http://www.nintendo.com/whatsnew/detail/...zOrgBURhzw
Probably all titles are losing internet play, but some may stay online for a while; not all Wii games with online play are in the list there, but the lists aren't consistent between regions, so we'll see.
But yes, really. Pretty sad, worst of all for the lost DS stuff because this means that any Picross 3D, Picross DS, Band Bros., Mario vs. Donkey Kong 2/3, etc. stuff not on your cartridge will become lost forever... except to piracy I presume, which I hope will save all of that stuff. The online play probably will be gone forever, but at least that stuff hopefully can be saved... this kind of thing is unacceptable!
http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2014/02/th...-consoles/
Ars has posted the same thoughts I have about things like this. I actually understand why Nintendo would eventually need to "turn out the lights", but as Ars states, they (and MS and Sony and EA and the rest) owe it to us to put out framework we can use to set up our own servers when they turn out the lights. As Ars makes clear, they don't have to do this when the services first launch, just saving it for when they close. Further, they should "host" the DLC and online-only content on their FTP for users to freely download (or purchase and "side load" onto their systems after the fact). Basic consideration, that's what I'm saying here.
Yeah, any decent company absolutely would do that... but none of the video game console manufacturers seem to care enough to bother. If it's not something they're currently selling, they just want it to go away, I guess. Very unfortunate. PC games get their online shut down too, but they're much more likely to last, or at least have options that don't require the servers. And developers are more likely to care and try to find solutions than console ones are.
As for hosting the DLC and online-only content, there is a solution to that, at least: piracy.
Well, the DLC was free to begin with, so it's hardly "piracy", but you forget the technical hurdles here. Not only will they need to reverse engineer up a local server that a DS or Wii can connect to, they'd need to somehow "pull" the DLC off of cartridges, and hope they can get a full accounting of all of it (such as in the case of Picross DS where you literally are unable to download ALL the DLC on one cart, it won't all fit). Again, more reverse engineering and it'd require a full community working together.
Frankly, the original XBox has been offline for years and I don't think they even have all THAT DLC (and patches) available to download somewhere. Odds are slim, it looks like some of this is destined to vanish forever.
So, here's the deal. I suggest this thread become a listing of "must have" digital download DSi and Wii games and DLC, so we can get them while the getting is good.
Update: It appears we've misread what Nintendo's doing. Online play will be disabled, but the online store will not be.
(However, that leaves me with one question. What of the DLC that needs to be downloaded from inside the games? Does that count as "online play" or the "online store"?)
Yeah, I thought that the online stores were fine. The issue is that for original DS games that download stuff, I believe they get it from the same system as online games, so if they take down Wi-Fi Connection, they will almost certainly be disabling DS data download (for Picross DS, etc.) as well as online games.
For newer consoles which have dedicated stores, though, including the DSi, 3DS, Wii, and Wii U, software purchase and download will continue to be available. As for the DLC downloads within Wii games,though... good question. I would expect they'll still be available, since the Wii Shop channel will be and it probably goes through that, but I'm not 100% certain on that.
Quote: Well, the DLC was free to begin with, so it's hardly "piracy", but you forget the technical hurdles here. Not only will they need to reverse engineer up a local server that a DS or Wii can connect to, they'd need to somehow "pull" the DLC off of cartridges, and hope they can get a full accounting of all of it (such as in the case of Picross DS where you literally are unable to download ALL the DLC on one cart, it won't all fit). Again, more reverse engineering and it'd require a full community working together.
For stuff like Picross or Mario vs. Donkey Kong, you'd probably just need roms, or multiple roms, with the stuff downloaded in them, yes?
Well, the "in-game" stores may still not go through the Wii Shop channel directly. That's the problem, we really don't know how that's handled. Handling DLC entirely through in-game stores was always awkward (and in fact, 3DS games use those too).
Update: Just read a note sent out to my Wii from Nintendo. It clarifies the store situation. Any game with a red "pay to play" icon (meaning, has DLC that can be purchased online, such as in "My Life as a King") will still function after the shut down.
This is good, because that means content won't just vanish on that day. Well, except for Animal Crossing, which had an annoying "send out an online letter on specific days to unlock exclusive content" system. However, those things are already beyond our reach outside of hacking because they were limited to specific dates (hate that stuff, true art... is eternal!).
So change of plans, let us use this thread to organize some last-minute online games before the online gaming shuts off for good. Add your name (and friend code) to this little list and we'll have a better way to get started.
Mario Kart DS:
Mario Kart Wii:
Tetris DS:
Super Smash Bros. Brawl:
Animal Crossing Wild World:
Animal Crossing City Folk:
That should about cover it.
Hmm... well, Wii DLC is okay? That's great. It's too bad that DS downloadable stuff really is about to go away forever, isn't it... I should download everything I can for the games I have with support (Layton stuff, Mario vs. Donkey Kong 3, Picross DS and Picross 3D...)! I rarely plug in my wi-fi router (stupid bad half-nonworking thing), but I'll have to for that. And for DS online too.
And on that note, while I never played DS or Wii games online much at all, because of how bad Nintendo's online service is -- it just never interested me much with such a dated system -- we should do that, yeah. I'll have to look up friend codes; never bothered with them before, since I was barely ever playing the games online anyway.
Okay, so the reason why this happened is apparently because the people who bought Gamespy technology, which Wii and DS online play uses, have decided to kill off the service, ending support for all titles on both PC and consoles. It's pretty sad, but there's no question that it has to be the reason why Wii and DS online play is about to get shut off... it's not only them that are going down, some older PC games are as well.
Nintendo was using Gamespy as their backend? Now THAT I didn't know.
Yeah. And I said PC, but some console games on the PS2, Xbox, etc. use Gamespy too. Bungie just recently said that they'd set up servers to keep Halo PC and Halo CE for the 360's online play running, for example, or else it'd have gone down because of this. Nintendo isn't willing to do that, I guess. Unfortunate... unless there is some rights or license reason why it's possible for some things to switch to their own servers but Nintendo can't? I don't know.
So like Nintendo, EA is going to shut down all of their games running on Gamespy. Here' s a list:
http://www.ea.com/1/service-updates This includes their remaining Wii and DS games with online play, and also some great PC classics like Battlefield 1942, Crysis 1 and 2, several Command & Conquer games, Neverwinter Nights 1 and 2, and more. Not good... I hope for at least some of them that a workaround is found! :(
And yes, this applies to Wii and DS games as well. As the fan-run servers for Phantasy Star Online on the Dreamcast and Gamecube show, if you get all the relevant data, you can make a fan-run server... I just hope that people manage to collect the necessary information and that it's possible to do!
Remember, part of "the necessary information" is DLC, and another part are encrypted keys that Nintendo Wifi uses. Those are going to be difficult, if people even care enough to bother.
I really had no idea Gamespy, as an online service, was THAT wide-spread. It's rather shocking really, considering that I'd thought we would see their logo indicating as such at the very least. It seems to me that having Gamespy itself become such a major pillar of the online community was a mistake. Here I thought that Nintendo actually had their OWN infrastructure for online gaming at the time... it really makes it clear that as far behind as Nintendo's online services were during the DS/Wii era, I was still giving them too much credit.
Oh yeah, from the late '90s and through the '00s, Gamespy tech was definitely one of the top ones. Gamespy the website faded in the early '00s and shifted around in ownership, but their online gaming connection servers and software was pretty good and very popular. However, they faded more recently, and the company that bought the online gaming side (the website got shut down a year or two ago) decided to shut the whole thing down. I don't think that people used Gamespy tech too much, though -- it was good, and it was popular, so why not?
Instead, it just shows that you can't rely on online services staying up. We've seen this before, like when the original Xbox's online was shut down (or the Dreamcast, etc), or in the dozens of games EA has shut down online play for before this, among plenty of other examples, but this is a big one... but it really is all the fault of the people who bought Gamespy and how they decided to completely kill off a still-relevant service. It's sad, and frustrating, but I don't think there was anything wrong with relying on Gamespy -- for quite some time they were one of the biggest players in online game servers! Why not work with one of the leaders?
So, some people are working on a workaround. Only some games are going to work online, though... need people to capture the online data from the servers, and people apparently care about only certain (more popular) games. At least more games are being saved here than when the Dreamcast's online was taken down, though... back then only Phantasy Star Online's server data was captured and not anything else, so that's the only DC game where fan servers are possible.
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=819724
http://forum.wii-homebrew.com/board42-kr...e-support/