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Portables (Games) Entertainment Games

Nintendo Pokemon Mini LCD Game Hacked 179

Posted by simoniker from the home-mini-brew dept.
Team Pokeme writes "Nintendo's Pokemon Mini LCD mini-handheld has been hacked by us - you can check out the videos on our site for more information. The cartridge pinout has been reverse engineered by using logic analyzers (thanks to DarkFader), and also the instruction set by disassembling (thanks DaveX!) the Pokemon Mini emulator that is built into Pokemon Channel, a GameCube game. DaveX wrote the first homebrew game, SokoMini, after finding out the tilemap stuff."
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Nintendo Pokemon Mini LCD Game Hacked More

Nintendo Pokemon Mini LCD Game Hacked

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  • P-M Site's in Japanese. (Plus it would be helpful to let others know before the /. effect)

    • Basically, it's a portable game console - er, a cheap toy for really small kids who aren't old enough to be trusted a real Game Boy. Has bright colored plastic, lo-rez display, d-pad and two buttons, and IR port. It uses cartridges.

  • But at the end of the day... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Tezkah ( 771144 ) on Sunday June 06, 2004 @07:46PM (#9353194)
    ... you realize that you spent your time hacking *pokemon minis*.

    • Re:But at the end of the day... (Score:5, Funny)

      by Raven42rac ( 448205 ) * on Sunday June 06, 2004 @08:20PM (#9353367)
      Why not hack a Pokemon mini, everyone has to start somewhere, not everyone starts out hacking Crays and Beowulf clusters. Speaking of, here is the obligatory "imagine a Beowulf cluster of these".
    • I think your only allowed to say that if you've got the know how to analize timing patterns to figure out pinouts and then reverse engineer the rest of it. I doubt that's a walk in the park.

    • Re:But at the end of the day... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by John Starks ( 763249 ) on Sunday June 06, 2004 @11:07PM (#9354036)
      I'm a little annoyed by the attitude here. This is a pretty impressive reverse engineering job, but most of Slashdot is just laughing it off because the device was originally created for Pokemon related games.

      I mean, I doubt any of the mad PHP coderz around here could do anything these guys just did. I know I couldn't.

      Really, give them some credit.

      (Cue posts saying "man, it was a joke.")
      • man, it was a joke. ;)
    • Yeah, why haven't they gotten to work on the game.com [vidgame.net] yet? I mean, jeez.

      Seriously, though, there used to be this great (so far as Tiger video game web sites go) with videos from game.com games, all sped up so the system wouldn't look so bad. I guess if you can hack a Pokemon mini-game, you can hack anything.

  • Hacked? (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 06, 2004 @07:48PM (#9353201)
    Cool! I always wanted to play Pokemon vs Street Fighter.

  • looks pretty cool.. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by dave1212 ( 652688 ) * on Sunday June 06, 2004 @07:48PM (#9353203) Homepage
    I checked the videos, it seems like an interesting idea, but also somewhat confusing. How many games were on it at one time, and what all can you play on it now?

    Nice site, btw.

  • Shout-outs (Score:5, Funny)

    by iswm ( 727826 ) on Sunday June 06, 2004 @07:48PM (#9353205) Homepage
    Something about the 'shout-outs' in this article that keeps me from taking it a bit more seriously.

  • The real questions is... (Score:5, Funny)

    by iserlohn ( 49556 ) on Sunday June 06, 2004 @07:49PM (#9353209) Homepage
    Can NetBSD run on it yet? :)

  • Awesome... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by herrvinny ( 698679 ) on Sunday June 06, 2004 @07:50PM (#9353210)
    Definitely going to try this stuff out. I'm a what people would call a Pokemon fanatic [slashdot.org], have all the Pokemon Game Boy, GameCube and Nintendo 64 games (and occasionally duplicates of the same cartridge ;-) ), with all of them beat. (Okay, ladies and gentlemen, start your jokes).

    But anyway, this looks _extremely_ nice, this might be useful as a screen to display quick stats on a server, or just as a game platform. Again, very nice job.

    • Re:Awesome... (Score:5, Funny)

      by Quarters ( 18322 ) on Sunday June 06, 2004 @07:53PM (#9353225)
      (Okay, ladies...)

      Um...well, I guess I can respect your optimism.

    • Re:Awesome... (Score:3, Insightful)

      by aurispector ( 530273 )
      Well, hacking a little box like this isn't (to me) particularly interesting. It does make me think that in 5 years or so, when your cell phone is also your camera, pda, MP3 player, portable wireless broadband storage device, etc., and Microsoft, the RIAA, etc. have bribed congress to allow them to hard-wire draconian DRM into a device that no sane person would want to live without, some nerd somewhere will figure out how to hack it.

      Warms my heart.

  • Improvement! (Score:5, Funny)

    by xsupergr0verx ( 758121 ) on Sunday June 06, 2004 @07:54PM (#9353230)
    Maybe they are hacking it to make the game fun?
    Otherwise, I am impressed that a team of 8 year old girls had the know-how to hack their toys.
    /sarcasm
    • "Maybe they are hacking it to make the game fun? "

      Sorry, we're talking about the Pokemon Mini here, not the Ngage.

      (Which one do you folks think has sold more?)

  • Logic Analyzer (Score:2, Funny)

    by AlgUSF ( 238240 )
    Now that you are done with the LA, could I take it off your hands for $100? :-)

  • Chatbox (Score:2, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Check out the chatbox on the right:

    @ p0p: mhhh, taking the videos offline until that slashdot flood is over..maybe we survive one more day then :-(

    I'm guessing they'll be taking the chatbox down too, to begin with. Maybe even the whole server :)

  • 1MB Max Cartridge Size (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Dan East ( 318230 ) on Sunday June 06, 2004 @08:08PM (#9353306) Journal
    Looking at the pinout to the cartridge, it appears up to 1 MB is addressable.

    The address bus is 10 bits, selectable to represent the high or low byte of the address.

    2 ^ 20 = 1048576 bytes

    Not too shabby.

    (Well, I tried to post the pinout since their website is responding very slowly, but Slashdot wouldn't accept it - "Lameness filter encountered. Post aborted! Reason: Please use fewer 'junk' characters.")

    Dan East
  • ...Server dead. After, what, 24 comments?

  • pokemon (Score:3, Funny)

    by ogewo ( 652234 ) on Sunday June 06, 2004 @08:10PM (#9353315)
    pretty hardcore...i'll be sure to tell my eight year old brother that he'll probably have pong on his pokemon mini

  • oo (Score:4, Funny)

    by mattyrobinson69 ( 751521 ) on Sunday June 06, 2004 @08:11PM (#9353320)
    port linux to it
    port bochs86 to it
    run windown on it
    play the windows version at an astonishingly bad fps/resolution

  • hmm (Score:3, Informative)

    by spamchang ( 302052 ) on Sunday June 06, 2004 @08:13PM (#9353338) Journal
    the site looks /.'ed. anyone got a mirror?

    looks like the sort of project a less than legally-conscious prof might have handed to me in digital systems classes this year =P

    • Re:hmm (Score:5, Funny)

      by fpga_guy ( 753888 ) on Sunday June 06, 2004 @08:34PM (#9353420)
      the site looks /.'ed. anyone got a mirror?

      This is starting to shit me - I'm all for shameless self-promotion [uq.edu.au] but goddammit make sure you've got a server that will last more than 10 seconds!

      Can I also please make the Ob/. joke that the page is clearly being hosted on the pokemon-mini they've hacked?

    • It appears that if you directly go to /index.php instead of just the main index.page, the site is still up.

      PokeMe main page [shizzle.it]

    • less than legally-conscious prof

      What makes you think there's anything "less than legal" about it?

      -

  • Call me crazy... (Score:4, Funny)

    by gertsenl ( 719370 ) on Sunday June 06, 2004 @08:18PM (#9353357)
    ... but isn't this a violation of the DMCA? And isn't /. in violation for posting it? And aren't we in violation for reading it?

    DAMN YOU, I'M A WANTED MAN! ::runs and hides under bed::

  • another site slashdotted (Score:4, Informative)

    by tearmeapart ( 674637 ) on Sunday June 06, 2004 @08:30PM (#9353404) Homepage Journal
    caches: index [64.233.167.104] gallery [64.233.167.104] links [64.233.167.104] projects [64.233.167.104] Please note these links are not very thorough, but the site is not either. Please also note the "@ Safrax: HI SLASHDOT" and "@ Poo Poo Head: Slashdot can suck my ******" on the right panel.

  • Nutty base for a HUD (Score:5, Funny)

    by vik ( 17857 ) on Sunday June 06, 2004 @08:33PM (#9353416) Homepage Journal
    And who is going to be the first sad person to use this as a basis for a wearable head-mounted display then?

    Vik :v)

  • IRC Channel (Score:4, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 06, 2004 @08:40PM (#9353453)
    For those that care.

    #pmdev on EFnet

  • What the heck (Score:4, Funny)

    by pcmanjon ( 735165 ) on Sunday June 06, 2004 @09:01PM (#9353531)
    1) post your website on slashdot to boast it
    2) change your website to "bah come back later"
    3) everyone who wants to see the page from slashdot doesn't get to due to said message, thus defeating the purpose of being posted on slashdot
    4) ????????
    5) profit!!!

  • Down for the count (Score:3, Funny)

    by __aafkqj3628 ( 596165 ) on Sunday June 06, 2004 @09:07PM (#9353559)
    What a great idea! Plug your own site on slashdot, when you have no idea what you're in for.
  • does it allow for pokemon slash?

    (this post is just a shill to call attention to my related, yet ancient sig)
    • Pokemon slashdot effect? Sure!
      There's a special adapter that lets you plugs the the cartridge port directly into a wall socket!

      -

  • Cards! (Score:1, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I only have Pokemon cards, you insensitive clod!

    (first edition too, muhahah....let the kids tear theirs up...mine are sleeved and waiting for them to enter the prime earner years...ok I'm lame)

    Guess I should have sold both Charizard cards when it was up to $900 on eBay...wonder who bought that? I bought mine at the comic store when they came out, since I was so into CCG cards at the time.

  • Next to put clustering GNU/Linux on there... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Yaa 101 ( 664725 ) on Sunday June 06, 2004 @09:50PM (#9353715) Journal
    So we can have a pokemon mini beowulf funfest...

  • Why's everyone dissing on Pokemon...? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Bryan Gividen ( 739949 ) on Sunday June 06, 2004 @10:10PM (#9353800)
    Ouch, seriously, ouch.

    So I was about 12 when Pokemon Red/Blue came out. It was the driving force behind me learning how to build better webpages. And for a lot, the communities online turned into mini-hacking projects. It introduced kids to how to break open coding in a game and search for things. I friggin scanned the stripped coding along with tons of others who wanted to know how it worked. From there, tons of kids began to learn some variable formulas and indepth logics from the second set of games that led to new projects.

    I agree, its a fad, but for some of us, it was our segway into learning more about technology, programming, and how to pick up women...

    Okay, maybe not the last one, but the other two stand.
  • I always had a real issue with the whole Pokemon concept, especially in its animated incarnation. I mean, essentially what we have is kids training their "animals" to beat the crap outta each other with various attacks. How is this crap different than training pit bulls to rip each other apart, or roosters to kill each other?
    • I always had a real issue with the whole Pokemon concept, especially in its animated incarnation. I mean, essentially what we have is kids training their "animals" to beat the crap outta each other with various attacks. How is this crap different than training pit bulls to rip each other apart, or roosters to kill each other?

      Well, umm, it's maybe different in that, umm, IT'S NOT REAL!!! Much better that the kiddies run around digitally fragging, maiming, blah blah blah than doing it for real, no?

    • Because I am actually training small yellow mice and large fire-breathing dragons to make each other faint.

      I know, it's not quite as dramatic as your post.
    • C'mon, Pokemon teaches kids a valuable lesson about the moral ambiguity of our world. The heros and the villains are exactly the same, the only way to tell Ash & friends apart from Team Rocket is that you are TOLD that Ash is the good guy. If you can't see the profundity in that then I don't know what to say...
    • How is this crap different than training pit bulls to rip each other apart, or roosters to kill each other?

      Well, for one, it's animated. Do you also suggest we pull all drama revolving around murder or drugs?

      If your kids learn how to behave from afternoon television, I suggest you consider that parenting may be the real problem.

  • Hack the Leap Pad (Score:4, Insightful)

    by PetoskeyGuy ( 648788 ) on Sunday June 06, 2004 @10:39PM (#9353938)
    If only someone would come up with a way to hack the Leap Pad or a similar device. I really like how durable the things are, they can take a beating, but the books for it just suck. Most books seem one step removed from the "Mattel and Mars Bar Quick Energy Chocobot Hour".

    I would like to put my own lessons into it. Printing pages, recording, would all be fun. I don't see any other really durable hardware for kids that can be expanded. A 4 year old can do a lot of damage to things.
    • I dont know about the durability. My five year old has worn out the catridge port which on inspection seems poorly designed. But, hacking it never occurred to me before. That would be interesting indeed...
      • It would be nice to have the specs. Imagine something like the LeapPad with a basic compact flash interface. A cheap 8 MB chip would easily store enough for a good book. Plus it could be improved upon by others.

        It seems like a simple enough device, only audio responses to certain trigger areas, with a little occasional logic in there for games and variety. I know we'll probably be getting the bigger one soon, I guess maybe I'll keep the old one to play with myself. :)

  • summer project? (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Jicksta ( 760596 )
    Yeah. I'm too impatient to wait for their servers to be back online, so I'm asking anyway...

    Do we ("we" as in just about everyone not mentioned in the article) get the benefit of a tutorial or perhaps a just few elaborate hints on how to do this ourselves?

    If nothing explaining how to do this was/is ever written, there is absolutely no point in slashdotting this.

    On the other hand, if a tutorial is available, I'd love to get started on it. It'd certainly make a great summer project and even a great g

  • If you actually want one..... (Score:3, Informative)

    by Akai ( 11434 ) on Monday June 07, 2004 @03:38AM (#9354713) Homepage Journal
    I found the "Deluxe" package (with three games) for $9.95 at Pokemoncenter.com.

    The "Blue mini' (I did a search for "mini") is priced at $9.95 for both the regular and the "deluxe" package, where the other colors still want about $30 for the deluxe.

    For shits and grins I put in an order, we'll see if they honor the $10 price....

  • I don't know why some ./ers are whining about this hack. We are here because we're geeks and hackers, right? The fact that someone has used their brainpower to create a cool hack should be commended, not derided!

    Speaking of which, if I had these folks' technical savvy, I would have immediately bought Sony's Librie eBook, and hacked the hell out of it until I could put my own content in it! (Please, please, someone hack it!!) ;-)

  • Reverse engineering stuff like this is cool, but emulators are so common. When am I going to be able to buy these ROMs as a cart?
  • Mmm, Snorlax, my favourite Pokemon :-)

    A big lump who likes sleeping. Not that that reminds me of anyone...

  • Site working now (Score:2, Informative)

    by hattig ( 47930 )
    Looks like this device is a simple portable game console, which is pretty neat.

    24x16 tile graphics (each tile is 4 by 4 pixels, looks like 3 level greyscale) leads to a 96x64 resolution. It probably has 4x4 pixel sprites as well. All in all, probably a cut down Gameboy

    4MHz CPU, most likely 8-bit but this type of information wasn't on the webpage and I'm not downloading the assember packages to find out. Not much else online either about this device.

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