Nokia shows off SNES on N900, quickly thinks better of it

A little bit of emulation is a basic rite of passage for a modern day device that allows open software development, and the N900 is no different. We first saw the device rocking some SNES way back in September, but apparently Nokia couldn't pass up an opportunity to demonstrate the phone's prowess and put up its own video of a few emulators in action. Unfortunately, while emulators are completely legal, the ROMs that run on them are rarely legit, and despite Nokia's odd assertion in the video that "most publishers allow individual title usage provided that the user is in possession of the original title," the phone giant has since pulled the video from the internets, and Nintendo is reportedly looking into the matter. Of course, N900 emulatin' is still easy to come by from third parties -- check one out after the break.

[Thanks, Nirvan]

[legendemeritus Posted Nov 28th 2009 6:24PM]

@Malkmus
this emulator will not go gentle into that good night...

[bstock Posted Nov 29th 2009 12:09AM]

@Malkmus
At least with Maemo, being an open platform, all you need is the .deb file and you can install it from file.

[mrx001 Posted Nov 28th 2009 3:42PM]

How well does it run Super Metroid and Castlevania X.Can it run games full or near full speed?

[TheGZeus Posted Nov 28th 2009 4:52PM]

Just buy the cartridge.
Tada~! Fair use.

[eule Posted Nov 28th 2009 5:10PM]

Just buy a Dingoo.
Tada~! Fair gaming.

[elamre Posted Nov 28th 2009 5:54PM]

and if u guys would google some moar, you'll have found out that you can connect ur wiimote to teh ipod -.-
cannot do very much atm, but you can turn it! :3

[ProduktionModal Posted Nov 28th 2009 6:17PM]

So sick of game companies being tight asses about roms. It's not as if Nintendo is losing money on Super Mario World by Nokia using a rom. Once the game is out of production, who the hell cares? Keep selling the game or shut up and let people enjoy it. It's not hurting your bottom line.

[nate345 Posted Nov 28th 2009 8:08PM]

@ProduktionModal
Actually, Nintendo does sell super mario world on the Wii.

[Shaun Ryan Posted Nov 28th 2009 8:18PM]

@ProduktionModal
Nintendo still sells SNES games on the Wii Virtual Console. Not that I agree with their tight-assery, but they do still make money off SMW.

[jayy337 Posted Nov 28th 2009 7:14PM]

i play ROMs on my Motorola Cliq.

does anyone know where i can get THIS version of Super Mario World? the one i had is extremely short, and honestly pretty bootleg lol.

[Killahhops Posted Nov 28th 2009 7:21PM]

wish i had one...

[Scape3d Posted Nov 28th 2009 7:47PM]

I know the Pre is capable of this but when can we expect this to happen? Does it all depend on the GPU being opened and available?

[Eternity Posted Nov 28th 2009 8:44PM]

Who's bright idea was this? These are unspoken things you aren't supposed to brag about. Bloody hell! Is it true it has been removed from the repositories? Now I must hack my "open" device to get retro gaming???? What has the world come to? It's bloody linux for Pete's sake. Someone should make a Hitler video on youtube about this.

[Munk Posted Nov 29th 2009 2:51AM]

@Eternity Yeah it was a bad move. But only the Roms have been removed (some other nintendo images maybe) from the official channels. The emulators still there and im sure there will be sites + rapidshare/torrents that will allow you to dl the roms and run em on the n900....just a few extra steps.

[Eternity Posted Nov 29th 2009 11:22AM]

Roms is really pushing it, those shouldn't be there... but definitely the emus should be able to be installed without any hacking or jumping through hoops on the default repositories.

[allen Posted Nov 29th 2009 7:12PM]

@Munk There was no Roms on the repository.
Theres no need to hack the device, its completely open. Get the installable .deb (like an exe) files, install to device. Download Rom through normal shady service/back up your own.

[Hydra Posted Nov 28th 2009 8:53PM]

Please give it the tmobile and att 3g radios, and its a done deal, I will hand over my money

[phreck Posted Nov 29th 2009 12:08AM]

it is true, i just verified that it has been removed from the extras-devel repo........ son of a bitch.

however, nes/gb/gba/sega emus live on in the repos. weirdness.

[Satz Posted Nov 29th 2009 12:56AM]

Phone part of N900 is not good,
GPS is below average
email is not so great
cant say its bug free..
interesting article
http://www.themaemo.com/and-now-for-something-completely-different-the-n900-and-its-killer-feature/

[Munk Posted Nov 29th 2009 2:54AM]

@Satz Way to promote your website! :P.

The company never targeted it to be a mainstream/killer device. Its step 4/5 according to them and meant for developers/enthusiasts and beta testers. Even at this early stage it is matching other, more mature platforms in functionality. With time it will get the polish and hopefully compete better than right now :).

[Didou Posted Nov 29th 2009 4:42AM]

It reminds me of an official video demonstration for a CD burner (I forgot the brand) where the presenter showed how to download music off Napster & then burn an Audio-CD with them. Good times. ;-)

I'm sure if I look hard enough I could still find it.

[isotrex Posted Nov 29th 2009 9:34AM]

I like the part where you can just use the wiimote in control the game. Pretty neat, it should solve the keypad problem on games.

[n1hmrd Posted Nov 29th 2009 2:30PM]

spot On!

[Joshua Przygocki Posted Nov 29th 2009 3:37PM]

BABIES!!!11!

[fanboykiller Posted Nov 29th 2009 8:20PM]

I can do that with my 3 year old Nokia e61i