Hello! In the next few days I'm going to buy my first flashcard for my 3ds. I've been reading about this gateway-bricking-3ds thing, and since every single post or news dates back to 2015, I was wondering if the bricking thing is still a major problem. By the way, what I'm intended to buy is the official gateway card, no clones, but I was worried of bricking my console even with the original card (I've heard of people getting their console bricked even with the official card). Thanks everyone!
Don't use Gateway. After you follow this guide you can have all the free games you want without buying a flashcart.
Yes, Gateway still has brick code in their launchers, and they've only gotten worse since they implemented it: they stole code for a9lh and called it their own invention.
Also, noob questions go here.
Yes, Gateway still has brick code in their launchers, and they've only gotten worse since they implemented it: they stole code for a9lh and called it their own invention.
Also, noob questions go here.
Last edited by Swiftloke,
At this point is best to skip Gateway altogether.
If you want a free but "slightly" complicated way to have free games on your 3DS go with a CFW (Luma 5.5 + A9LH is the favorite around here).
If all you want is a flashcard to plug and play games without all the hassle of hacking your system go with Sky3ds+
What firmware is your system by the way?
If you want a free but "slightly" complicated way to have free games on your 3DS go with a CFW (Luma 5.5 + A9LH is the favorite around here).
If all you want is a flashcard to plug and play games without all the hassle of hacking your system go with Sky3ds+
What firmware is your system by the way?
Last edited by Tony_93,
Thirds for "just CFW it" - since requirements to get a gateway working on your 3DS are same as being able to use CFW so... Just use CFW, save money, get loads of mountain dew or whatever. I have no opinion on Gateway personally just thinking in personal economics sense.
Gateway is becoming outdated, and the only good thing about them at this point is cheats, but even that is quickly becoming unnessary, as you can easily convert cheats for cfw. If you don't want to set up cfw or are on 11.0 and don't feel like getting a hardmod to downgrade, get a sky3ds+. Its almost plug and play, but be wary that multiplayer is a bit unsafe and they cost $80+
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No Gateway user has been bricked from the brick code since they fixed the bug that was causing the bricks shortly after they first introduced the brick code. Nowadays it's only bricking DSTWO+ users, so just don't get a DSTWO+ (or use SuperCard's "freegame" CFW with DSTWO+ which won't brick you)
Losing your warranty is the last thing you should be worried about, you'll only lose your warranty if they find out that you modded it, which will be hard since A9LH has brick protection so you can recover from any type of soft brick and a fully bricked console won't even boot so they won't be able to find out that you have A9LH installed on it, but if you're still worried about that, use menuhax + emuNAND so your system stays unmodified and all the hacks reside entirely on the SD card.
There's even less point in a Sky3DS+ than a Gateway, it costs more, does less, and is a hassle to use with the buttons, though admittedly that got a lot better with the + version where they added a second button so you don't have to cycle through the entire list to go backwards.
At this point the best is to just stick with CFW which doesn't cost you a thing, and use tools like tikShop or encTitleKeysUpdater + FreeShop to get your games easily.
Last edited by The Real Jdbye,
Above post is right; CFW is far more versatile than Sky3DS and cheaper to do. You only need one big SD card instead of two; online play will be 99% a-OK, updates now are more likely to block sky3DS before CFW's tho do not go quoting me on that. Sky3DS is very limited to use and to make online play work with it you'd still need a CFW so - just CFW and you will be good to go online, can use some fantastic CIA homebrews too; like Quake on 3DS and stuff, custom themes and all of homebrew tommfoolery since CFW with a CIA homebrew channel launcher is far more future proof than relying on shaky situation homebrew access with other methods is in.
I modded my 3DS the week news of first downgrade news happened. Aside the 200+ attempts to get the HAX init to init correctly on N3DS of mine; The world has been my oyster ever since; I kept buying games even from eShop, cartridges and everything.
Also CFW is only way to enjoy Virtual Console Injects, especially GBA injects which are fantastic on 3DS. DSi ware is other thing you NEED cfw to install and run with.
Warrantly really is nothing, if your console has not melted yet, changes with nintendo product is that only thing that will melt it is something warranty would deem your fault anyway. Small time stuff is easily self repaired too so, no big time worry on that front.
Kinda surprised no one asked this, but what is your current firmware version?
If you are on 11.0.0-33 you will either need a friend with a hacked console who is willing to help you do the DSiWare downgrade hack (it's not the simplest hack in the world), or get a hardmod installed to allow the physical dumping/flashing of the NAND chip.
You can follow plailect's cuide and use tour gw with other cfw like luma 
i use this combination LUMA forma gba games and gateway for 3ds games
i use this combination LUMA forma gba games and gateway for 3ds games
Luma3ds is pretty much the only option. I recommend (and probably most other people who would respond to this) to follow https://github.com/Plailect/Guide/wiki/ this guide to where it has you inject fbi into health and safety (its the beginning of part 4 iirc.) This will have you running luma3ds as a cfw, with a cia installer over health and safety. A9lh itself can be considered optional, read ahead, decide if it is worth setting up. I will tell you this though: you will not have to worry about emunand as there is complete brick protection built into the console with a9lh, and the ability to update without worrying.
They stated they were on 10.7
You'll lose your warranty if you use a flashcard too. Just go for installing Luma and A9LH using that guide linked above.
They never claimed to have invented it. Regarding this, the worst they're guilty of is not following one of the requirements of the GPL license (which only applies if they used existing code instead of using concepts).
And this is probably the least legal illegal thing that's done, seeing that there's copyrighted Nintendo material in their launcher. Some CFW devs aren't any better about that. The luma wiki and Plailect's guide both directly link to Nintendo cia files.
While this statement is true, Nintendo would have a much harder time proving a Sky 3DS was used compared to A9LH CFW.
Last edited by evandixon,
Considering the lengths they have gone to (and are still going to) in order to fuck over people who buy products that use parts of their own code its pretty fucking shitty of them to not only fail to acknowledge the existing credit for A9LH, but also intentionally word their updates as if to suggest that they are responsible for the exploit. They may not directly claim to have discovered/developed it, but things like renaming it to "Gateway Fastboot" lead directly to less informed individuals assuming that it is 100% their product.
After they called it arm9loaderhax or whatever they said the first time*
Either way, gateway isn't a moral compass, and people should just let them die. They had their time in the past.
Yeah, just like how ShadowHand calls his implementation ShadowNAND. The only difference is that ShadowNAND says "forked from dark-samus/arm9loaderhax". If Gateway used dark-samus's code, they technically have to do something like that too, but my point is that they're already doing much worse by including copyrighted Nintendo files.
- No one is chatting at the moment.
