Play Famicom games on your DS Lite with 'Familator'

29 Comments by Scott Jon Siegel Nov 26th 2007 2:00PM
Filed under: Nintendo DS, Portable, Retro, Peripherals

Hideous name, and less-than-hideous hardware. CYBER Gadget's "Familator Lite" plugs into a DS Lite's GBA slot, allowing users to insert their Famicom cartridges and re-live their favorite Nintendo classics in portable form.

Would rather re-live the classics on television? The device allows for TV out. Would rather play with the original Famicom controllers? Well... the device doesn't do that, actually. But it does that other stuff!

The Familator Lite is due out in Japan in December, but no price has been set. Sadly, the device's form factor means it's only compatible with the DS Lite, and not its phatter older brother.

[Via DS Fanboy]

Tags: ds, ds-lite, dslite, famicom, familator

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(Page 1) Reader Comments

Jerk Face: Nov 26th 2007; 2:02PM

That's neat.

rv: Nov 26th 2007; 2:31PM

Prepare to be familated!

megapenguinx: Nov 26th 2007; 9:55PM

Oh god now you're gonna die

Geist: Nov 26th 2007; 11:19PM

Damn you rv, that's the first thing I thought when I saw the name.

Fernando Rocker: Nov 26th 2007; 2:11PM

At first I tought it was a DS Phat... but... Is there a silver DS Lite in Japan?

Looks nice...

Kassu: Nov 26th 2007; 2:14PM

In Europe too.
Too bad that it costs 2x as much in Europe than it does in the US. I ordered my DSL from the states, but no silver for mw now...

Kassu: Nov 26th 2007; 2:16PM

For me*
Yet again - Typos suck.

This...thing. I'd rather just use *Piracy*

ShortFuse: Nov 26th 2007; 2:18PM

I think there was a FF3 Limited Edition in silver. That might be it.
I imported a black one when it launched in Europe for $70 extra. I just didn't like the white ones in the US. I don't know why Ninty likes to do region specific colors. :(

dsub: Nov 26th 2007; 2:17PM

anyone know if this will work with US NES games?

Crono (NDF - Knight of the Old School): Nov 26th 2007; 2:44PM

No, the famicom connection is a different size than the US NES connection. In fact, the original Super Mario Brothers cartridge has the Japanese famicom board inside with an adaptor to play in the NES.

Unfortunately, it doesn't work in the opposite direction in this case.

SKI: Nov 27th 2007; 8:18AM

You can play NES games in a Famicon with an adapter. Maybe there will be a resurgence of them if a lot of people import the Familator.

ShortFuse: Nov 26th 2007; 2:21PM

I think they should have made a small NDS cart that loads NES roms and included an adapter to transfer from original NES Cartridge to that NDS cart.
Having to carry the big 5.25" cart seems a bit silly, especially since NES rom loading over NDS has been done by homebrew community.

Silent Xenocide: Nov 26th 2007; 2:26PM

Sounds pretty baller. Too bad I dont care much for famicom games.

Shagittarius: Nov 26th 2007; 2:27PM

I'm waiting for the super-felator that emulates the super-famicon.

JPN: Nov 26th 2007; 2:27PM

I like the name.

WiNG: Nov 26th 2007; 2:38PM

wow it's kinda huge, considering you could just... play.... these on an emulator on a PDA or smartphone.

What next, a Genesis adapter, followed by a SegaCD and Sega32X plug-ins, that quintouple the DS' size??!?

Crono (NDF - Knight of the Old School): Nov 26th 2007; 2:44PM

Sega Nomad FTW!

Sonicandtails: Nov 26th 2007; 3:04PM

I perfer nesDS on my R4 thank you.

Shignami: Nov 26th 2007; 3:24PM

QFE

Josh: Nov 26th 2007; 3:10PM

You can already do this, without the goofy huge oversized cart adapter, any one of the DS hack cartridges (for example the R4) can run homebrew, DS homebrew has very good Nintendo, Super Nintendo, and Genesis emulators with about 80% compatibility right now. Oh and there are game boy and game boy color emulators too. The best Nintendo emulator has the L button mapped to an instant rewind, and they all support save states.

I already own a giant collection of game carts, so no I don't feel bad about playing roms, I'm not playing anything I don't own.

Rob Accomando: Nov 26th 2007; 3:18PM

I have a Supercard somewhere which was cool until I got a CFW psp. Used use a gameaxe a while ago but it took like 9 AAs.

Gamer XoverY: Nov 26th 2007; 4:44PM

Cool...I just purchased FF2,FF3, DQ2-4 (Famicon versions) on Ebay and Now Can play it on the road as well. Just One Question How The Hell Do I order one????

drun: Nov 26th 2007; 8:00PM

The game on the screen...must not be an NES game according to color

Squirrel3D: Nov 26th 2007; 9:06PM

I want an NES version....

matthew: Nov 26th 2007; 9:26PM

or you could skip the clunky adapter and buy a real famicom portable

enter

pokefami

about the size of your ds and takes 3 aa batteries

carts plug straight into the thing

2.5 inch lcd screen, speakers, video out to TV with included cable, made by japanese company, red and white color scheme to match the famicom

mike: Nov 26th 2007; 10:04PM

roms are good too play even if you own the games. I feel like playing FF6 again but dont want to hook up my SNES. I might by a ds + R4 and just downlaod the rom.

PT Cruiser: Nov 26th 2007; 11:21PM

I agree, just use an R4 and save yourself the trouble. If you already had the carts to begin with, then you're legally allowed to play those roms.

lemcog: Nov 27th 2007; 12:01AM

I like how it's bigger then the system itself.

aggrocrag: Nov 27th 2007; 1:22AM

Nintendo at least should release a flash cart so we can pull games from Virtual Console. Similar to what the Ps3 can do for the PSP.

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