Artic Base, an open source tool for broadcasting games from your Nintendo 3DS to an emulator, has been released! Artic Base allows playing your owned collection of 3DS games, physical or digital, on a compatible emulator without having to dump them first. Furthermore, the tool syncs the save data, so you can resume your progress at any time from the console. Below is the list of features this tool provides, coming from the Artic Base Server github repository.

Features​

• Play games from your console without having to dump them.
• Sync the savedata/extdata of the broadcasted game during the play session.
• Load shared ext data and NCCH archives from your console.
• Remove the need to dump AES keys, as the decryption is done by the console's OS.

Advantages over playing on real console​

• Play your games at higher resolutions.
• Use external controllers that may better fit your playstyle.
• Switch between playing on your PC at home and your console on the go.
• Reduce e-waste by reusing partially broken consoles to broadcast your games to your PC.
• Allow museums or non-profit game preservation organizations to have a centralised database of preserved games, while using an Artic Base Server + a compatible emulator to do research as needed.

As the tool author claims, Artic Base aims to help players enjoy their collection of Nintendo 3DS games with several advantages, such as being able to play at higher resolutions, switch between playing on a 3DS on the go and and a PC at home, and using their preferred external controllers. Furthermore, it helps reducing e-waste by allowing the use of partially broken consoles to act as a server instead of having to toss/replace them. The tool also removes the need of having to deal with classic emulator shenenigans, such as having to dump games or getting cryptographic keys. Keep in mind however that due to the network speed of the 3DS, slower loading times may be experienced.

At the time of writing, the only emulator supporting Artic Base is a forked version of the former 3DS emulator Citra, maintained by PabloMK7.

A demonstration of Artic Base was posted to PabloMK7's YouTube channel a few days ago, showcasing Shovel Knight being broadcasted to a PC.

​

What do you think? Will you do another playthrough of your collected 3DS games using this tool? Leave your thoughts in the replies!

Artic Base Server (3DS application)
PabloMK7's Citra fork with Artic Base support

 

[MinusKid]

This is an absolutely amazing piece of software. I wish people would talk about it more. 3DS emulation is amazing but if I wanted to play from the TV from my bed, the touch screen controls would be weird. So I find it awesome that I can use the 3DS Controls and touch screen for it. Really amazing software.

 

[sonic1000]

Anyway to use this with LayeredFS and DLC?

 

[HinaNaru Cutie]

It won't work with screen casting. You have to install the app on Android TV/Google TV by sideloading.

No idea if the Linux version will even work on ARM, Android version should work in Switchroot Android, but may run slowly.

um... soo i downloaded linux on my switch got it to work did the jimmy route and got citra up on it.. annd atric base surprisingly runs not joshing here it legit runs i am actually surprised, however... i have no idea how to set this sucker up at all on my switch - not the same as the pc so difference is real :c i would like help but i dont know if anyone has set up citra and found a good stable like settings for it on switch.

without knowing how to properly get the settings for it the game streams in laggy and the audio is like a choppy boot leg audio song from the 2000's lol. but yeah its bad.. but did kind of manage to lower it a little bit down when i messed with the graphics and kept it plain.. from what i know it can handle. thats it. i left the settings alone after trying to do it alone, puttung it defeault to just messing with one thing and its working kind of better than before but not playable better it still has lag and audio lag but not super heavy.

 

[HinaNaru Cutie]

um okay.. so i went off and ditched the linux because i realized, more so, remebered late that i can just screen mirror my phone on my console without a problem, so that allows me to stream articbase onto the citra on mobile android.. see it works fine but i dont know if this is normal?? but i tried opengl and volkan and opengl works horrible, had to try it first for i can see if maybe i gotta swap between main effects to fix the issue but it didnt.

anyway my issue i have is when i am about to see the opening cut scene animation for the game professor layton vs phoenix wright game it lags.. like skips than the audio is jacked like it would lag to and play than do the same process. is this normal? cause once i skip, sadly, the opening scene the game plays fine, however it does the same lag audio when it gets to a scene where a character is speaking - no cut scene just ingame. i have no idea why this is happening

edit: umm yeah this artic base or maybe its the citra android build?? is making the whole touch screen not work at all, like i tried to play theaterhym final fantasy and it refused to work on the touch screen part. i chose the 3ds to be my controller on my phone and it just does not want to work at all properly.

 

[Richmountain112]

CTGP-7 doesn't work with Arctic Base

 

[Datbo]

Is there an easy way to disable artic base. I want to check out my activity log but it just crashes now'

 

[Agent8]

Can you use Romfs mods with this?

 

[Sundree]

Apologies for necroposting, but I just want to add that this software is the entire reason why I got back into playing games on my 3ds.

I've also been wanting to record footage from my 3ds for years too, but haven't been able to due to the current state of 3ds capture stuff. Only downside I've come across is long load times and half-second freezes every once in a while, but that's a small price to pay for what ArticBase currently offers.

 

[FanNintendo]

I updated my Luma3DS v13.2.1 and updated citra 240927 also updated the artic base v1.2.0 now my 3ds not waiting for citra connect. When I press A to launch Artic base it go back to title screen and citra not finding connection.

 

[PabloMK7]

I updated my Luma3DS v13.2.1 and updated citra 240927 also updated the artic base v1.2.0 now my 3ds not waiting for citra connect. When I press A to launch Artic base it go back to title screen and citra not finding connection.

Not sure what you mean, go back to title screen? What title screen?

 

[FanNintendo]

Not sure what you mean, go back to title screen? What title screen?

Everything working fine now the address connect was was wrong and my wifi connection isnt good right sometime. Thanks for checking with me and the updates are getting better.