Tendo City

Quote:It has been discovered that the digi-cards have been on sale through Nintendo of Japans online store recently and out of interest here's how much they cost:



The SD Digi-Card Adapter, priced at 1,500 Yen




The SD Digi-Card Adapter + SD Memory Card priced at 3,000 Yen

The SD Digi-Cards, for the unaquainted, can be pluged into a PC which will allow the intriguing possibility for gamers to send game data to each other and even download events. Animal Crossing e+ will be the first game to exemplify their use in which they will allow data to be e-mailed between you and your friends and allow pictures to be taken with your PC.

There has been an official site launched for Animal Crossing e+ which will can be viewed here.

Hopefully, they'll start selling these over here pretty soon.

Cube-Europe

I certainly hope this isn't just for games designed to use the device. I figure it's for all games that save, but you know, there's the chance...

In any case, it's about time! Finally, BULK saving is a reality! Now then, there really IS no excuse for F-Zero GX not to have a map editor in it, even if they are too lazy to shrink down the data used to store the maps.

F-Zero is almost finished and the SD adapter isn't really out yet in most places. I'd say that that's a great reason...

Unless you want it delayed several months, minimum, so they can add a map editor?

Oh, and I'd still be very, very surprised if this is usable as just a standard memory card.

I don't think there is any reason why they couldn't be used as large memory cards and besides the article says "can be pluged into a PC which will allow the intriguing possibility for gamers to send game data to each other".

I guess its possible that it'd work as a memory card, but given what I've heard Nintendo say about it and how its been explained it sounds like it'd be exactly like I expected all along -- an extra that would require games that are specially programmed to accept the special card. And it'd mostly be for just a few games to transfer to PC... like Animal Crossing e+ here.

You will be able to use it like a regular memory card, at least for Animal Crossing:

Quote:
June 16, 2003 - In a little more than one week Japanese GameCube owners will get their hands on an upgraded version of last year's sleeper hit, Animal Crossing.
Essentially an expanded edition of the US release, Doubutsu no Mori e+ includes all the features Nintendo added for the American version such as e-Reader compatibility and GCN-to-GBA NES game downloads, plus a slew of other little upgrades and bonus games.

Here's a list of changes (we prefaced any features not included in the US release with the word "NEW"):


NEW: Upgraded animal designs
NEW: Conversations and topics are changed
NEW: All-new events added
NEW: More than 100 additional items
NEW: Visit the island without a GBA
Receive items using passwords
NEW: Save village data on SD Cards (using the SD Memory Card adapter)
NEW: Take photos of village life, store on SD Cards, and print using photo printers, etc.
Transfer data to the game using the e-Reader
Get letters from animals and import designs via cards
NEW: Link up to the GBA and play all-new mini-games
Download NES games to the GBA via the link cable.
Because many of the features were already included in the US edition, Nintendo is currently not planning to bring the Doubutsu no Mori e+ upgrade stateside. Here's hoping the already-talked-about Animal Crossing 2 isn't far behind.

Doubutsu no Mori e+ is set to ship on June 26. It will be the first game to utilize Nintendo's new SD Memory Card Adapter.

That's nice.

All we need to know now is if it works like a memory card or if it needs special programming in games to get them to recognize it.

I certainly hope it does let me use whatever saves I want on it.

In other news, just got a GBPlayer. Of all the things it DOES do, the real questions are what doesn't it do. First off, no it doesn't have the GBC infrared port :D, but I think we all knew that wouldn't be the case. Second off, something that was "iffy" to me, though I was REALLY hoping it would be there, SGB support. Nope, not a single drop of SGB support is to be found. The only colorizing for those old GB games, SGB mode on it or no, is the standard GBC stuff. So, no colorization, no special borders for those packs, and worst of all, none of those exclusive gameplay options for the old SGB designed games... That'll mean that a few old Bomberman games can't use the SGB multiplayer with one system and one gamepak mode, nor can my old game Space Invaders be able to use "true SNES mode", in which the border is done away with, and a whole SNES version of Space Invaders is dumped into the SNES via the SGB, with SNES quality graphics and sound and rotating and zoom effects and everything, for Space Invaders... I really wish Nintendo hadn't dissappointed on this. After all, the GBPlayer in and of itself is a purely luxery item anyway, so it should have luxery perks just like that. But there's still a chance it could be added. All that's needed is a special kind of software disk to be released where you choose to emulate SGB mode via an option when that particular disk is used. At the very least, I do actually HAVE an SGB, so I myself don't have too much to complain about as I can actually use the SGB modes.

I still doubt that it'll let you do that based on what Nintendo is saying. I hope it does... but doubt it.

As for the GBPlayer... I didn't expect SGB compatibility since it hadn't been mentioned, but them leaving it out is very, very dissapointing and I think it really is a major flaw in the GB Player. It just seems like such a simple thing to add that it should have been a no-brainer... well maybe not totally simple, but not so complex that it should have been left out. And lots of games utilize it!

I'd LOVE to see Donkey Kong in its full-color glory, or be able to play Bomberman GB in multiplayer mode for the first time, or see the SGB-exclusive borders in SGB-compatible GB games I have... that'd be really cool and much cooler than those standard GBP borders. Nintendo really dissapointed me... not right now, but a while ago when I realized that they wouldn't put in SGB mode.

When will I get a GBA/SP/P, I don't know... but I don't know what I'd get.

Maybe I'll just save up and get a SP...

The last I heard is that it will only work for games that specifically look for it, unlike a memory card. So while there is a good chance all future games will let you use it as a memory card, the old ones won't. Maybe that has changed since.

It is completely different hardware so it makes sense that it would have to be enabled sepearately in the game code.

Well it all depends. There are two ways it can work with the old games. The first is if the SD card adapter actually translates the card to look just like a (very large) GCN memory card. This could get tricky. I think it could be done if the other non-GCN save files are "suppressed" in the convertion. That's a bit complicated though.

The second way is more likely. This is if the GCN, and in fact the save systems of all games made to date, has already been made with the SD cards in mind. Since this was originally intended to be a LAUNCH accessory :D, it's possible. After all, the save data code is very likely something that's just copied and pasted directly from Nintendo's data on how it works, which would mean SD card support would also be copied and pasted each time. That's the lazy way of making it work.

The third option is that this SD card thing is a total waste as it doesn't in fact support anything but specially designed games :D. Well, not a waste, but a shame.

You'd have to be quite optimistic to choose either of the first two options.