Earlier this week, Nintendo released a firmware update for its dead console, the 3DS. While the 3DS still has a bunch of dedicated players, the update came as a huge surprise, as no new games are developed for the console, and its eShop has been offline for weeks. Therefore, it was quickly assumed that there was only one real purpose for the update: to stop piracy.

However, if this was Nintendo's plan, it failed. While there was initially some panic that the 3DS update would disrupt the modding scene, the community has already found a workaround. Now, 3DS owners in certain regions are able to hack their devices again even if they downloaded the version 11.17 update. It's expected that this fix will be available worldwide soon, thwarting Nintendo's apparent plans to stop players from using the 3DS for anything other than officially released games.

This development was spotted by the Nintendo homebrew site, WiiDatabase, which lists the 3DS exploit super-skaterhax as compatible with update 11.17. Right now, this seems to only be applicable to those in Europe, but given how many updates the hacking scene has worked around before, we can expect that to change soon. Super-skaterhax creator, Zoogie, has also confirmed that this is in the works, as they get around US-only changes to the home screen that are interfering with the software.

Others on Twitter are also reporting that 3DS consoles are once again hackable in both Europe and Japan, so it seems that other modders are circumventing Nintendo's changes as well. In fact, it seems that some were able to find workarounds on the same day that the 11.17 patch went live. If throwing a wrench in their plans was Nintendo's goal, then it will definitely need to go back to the drawing board. Or leave them alone, since the 3DS is largely unsupported now anyway.

Hats off to the 3DS modding community man.

The 11.17 patch that dropped *today* has already been circumvented for EU/JP region consoles with a fix the US one coming soon.

— FalKoopa 🌈 (@FalKoopa_) May 23, 2023

As we mentioned in our initial report, some 3DS exclusives are now only playable through piracy, or by splurging on a console that already had them installed. Even some physical games can only be bought through resellers - another method that won't see the developers, or Nintendo for that matter, make any money.

In any case, this has been an incredibly unpopular move from Nintendo. While it hasn't been confirmed that stopping hackers was the company's intention, it's hard to imagine why else it would go to the effort of updating a console it doesn't release games for anymore. It remains to be seen if it comments on the matter, or even has another go at stopping the modding scene.

Posted: May 28, 2023 8:01 pm
Related Forum: Gaming Discussion

Source: https://www.thegamer.com/nintendo-3ds-hack-update-11-17-piracy-circumvented-homebrew/