I've been away for a while and could use some updates.

[Rydian]

So I haven't been around for months, due to a lack of a home internet connection.
So I'd like to know what sort of things I missed...

3DS
1 - Did Gateway ever update the firmware compability?
2 - Am I correct in seeing that it's still just one ROM per?
3 - Does the gateway support recent 3DS games or only the older ones? What's the cutoff?
4 - Have any other working carts come out that are better or at least the same and cheaper?
5 - I read mention of homebrew, yay? What's the basic gist of that?

DS
1 - Have any of the DS flash carts dropped another model version in terms of firmware compatibility?
2 - I see that TempGBA updated, any other major emulator updates of note?

Vita
1 - What's the current situation on the Vita's firmware hackability? I've been getting e-mails from Wololo's forums every so often with release info but haven't done any actual reading.
2 - Can the hacks do more things now or is it still PSP-style homebrew?

PSP
1 - Has anything interesting happened or is the PSP frozen in time still?

Wii
1 - I see that the compatibility of Nintendont is still growing pretty slowly. Has anything else relating to GC loading improved?
2 - Anything major to take note of or is it still dying slowly?


And of course if anything amazing happened with other systems (as far as ROM/ISo running and hacking) I'd like to know too!

 

[WiiUBricker]

Regarding Gateway, basically they put bricking code in their firmware 2.0b2 that will brick your 3DS if you modify the launcher.dat in any way. Their reasoning for this is to prevent clone makers from ripping them off. There have also been reports of bricked 3DSes with untouched launcher.dats. Gateway is often referred as brickway. There is a thread for this somewhere here.

 

[Qtis]

So I haven't been around for months, due to a lack of a home internet connection.
So I'd like to know what sort of things I missed...

3DS
1 - Did Gateway ever update the firmware compability?
Nope
2 - Am I correct in seeing that it's still just one ROM per?
Beta firmware adds multirom support, at least in the videos (correct me if I'm wrong). Beta firmwares can cause bricking though (Devin had his 3DS bricked).
3 - Does the gateway support recent 3DS games or only the older ones? What's the cutoff?
Gateway and other 3DS flashcarts support most games except a few with a NAND save type. In other words, Pokemon X/Y and Animal Crossing.
4 - Have any other working carts come out that are better or at least the same and cheaper?
A ton, see Ryu's post on the matter
5 - I read mention of homebrew, yay? What's the basic gist of that?
Unreleased, but has the same requirements as all others, i.e. 4.5 or lower firmware.

DS
1 - Have any of the DS flash carts dropped another model version in terms of firmware compatibility?
Probably. Most add new carts for new firmwares. DSTwo is still going strong.
2 - I see that TempGBA updated, any other major emulator updates of note?
Not that I know, but I could be wrong.

Vita
1 - What's the current situation on the Vita's firmware hackability? I've been getting e-mails from Wololo's forums every so often with release info but haven't done any actual reading.
Dualboot firmware has been done with proof-of-concept, but nothing released yet. PSP side hacked with game exploits, but nothing on the PSVita front.
2 - Can the hacks do more things now or is it still PSP-style homebrew?
PSP related mostly. Still you're better off using a PSP to run the PSP homebrew, since the PSPs are dirt cheap and hacking a PSVita means losing PSN.

PSP
1 - Has anything interesting happened or is the PSP frozen in time still?
PSVita compatibility.

And of course if anything amazing happened with other systems (as far as ROM/ISo running and hacking) I'd like to know too!

Added comments. Can't say much about the Wii section, since I haven't really had a chance to dig into it due to time constraints.

The main point now in regards to your questions is keeping a 3DS/3DS XL at 4.5 or lower. Some say it could be the PS3 3.55 for the 3DS.

 

[Tom Bombadildo]

Vita
1 - What's the current situation on the Vita's firmware hackability? I've been getting e-mails from Wololo's forums every so often with release info but haven't done any actual reading.
2 - Can the hacks do more things now or is it still PSP-style homebrew?

PSP
1 - Has anything interesting happened or is the PSP frozen in time still?

Vita
1 - There have been quite a few exploit games released for the newest firmware, IIRC there's been 3 or 4 now for version 3.01 (which, at the moment, is the latest).
2 - The hacks are still PSP-Mode only, however the exploit on 3.01 has access to 64MB of RAM instead of 32MB, unlike the previous exploits (sans 1 or 2). I'm not sure if this was also available beforehand, but PSP ISOs are now playable, and PSX2PSP games are also playable however they don't have any audio.
3 - An extra here, there have been a couple interesting things hardware wise. Yifan-Lu has dumped the NAND of the Vita, and has been dicking around with the hardware for it. Katsu has developed a dual-firmware boot prototype, and it may be possible to downgrade the Vita similar to how Gateway has emuNAND. Katsu also developed an HDMI output mod, and has dumped Vita Cartridges as well.
4 - It should also be noted that the Vita Slim has finally been announced for EU and US, and will be sold this spring bundled with Borderlands 2 (there should be a thread on this in the Vita section somewhere, it's quite recent)

PSP
1 - Nothing new on the PSP front