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DS Web Browser in June 89

Posted by Zonk from the something-wrong-about-pr0n-on-a-nintendno-console dept.
Eurogamer reports that the Opera DS Browser will be available in June, though so far only in Japan. From the article: "In fit-to-width mode, Opera uses both screens for scrolling up or down a page with both screens completing the view. In DS mode, an overview of the Web page is displayed on the lower screen and a pink square can be moved around an area of the page. The area you have selected is shown on the upper screen."
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DS Web Browser in June More

DS Web Browser in June

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  • 1. What the hell took so long?
    2. When are we going to see the first sensationalist news article about rabid child molesters preying on kids with Nintendos?
    • 1. What the hell took so long?

      Probably the Opera team started playing Mario Kart DS when the devkits arrived, instead of actually working.


      2. When are we going to see the first sensationalist news article about rabid child molesters preying on kids with Nintendos?

      A couple of months ago there was one. Pedophiles could prey children via...Pictochat. Which has a range around 30 feet IIRC.
      • If you are referring to the one posted on Slashdot earlier, that was a joke article. For some reason it didn't get the foot (at original post time), but the article was clearly being sarcastic.

        I'm just gonna grab a good paragraph here from the article [gamesetwatch.com]...

        GameSetWatch co-editor Brandon Sheffield suggests that a potential dangerous chatroom lurer could post an ad on CraigsList asking children to email him or her to exchange Animal Crossing friends codes. Once the friends code exchange is made, the child ca

        • There was a "serious" one from ABC news [go.com], which is what the grand parent post was likely referring to. It is (as per American media norms) sensationalist as hell, and IIRC did make it to Slashdot as well.
          • aye I've been pwnt.

            and god damn, I've just watched part of Fahrenheit 911, and this (American paranoia in the media) is exactly what he's talking about. Why does the media need to give us 356233 things to be afraid about every night? I've listened to whats up for "news" tonight and damn.
        • No no, IIRC it also appeared on TV, and was about Pictochat.
        • That was making fun of a sensationalist news broadcast on the Philadelphia ABC affliate. The news people were serious... Well, maybe not completely serious since even they had to know they were full of shit and just making up crap for ratings, but serious enough.

  • DS Lite (Score:3, Interesting)

    by DeionXxX ( 261398 ) on Monday April 03, 2006 @11:50AM (#15050641)
    Anyone know when the DS Lite is coming to the US? I've been holding out, for one and don't want to pay $300 bux for one from Lik Sang.

    • Not sure, but based on the anticipation, I'm expecting there to be shortages of it for the first month or two anyways. I finally succumbed and ordered a regular DS from ToysRUs over the weekend. Good deal, got a free copy of Advance Wars with the order. The free game offer ended April 1, which is why I gave in and jumped on it. On an unrelated note, newegg has Metroid pinball for 18 bucks. To anyone out there who has it, would you recommend it?

      • Re:DS Lite (Score:3, Informative)

        by Servo5678 ( 468237 )
        On an unrelated note, newegg has Metroid pinball for 18 bucks. To anyone out there who has it, would you recommend it?

        I recommend it. It's a fun little pinball game and if nothing else you'll get the Rumble Pak with the game for free which I believe sells for $10-$15 by itself. It took me about 2 weeks to unlock all the secrets and get the high score on each table, but the Rumble Pak has come in handy for other games.
        • I second this.

          It's a decent pinball game. Not great, but fun for the most part.

          I don't get around to playing it often because I have too many other great DS games I'd rather play.
      • But the old one is so bulky and I've seen the screen... it's pretty dim. I'm planning on getting 2 (one for the wifey), and I know I'll be using them with the Revolution so I want to make sure I have the latest and greatest.
        • Don't get me wrong, I intend to either sell or give the regular one to a friend once I can get my hands on a DS Lite. I'm just getting tired of having no idea when it'll even come out. Of course, now that I've ordered one, they'll make the announcement in a few days and say it's coming out at the beginning of May like people are speculating.

          • Re:DS Lite (Score:2, Funny)

            by yammosk ( 861527 )

            Of course, now that I've ordered one, they'll make the announcement in a few days...

            Thank you. You have done us all a great service :)

        • Re:DS Lite (Score:2, Interesting)

          by PeelBoy ( 34769 )
          It's not THAT bad. I mean the screen is better than the GBA SP (pre-back lit version). I've been perfectly happy with mine. It's been pretty rare that brightness is an issue for me.

          It is a little bulky but not any more so than the PSP. It's a lot more durable too.

          My only complaint is that it's a little top heavy so playing games like Mario Kart gets tiresome after a while.

          For $130 I can't think of any reason not to buy one. You could probably get a decent trade in for it when you upgrade to a lite but perso

      • Re:DS Lite (Score:3, Informative)

        by rev063 ( 591509 )

        On an unrelated note, newegg has Metroid pinball for 18 bucks. To anyone out there who has it, would you recommend it?

        As a real-work pinball junkie, I heartily recommend it. It's made by the same people that made the awesome Pro Pinball PC pinball simulations "The Web", "Timeshock", and "Big Race USA". (Disclaimer: I was a design consultant on the latter two, but I'd lost touch with the Pro Pinball guys a long time ago and didn't realise they were behind Metroid Pinball until I finished the game and s

        • I agree, and I'd also say of the two DS Metroid games, I like it the best. (Sadly, my stubby, malformed fingers can't comfortably do the contortions required by Metroid Prime: Hunters.)

          Also, it comes with the Rumble Pack, and you can't really go wrong by buying it. I play it all the time... it may well be my favorite game for the DS. (In fact, I like it so much I just recently ordered The Pinball of the Dead for Gameboy Advance.) Of course, I've always loved real pinball, and bought two pinball sims f

    • They're $199 from Lik-sang.

      Mine was shipped to me a few days back... so much for the "shortage". ^_^

    • Re:DS Lite (Score:2, Informative)

      by Swordsmanus ( 921213 )
      As far as I know the DS Lite hits the US either on May 7th or 21st. They tend to release hardware on sundays, and the new Super Mario Bros. game's release date has been pushed back two weeks to May 21. Normally Nintendo doesn't release games on Sundays unless it's with new hardware, so it seems very likely that the DS Lite and SMB game will release on the same day.
    • According to the Lik Sang website it's only $200 at the moment. Incidentally, my DS Lite arrived last week and it's really, really nice. Buy one immediately!
  • This is great, but will we still be forced to use WEP encryption?

    • Re:WPA Support (Score:2, Insightful)

      by BeardsmoreA ( 951706 )
      Why do you need - actually need - stronger encryption on a portable games console. Obviously when the browser comes out and you absolutely gotta do your banking from the sofa... I guess...?

      • Re:WPA Support (Score:3, Interesting)

        by the_maddman ( 801403 )
        How about because I use my wireless network for more than just my DS? It's not that I need my Mario Kart packets secure, it's about my laptops and server being secure.
        • Okay, first, running a server on wireless is just a bad idea. This is not only due to the fact that you just shouldn't send critical data wirelessly regardless of encryption, but also because you're not going to get the bandwidth you need.

          Second, why do you need so much encryption on your laptops? The most you're ever likely to be doing is sending information such as credit card data when you buy stuff online, and any good credit card company has good fraud protection. Besides, who is likely to be able

          • Alright, "You don't need wireless security because anything you'd need security for should be done over the wire" is just dumb. WPA is a decent enough standard to use for transmitting critical data over wireless. Its better than WEP. No matter how good my bank's fraud prevention is, I'd rather hold on to my credit card number. Plus, there's the whole issue of random people hopping on your wireless with no security or even WEP (especially if you're pushing enough packets for someone to guess your key quickly
            • While I understand the need and want for better security, I think you're post also states exactly why WEP is "good enough": Drive down your neighborhood sometime. Its pretty easy to pick up a few networks. I guarantee that at least one of those will be open. And this is where someone passing through the neighborhood will connect. They won't bother trying to crack your encryption if there's an open network a few doors down.
              • Ugh...your, not you're.
              • Sorry but WEP isn't "good enough" no matter how many people leave their WAPs wide open. We've been down this road already and nobody with an ounce of sense uses WEP. Face it, it was a mistake not being able to do WPA on the DS no much how much you think it's not a big deal. People will just have to decide if they are willing to live with that security risk.
                • Had to reply to this: ...nobody with an ounce of sense uses WEP.

                  I use WEP but only because I don't really feel the need to upgrade my 802.11b network card to g, and AFAICT nobody has used my network without authorization.

                • Re:WPA Support (Score:1, Informative)

                  by vexx0 ( 915665 )
                  Why dont you just have your Wireless AP let only cards with certain MAC addresses connect. You can view your MAC address on your DS so it not that big of a deal.

                  • Because that's only an illusion of security. Your MAC is not hardcoded on PCs. In fact, you can quite easily change your MAC in Linux when configuring your network device.

                    My understanding, though I could be mistaken, is that even when you are using WEP, the MAC address is still sent unencrypted (so you can do things like filtering). Because of this, somebody needs only to sniff a little bit of traffic to find a valid MAC and set their machine to use it.

                    That said, I still use WEP on my AP in my apartm

            • SSL (Score:1)

              by tepples ( 727027 )

              If anything, the flaw with WPA is that it might not be secure enough, but unless my wife starts suddenly letting me string cables across the house at will, WPA will have to do.

              Then set up your AP to use WEP and a MAC address whitelist. Buy a second AP to use on a different channel if you have to.

              • Just passively listening to traffic of a wireless network, you can get the MAC addresses of the clients participating. Then you can use a utility such as macchanger to change your MAC to their MAC, and if its a simple system like WEP I think you'd easily be able to get onto the network even if they're on the network still. A whitelist doesn't really work as well as people sometimes assume it will, and the costs of your solution involve two networks.

                Of course, if Nintendo only needs access to their own serve

                • Of course, if Nintendo only needs access to their own servers, then you could probably just get their dongle thingy and run it.

                  Nintendo's USB Wi-Fi adapter works only with Windows XP, which in practice means it works only with PCs manufactured in January 2002 or later. If your PC is older than that, then it probably came with either Windows 2000 or Windows Millennium Edition, you need to buy an operating system upgrade. Sales of this upgrade subsidize the Xbox and Xbox 360 video game consoles, which co

        • Re:WPA Support (Score:1, Interesting)

          by Anonymous Coward
          So set up another insecure wireless network just for your DS. It's not hard. Nintendo chose not to support WPA for good reasons.

        • Re:WPA Support (Score:2, Interesting)

          by neumayr ( 819083 )
          How about a second base station? They're pretty cheap, especially if you only need 811.2b and WEP. Put it between your router and the modem and your network is pretty much secure - except against people wanting to use your uplink maybe.
      • Why should I need to reduce the security of my network just to use the DS? That's the annoying bit.
    • The hardware can't do WPA. At least not while playing a game at the same time.
    • Maybe more interesting, will it support login authentication systems (e.g. hotel wireless)? That's my biggest problem with the DS wifi support as it is. My campus network here at school requires a login to access... which means no Metroid Prime Hunters for me between classes.
      • If everything is tested correctly it shouldn't be a problem. Hotels usually have an open WIFI connection (no wep) that gives you a private IP but doesn't allow you to surf the net until you login via their local web page using a prepaid card or something. NDS should first connect to the hotspot and then open the login web page. The only problems may be login time-outs and pop-ups. Some PDAs have this problem.

        • Hotels usually have an open WIFI connection (no wep) that gives you a private IP but doesn't allow you to surf the net until you login via their local web page using a prepaid card or something. NDS should first connect to the hotspot and then open the login web page.

          But then you'd have to import a copy of Opera DS in order to display the web page.

          • No, you'd use Opera to activate the thing, and then you could switch to your favorite game and play away.

            • you'd use Opera to activate the thing

              Provided that Opera is made available for sale in your region at all.

              and then you could switch to your favorite game and play away.

              Unless the AP has some sort of timeout.

    • Re:WPA Support (Score:3, Interesting)

      by poot_rootbeer ( 188613 )
      will we still be forced to use WEP encryption?

      No one's forcing you -- you're free to use NO encryption instead.

      Anyway, my theory is that the DS's processors aren't powerful enough to do strong WPA encryption AND maintain a smooth multiplayer experience in a game like Mario Kart.

      In a web-browsing title, there will be more CPU cycles free to dedicate to encryption. It's not out of the realm of impossibility that WPA support will be included on selected titles.

      Not very convenient if you want to set-and-forget
    • Have your router keep logs, and check them regularly.

      If you notice someone's broken in, simply break in to THEIR computer over your wireless network and fill their harddrive with [animal]se and tub[woman]. Problem solved.

  • DS Browser In Action (video) (Score:3, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 03, 2006 @11:56AM (#15050706)
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ogWgYF3r4M [youtube.com]

    it's in japanese, but it's cool to see. not sure how youtube will handle /. but we'll find out.

  • Gaming implications? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by jomas1 ( 696853 ) on Monday April 03, 2006 @11:58AM (#15050724) Homepage
    There is a real chance that this browser can be more than a novelty and may open up even more games to the ds. Does no one else see this? If so I can't say that I've seen evidence on any of the video game review websites. Is there something about the ds opera browser that should not make it possible to play games like the ones on websudoku.com and http://dmoz.org/Games/Video_Games/Browser_Based/ [dmoz.org] ?
  • I just got a DS for my birthday.

    It seems like this might be one of those cases where havinly one of the 2 screens being touch sensitive might be a serious pain in the butt.
    • It's true that it could be annoying that only one screen is touch-sensitive, but it's still better than the PSP, which has *no* touch screen....
      • True. And I asked for a DS over a PSP because of the interesting stuff going on with it...though I still think it could REALLY use an analog nub type controller ala the PSP...it's funny how the Nintendo handhelds always lag one generation behind the systems games they could otherwise play, GBA could have used SNES' 4 buttons, DS could have used a N64-ish analog stick.
        • These things are broadly true, except I'm unsure about an N64-style analog stick. That would have required an entirelly different design for the DS, no matter how useful it'd be for Mario 64.

          I wasn't trying to turn it into yet another DS-vs-PSP thing, I only brought it up because the PSP also has a web browser that a good number of people seem to think is lacking. I don't know if Opera on the DS will be better, but the touch screen could make web browsing much easier. Some of the other obstacles to makin
          • Well it doesn have to be a full N64 stick, but I think some kind of nub should fit...

          • I'm unsure about an N64-style analog stick. That would have required an entirelly different design for the DS, no matter how useful it'd be for Mario 64.

            A pressure sensitive D-pad (as seen on the Dual Shock 2 controller) would probably have worked.

            • The control pad on the Dual Shock 2 is pressure-sensitive? Wow, I never suspected, I thought it was just the shoulder buttons.

              I learned something new today! Which games support this feature, would you happen to know?
        • But you are forgetting that the PSP lacks a second analog nub, which Sony itself invented (Dual Shock).

          That has hurted the platform a lot. FPS cannot have the same configuration as in the consoles due to this. At least, the analog should be in the right side instead of the left side, where is redundant.
          • Yeah, I guess you have to credit Sony for the second analog stick, though in most other ways they lead, not follow Nintendo in terms of controllers...the original PSX dogbone was just the SNES pad w/ 2 extra shoulder buttons and extended grips, w/ the dual shock they took the N64's rumble pack and analog stick and made both a bit better.

            You'd think the PSP would have room for a 2nd analog stick. It's like they're purposefully trying to keep things stripped down.

            You know, you could make a decent PDA out of a
  • As neat as it would be to browse the web on my DS, an app like this would only be worth a purchase if: 1. It stores pages for offline viewing. 2. It allows you to compose and view e-mails offline. I would totally get this if I could use it to tap out a few e-mails offline or download some RSS feeds and read them on the go. But otherwise, the time I'm most likely to encounter a wi-fi hotspot is when I'm at home with an actual computer. I imagine those two things are technically feasible, but since they ha
  • Once it is released, how do you aquire it and where does it get saved to?
    • Weird this showing up now...very old news, it was announced months ago. In any case...

      The browser has not been announced for the US yet, but when it is released in Japan this summer it will be sold alongside other DS software. Inside the box will be a standard DS cart with the browser, and a memory cart to go in the GBA slot to cache pages.

      It's going to be a great little device for checking e-mail and such (so long as you have webmail, as the browser will not support POP or other email protocols). I

      • Inside the box will be a standard DS cart with the browser, and a memory cart to go in the GBA slot to cache pages.

        That is pure rumor. This was talked about previously on /. and is the result of some fairly asinine wishful thinking. There has been no evidence to support this, and furthermore, it would be utterly unneccessary, as the DS cart has a good few magnitudes more memory storage capability than the GBA cart to begin with. Please, next time check your facts and name your sources if you're going to

    • Re:How? (Score:3, Informative)

      by Kelson ( 129150 ) *
      You'll buy a DS card [opera.com] and plug it in.
    • It is a regular DS cartridge.

  • Comment removed (Score:3, Funny)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Monday April 03, 2006 @01:13PM (#15051485)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • Anybody used DS Linux yet? I keep meaning to try it on mine. I'd love to make a DS distro that had, say, epiphany, kismet, nmap, and an irc client. That could be really useful...

    • Its still CLI-only at this point, but lynx runs at least :)

      Some day X will happen, but there are a few restriction on it that are annoying (no MMU, so no swap, only 4megs RAM on the DS, etc).

      Someone will probably get a /really/ lightweight X running eventually.
    • I'll start using it when it can write to my SD card. If it will ever be able to write to my SD card. Maybe I'll try it before that sometime for the browser though.

  • Opera Mini cell phone browser (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Is0m0rph ( 819726 ) on Monday April 03, 2006 @04:17PM (#15052961)
    After using the Opera Mini browser on my cell phone I'm sure they'll do a good version for the DS. There's really no comparison between the Opera cell phone browser and built in phone browsers. It's in another class.

  • Lies (Score:1)

    by dcapel ( 913969 )
    A DS web browser has been available for a long time now -- DSLinux runs lynx.

    Opera was too slow, so they are second. :)
  • I hope it supports Flash, but I wont hold my breath on that. I'd be kind of neat to make flash games for the DS.

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