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[Mike-MGarcia]

Hi there,
You don't hear much about the Nintendo 3DS, but it's alive! 

Just wanted to share my info on development on the Nintendo 3DS #Nindie (not homebrew!).

It's mostly for C/C++ but there's also Unity3D support (YMMV).

The LT;DR version is:

•      Free to sign up
•         Strong recent sales, a long life left in 3DS
•         Library spanning 3 generations
•         Good affordable hardware
•         Great software features
•         Sustainable ecosystem & eShop features:
•             Developer friendly rating & review system
•             Nintendo brand association
•             Higher value proposition
•             Not shovelware friendly
•             Not a flooded Over saturated ecosystem
•             QR Codes - a visibility tool
•         Path way to Switch
•         Launching on a console

I go into more details about in my blog here:

http://mgarcia.org/2018/04/10/why-indie-developers-should-consider-making-games-for-the-nintendo-3ds

 

Really low barrier to entry, but high technical barrier to product IMO anyway.

I'm also doing monthly development blog updates.

Happy to answer any questions (non NDA related)!

PS: I'm a noob, 3D is hard, C/C++ is hard, console dev is a PITA!

Cheers

Mike.

[ProgramGamer]

Hey, publishing to 3DS is actually something I'd like to do eventually! Do you have information on what types of frameworks/libraries are available to use on the 3DS? Is SDL2 compatible for example, or would I have to write some of the graphics code myself?

[Mike-MGarcia]

Hi,
I can't go into details (NDA) there is a SDL1 version for 3DS but it's far from complete (it's a good guide tho).

Regarding other frame works, openGL ES 1.1 is an extension.. which means it's not hardware, which means CPU core hit, which means slow (okay for 2D).
The OG 3DS hardware is very limited, so mostlikely you'll be rolling your own tech, there are 3rd party libraries ie http://www.engineblack.com/
So yeah, there's a graphics learning curve there.. but it's well documented.

Saying that, I did do a SDL/openGL port fairly quickly so it's not too different.


PS: Transparency needs to be rendered last, or it'll use the clear colour.


 
Mike.