is a NDS cartridge while the red one is a 3DS cartridge complete with the bit that sticks out at the top. On the red cart however you can feel the microSD card slot under the sticker because the case is removed there. I suspect this is because of the alignment of the components on the PCB board.
Only the red cart has as springloaded microSD slot.
The Gateway 3DS certainly lives up to the expectation of playing 3DS backups. However, as of writing the cart only works up to firmware 4.5.x of the 3DS, as it is exploit-based. Games released after march 2013 (need comfirmation on this) come with the 5.1 firmware update and will break compatibility. The games that do work, work fine. If you exit the game on the correct way the savefile will be stored on the 3DS SD card, which makes having multiple saves and exchanging them quite easy.
The bundled NDS cart is a necessary but certainly not unwelcome addition to the package. It is not only meant for preparing the system for the exploit, but it can also play most if not all NDS games.
Pro's:
- Plays 3DS backups.
- External saving.
- Comes with good NDS flashcart.
Cons:
- Only works with certain games released before the 5.x update.
- Not being able to have multiple 3DS games on the microSD card.
- Expensive, €75/$80
- Limited compatibility
Considering this is the first 3DS flashcart I can live with not being able to play every game yet. The Gateway team is hard at work to updating the exploit to support 5.x and possibly 6.0 firmwares so more compatibility will be seen in the near future. And as this is the first 3DS flashcart the price will be high.
Final Score: 70%
DS-Scene would like to thank the Gateway team for sending us the review sample.
Re: Gateway 3DS DS-scene review
I'm usually a happy early adopter of 1st gen "backup" devices but this seems so limited, that I think I'll wait for something better. Not mentioned in the cons list specifically, but I read on gbatemp that it doesn't run unsigned/homebrew 3DS code either.
Re: Gateway 3DS DS-scene review
nothing unsigned, that would be a whole different ball game. This cart is very limited, I am sort of tempted to grab one and use it on my older 3DS with the handful of decent games that already exist and then buying a 3DS XL for newer stuff, but the cost of doing that would probably not really save me much over just buying the few older games I'd want anyway.
I just hope it opens a few doors to other hacks
Re: Gateway 3DS DS-scene review
2 more potential reasons to buy this - a firmware update in the works that allows:
- Playing games from any region
- Spoofing firmware versions (to allow booting of games which usually require a newer 3DS firmware than Gateway supports)
Source: http://gbatemp.net/threads/gateway-3ds-firm-spoof-multi-region.352793/
Re: Gateway 3DS DS-scene review
website is showing apache holding page now
Re: Gateway 3DS DS-scene review
Quote:
Originally Posted by
raelmadrid
website is showing apache holding page now
Things got a lot worse than that now... although depends how you look at it I suppose.
Re: Gateway 3DS DS-scene review
Seems to be back up now
was going to invest in one of these but seems expensive, think i shall wait a bit for the clones ;)
Re: Gateway 3DS DS-scene review
I can see this ending up as a soft mod , with the games loading from the 3ds own sd card.
ill not be buying it .
Re: Gateway 3DS DS-scene review
thought they got taken to court and heavily fined , also they can only hold 1 pre installed 3ds game and sell for £70
Re: Gateway 3DS DS-scene review
Yesterday's firmware update has made the Gateway 3DS card a lot more interesting:
- NAND emulation (now you can play retail game cartridges which would have previously demanded that you install a newer firmware, and access/use of the eShop has been restored, running a virtual latest firmware)
- NAND backup to SD (there is no easy, solderless way to restore your NAND yet (read: http://gbatemp.net/threads/nand-flas...3ds-xl.350668/), but none-the-less it is still worth backing up your NAND as it will probably make fixing/downgrading easier in the future, in case you accidently update your firmware beyond the version Gateway currently supports)
- More game compatibility: notably, the new Zelda game now works. Only 2 games are not working (Animal Crossing New Leaf and Pokemon)
- GUI! Yes finally there is a GUI to make Gateway a bit easier and prettier to use.
More info in the usual places:
http://www.gateway-3ds.com/
http://gbatemp.net/threads/gateway-2...leased.358498/
This is a beta firmware but I've not experienced any issues yet.
There are still some functions even the latest firmware cannot perform, although they are all touted as "coming soon". Namely;
- Multirom support (at present it is still one game per micro SD card)
- Cartridge backup
- Online play
But most people can live without those features for the time being I think.
Re: Gateway 3DS DS-scene review
Where's the best place to order that would have stock and not ship from outside EU
Re: Gateway 3DS DS-scene review
Quote:
Originally Posted by
4031283
Where's the best place to order that would have stock and not ship from outside EU
You will not get an answer to that on the forum due to the rules, try Google
Re: Gateway 3DS DS-scene review
Just bought an R4I gold deluxe for £40. Does the same thing as the Gateway but cheaper.
Re: Gateway 3DS DS-scene review
Quote:
Originally Posted by
fastlegs_
Just bought an R4I gold deluxe for £40. Does the same thing as the Gateway but cheaper.
It doesn't have the same features/compatibility as of yet, but it may well catch up if/when it next gets a firmware update.
Re: Gateway 3DS DS-scene review
It plays all the games I have tested, although I hear it doesn't play the new Zelda. The new 3.0 update is coming soon apparently.
Re: Gateway 3DS DS-scene review
neither cards play Zelda yet, and I wouldnt expect the R4i to play it until its playable on the Gateway. For me, I'd rather pay a bit more and get a gateway if the R4I team are just cloning it.
Re: Gateway 3DS DS-scene review
Re: Gateway 3DS DS-scene review
Slightly off-topic but can the R4i (purple) cart play 3D games. I know it can play 2D but was wondering if 3D games can be played?
Re: Gateway 3DS DS-scene review
No as far as I know just the R4I Gold Deluxe, Gateway and the 3DS Link cards.
Re: Gateway 3DS DS-scene review
Just noticed the 3ds link claims to run zelda too, i wonder if they are developing and not cloning afterall.....maybe time to invest...