Due to the amount of work I have this semester, I cannot update Soku Lobby as frequently as I have in the past. I have decided to make the source code available to anyone who wishes to help develop it. Just email me and I’ll send you a link to the code (if you’re serious about development). Anyone that contributes to the development gets an achievement.
Soku Lobby – Relay
July 25th, 2011 
dotMaiku Recently, a relay feature was added to Soku Lobby. This enables people who couldn’t host games before to host. Everyone is able to host now!
Tutorial: Make a secret, secure WEP network for your old DS games!
June 20th, 2011 zach Background: Do you use WPA encryption on your wireless network and want to play old DS games like Mario Kart DS? Many pre-DSi games don’t support WPA networks, and even if you play them on DSi or 3DS, which support WPA in their firmware, you still won’t be able to connect.
Are you using WEP or open (no) encryption, but have a fast router and are getting error code 52100? Your router’s transmission rate may be too fast for your DS, but if you change it to Nintendo’s recommended 1-2mbps, your net speed on all your computers goes down to 2mbps from the 8-10 you might pay for!
What do you do in either of these situations? I found a solution! I’m going to assume that you are using a regularDS (thought a DSi or 3DS will also work) and that you already have a router, but for a router related reason you can’t get on to Nintendo WFC on your older games, or at all. This solution will cost you, but the equipment bought is cheap, you already might have it, and it can be used for many future activities if you decide to re-purpose it!
In short, we’re going to get a second router, connect it to your first router, change the encryption, hide the network, and use MAC address filtering. Let’s begin!
Difficulty: Intermediate
SUPER IMPORTANT: This tutorial assumes you understand the basics of networking and IPs. You should know about DHCP and static IPs if you are using them. Some of the troubleshooting I’ve built-in to this tutorial if things don’t go right uses advanced terms and concepts, but if everything goes as planned you shouldn’t need to use them. I can’t be held responsible for any damages to your stuff. Proceed with caution and at your own risk. I’ll do my best to help you, but am making no guarantees that I can solve / support every problem that comes up. This is a fairly simple process, but I have written a lot to make it as accessible as possible, so it may look more complicated than it is. Either way, if you don’t know what you’re doing, DON’T do it!
Soku Lobby – Part 18
May 18th, 2011 dotMaiku As you have probably noticed, my internet has been dropping very frequently. It usually drops about five times a day and lasts anywhere from 5 minutes to an hour. This is quite frustrating being suddenly disconnected from the lobby. It is very frustrating for me, since I lose my internet connection and have to find something to kill time. Since this has become such an issue, I have purchased a dedicated server. It will host my server programs on it, and will have a much better up-time than my home internet. The program for the lobby server is going to be moved to that server. You must upgrade to v0.6.6.7 when it is released. If you don’t, you will not be able to connect to the lobby. This is because I am changing IPs.
Soku Lobby – Part 17
April 15th, 2011 dotMaiku Soku Lobby v0.6.6.1 is out, if you didn’t already know. It is the most stable version yet! This version went through quite a bit of testing before being released. The core modules had a re-write, which added much needed stability. Neither program will crash mid-game or randomly. There are still some bugs lurking around, especially with leaving rooms.
Soku Lobby – Part 16
March 2nd, 2011 dotMaiku Open beta started on Tuesday. Things went pretty well. The server is able to handle the load just fine, but with some issues. There was a maximum of 40 users online at once on release day. And around 25 rushed in right after open beta started. Approximately 400 MB was sent to the server, and 4.5 GB was sent from my server on release day alone. Impressive!
Soku Lobby – Open Beta
March 1st, 2011 dotMaiku It is official, Soku Lobby is now in Open Beta. Anyone can login and use the program. All of the accounts created on the prototype have been migrated to the new database. If you had an account before, it will still work. Just a note: if you had an account, and you don’t login within the month of March, I will delete your account to clean up clutter on my server.
Soku Lobby – Part 15
February 25th, 2011 dotMaiku Lots of testing has been going on, and progress has been made. We are on track for starting open beta. Open beta will be on Tuesday, March 1, 2011. This means that everyone will be able to use the program. This also means that it is not complete, and there will be bugs. If you happen to find a bug, please check the Known Bugs list before telling me about it. If it’s on the list, I already know about it. That means don’t tell me, I don’t need 100 people telling me the same thing. You’ll be ignored if you do.
Soku Lobby – Part 14
February 9th, 2011 dotMaiku Closed beta testing has been going really well. I’ve received some good feedback and test results. The delay is consistently half of soku’s. There are still some issues. One, and the most important is a deck sync issue. Currently, Soku or the client will crash sometimes when decks are being updated. The other issue is with wireless. Wireless doesn’t have a consistent ping like wired does. One match I played was spiking every couple of seconds, since the ping was jumping from 70ms to 120ms. I’m working on an averager which will smooth out gameplay for “spiky” connections like wireless.
Soku Lobby – Part 13
January 25th, 2011 dotMaiku Since there has been concern over the lack of updates recently, I decided I would post this. Yes, I am still working on the client (why wouldn’t I?) and no it isn’t quite finished yet (boo).
The core and protocol are complete. I am currently stringing everything together in the GUI. That means all the hard work is done. I decided earlier this week to release a “pre-beta” of what I have. “But isn’t that the same as the prototype/alpha?” Sort of, yes. I said that “beta will have working netcode” and this does not have netcode in it, because I’m still attaching it to the interface, therefore, it wouldn’t be right to call it “beta.”