An update for the RG DS and RG DS Plus, delivered over Wi-Fi only. It brings together the 0.5.3 builds the beta testers have been running: three new languages, Pokémon companion pages for the GBA games, a speaker EQ for the RG DS Plus, Game & Watch, an Activity page, clearer Settings and a long list of fixes.
There is no new SD card image. A fresh install is 0.5.0 from the 0.5.0 release, followed by this update.
🌍 Three new languages
- Español by Pixelado Dev, and the Pokémon companions read the Spanish releases of the DS and GBA games.
- Italiano by Olympicus.
- Suomi by HANHITSI.
The language is now picked from a list: Settings › System › Language, and in the first-time setup. Game titles, file names and network names are never translated, and START and SELECT keep the button's name.
🐉 GBA Pokémon companion
The DS companion's pages for Ruby, Sapphire, Emerald, FireRed and LeafGreen and the ROM hacks Glazed 9.2.0, Gaia, Heart & Soul, Lazarus, Seaglass, SoulGold 1.2.1 and Unbound: Battle (with the foe's weaknesses on a tap), Party, Team, Here, Map, Guide, Pokédex and a journey log. Milestones tick off as you beat their foes.
- Turn it on in Settings › Other systems › Second screen › Detailed Pokémon pages.
- Switch between the menu and the companion like on the DS: a corner button, Back, or F for the menu.
- Challenge mode (Nuzlocke) works for the GBA games too: first encounter per area, losses kept.
The DS companion now also covers Pokémon HeartGold: Origin (party, place, map, bag, Pokédex).
🔈 Speaker EQ
Settings › Display & sound › Speaker EQ: a tuned profile for the RG DS Plus speakers (less honk, less harshness), seven sliders of your own, or your own Equalizer APO profile in banana/speaker-eq. Speakers only; headphones and Bluetooth are left alone.
⌚ Game & Watch
Game & Watch on both screens, through MAME. Bring your own MAME ROM zips (roms/gameandwatch) and their MAME artwork zips (roms/gameandwatch/artwork).
📊 Activity
A new tile on the home row: your play time, a timeline and trends, and what to play next.
📝 Clearer Settings
Every row has one plain sentence, and a line under each choice says what the selected option does.
🕹️ Emulators
- Commodore 64 and ZX Spectrum (basic support).
- BananaDS: black caves and washed-out fog fixed (fog started at the camera in every game that uses it; Black 2's Chargestone Cave was all black). The left stick's diagonals work.
- DS CPU speed in BananaDS's settings and per game (X on a DS game), up to 2133 MHz. For games that lose frames on their own; raise it per game, not for everything.
- No crackle when fast-forward ends, and fast-forward's Max stays Max.
- The N64 crash on Panfrost and the in-game shader are fixed.
🛒 Store
- GBA DS by kyannon: dual-screen GBA, with its icon, tile picture and description.
- Poketool and PortMaster are no longer built in. Install them from the Store; your data stays.
💾 Saves
- RetroArch and BananaFront saves move to one folder,
/data/saves, the first time you start a game. The old copies are kept inbanana/saves-legacy. A blank save never replaces a real one, and Game Boy saves made with mGBA stay with their games. - A full card no longer cuts DS saves or settings short.
- An update that is cut off can no longer leave the handheld unable to start.
😴 Sleep and Bluetooth
- No minute-long stall when the lid closes soon after starting up; the screens go dark at once, and Wi-Fi and Bluetooth survive a quick re-close.
- Opening the lid while it is going to sleep no longer leaves it dark.
- Touching the screen counts as activity, so it no longer dims while you use it.
- No 18 seconds of silence at start-up when headphones weren't what played last.
🔧 Fixes
- Search finds genre words such as "rpg" and "fps" in game names.
- The Dot (MiZai), Dot (MiZai, RG DS+) and Retro themes draw properly, and a theme with bad numbers can't crash the menu.
- DS games with the same name get their own icons, and zipped DSi games start in BananaDS.
Translations
- Español by Pixelado Dev
- Italiano by Olympicus
- Suomi by HANHITSI
- 简体中文 by Majirefy
- Русский by Vladislav (LVD) and Ruslan (Nestrahoff)
Lines added in this release (the new Settings texts, Speaker EQ, Activity) show in English in the other languages until the next round of translations.
Contributors
Thank you to everyone who sent pull requests for this release:
- tjsmith00: the GBA companion pages, guides and menu switch (#209), the sleep fixes (#196) and the Bluetooth start-up fix (#195).
- pixeladodev: the Spanish translation (#199) and the Spanish releases in both Pokémon companions (#178, #182).
- VektorKnight: Speaker EQ (#200).
- swouapiy: the clearer Settings texts (#211).
- SirSpacePickle: Game & Watch (#206).
- marlupatrocinio: Activity (#213) and the BananaDS left-stick diagonals (#176).
- kyannon: GBA DS in the Store (#205).
- jesussaves-dev: Commodore 64 and ZX Spectrum (#166) and the fixes from the 0.5.2.2 reports (#171).
Update
Settings › System › Updates › Check for updates, then Download and Install. (On 0.5.0 or 0.5.0.1: Settings › System › Update.)
It installs to the card's other system slot, and the version you had stays one restart away (Settings › System › Updates › Previous version). Your games, saves and settings stay as they are.
Known issues
- The Speaker EQ profile is tuned for the RG DS Plus; the RG DS gets the sliders only.
- Activity's history starts the first time you open it, and its tile uses the same picture as Recently played for now.
- Pokémon White 2 can freeze when switching Pokémon in battle in BananaDS (#169); SuperDrastic is not affected.
- The HeartGold: Origin companion's Battle page is empty.
- The known issues from 0.5.0 still apply: README › Status.
Tested on the RG DS and RG DS Plus. The 0.5.3 builds went to the beta testers first.