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Post by UsualNoise on Feb 24, 2015 1:16:00 GMT -5
We had an old thread for DS flashcart / homebrew stuff, but it was over 5 years old and seemed pointless to resurrect it at this point. I'm just now getting into the 3DS flashcart scene since I'm up to 20 3DS games (most of which I haven't played) and want the convenience of my DSTwo flashcart for 3DS games. So ... I just ordered one of these: www.sky3ds.com/I picked this one since it does not require any specific firmware and works with the New 3DS (if I get one). The only catch was it doesn't allow ripping your own games, so I found a workaround that lets me do it on a 3DS XL I just got for my daughter (firmware pre-9.2) using an exploit for the Gateway flashcart (not actually requiring the cart, just a software download): gbatemp.net/threads/rom-headers-question.381164/page-4www.maxconsole.com/maxcon_forums/threads/286487-3DS-N3DS-Gateway-Ultra-GuideI'm happy to say the exploit works and I'm just finishing up dumping all my 3DS games and save files now. By dumping my own games I can avoid the recent online ban that Nintendo starting dishing out (bans affect ROMs with 'public' or widely distributed internal headers). If anyone ends up doing anything similar let me know if you have questions ... the above references weren't the easiest to follow and the documentation on the interwebs in general is lacking. Anyway, I'm excited to have the convenience of digital games on my portable once again. I'll post another update once I receive the flashcart and get everything set up. Once again, thanks to Nintendo for trying their best to inconvenience me.  |
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Post by oldskoolboarder on Feb 24, 2015 11:50:24 GMT -5
Hmm. Considering that my son now uses our 2nd XL and has already lost our MK7 (Grr), there may be a value to having a backup.
1) How do you backup your own game?
2) How big is a game? When Gateway started, I saw that games were 2GB to 4GB.
3) Can you store multiple games on a card? IIRC, Gateway was 1 game per memory card.
Is that thing really $96? Whoa... Not cheap.
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Post by UsualNoise on Feb 24, 2015 12:24:10 GMT -5
1) How do you backup your own game? The second link I posted above gives most of the info you need. Requirement: you need a 3DS / 3DS XL with a firmware of 9.2 or lower. You place a file called launcher.dat (part of the software package for the gateway flashcart) on the SD card in your 3DS. Then navigate in your 3DS browser to go.gateway-3ds.com and it will use an exploit to launch the gateway interface. From there you can do a variety of things, but most importantly it will let you dump a 3DS cartridge and save to the SD card. Also can be used to restore a save (nice feature if you want to share a game with only one save slot). I dumped all 22 of my games last night, 4 were 2 GB, 9 were 1 GB, 7 were 512 MB, and 2 were 128 MB. All will fit with plenty of room to spare on a 32 GB micro SD card. I don't know about the Gateway at this point, but the new Sky3DS version that I ordered is at least 31 games, possibly more (haven't read the documentation yet). The previous Sky3DS version was 10 games, and you couldn't change the game once assigned to a slot. That was way too limiting for me to be interested. Yeah, my total with fees was about $94 where I bought it. But the promise of freedom from physical media (without being tied to a system like Nintendo's current policy requires) was too tempting. It's something I've been waiting for for years, ever since my first 3DS purchase. |
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Post by oldskoolboarder on Feb 24, 2015 13:29:45 GMT -5
Thanks for the info. Yeah, it's $$ but interesting. I carry my games in a case but always fear I (or my son) is going to drop it (and we have many times). I'll try my hand at ripping my carts and see how it goes.
Keep the updates coming, I'm curious how your experience goes.
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Post by fatty on Feb 24, 2015 23:49:24 GMT -5
Thanks UsualNoise. This is something I will do in the future once the carts go down in price. Wish I would have had this when my last unit was stolen. OoT3d and Kid Icarus are not cheap anymore.
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Post by dschroll on Feb 24, 2015 23:53:41 GMT -5
Can't you download them from eshop fatty?
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Post by fatty on Feb 25, 2015 0:04:01 GMT -5
Yeah, I will as a last resort but I still love physical, and hate Nintendo's digital policy. You know me, I can wait until I find the right deal haha and if I don't I can borrow it from my brother eventually.
Though I may end up using my coins on them for my club Nintendo rewards.
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Post by oldskoolboarder on Feb 25, 2015 0:57:05 GMT -5
My OG 3DS is still on 7.x.x so I tried ripping SMB2. I was able to do so successfully following those launcher instructions. It created a 537 MB 3DS file.
Does that file have to be patched? If so, is there some step by step? I saw mentions of tools (below) but it wasn't really clear what to do.
**
4. use a tool to see/extract your UniqueID (example : Gateway ROM Patcher)
5. use a tool to edit your Sky3DS template to inject the UniqueID to your games (example : No ban no sky)
**
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Post by UsualNoise on Feb 25, 2015 13:45:13 GMT -5
The file is good to go as-is. The way the Sky3DS unit works is it uses a text file as a template 'master list' of games. As long as your game matches one of the games in their template it will run OK. The only reason you would want to replace the ID in the template with your actual ID is if you're thinking about playing it online. THEN you definitely want to replace the header in the template. I went through and did it for all my games just to be safe.
To summarize, to do the header / ID replacement you just have to replace the info in the template.txt file downloaded from the Sky3DS site. I used the No Ban No Sky tool to substitute my private header; this private header was exported from my ROM dump via a separate tool: Gateway ROM patcher.
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Post by UsualNoise on Mar 1, 2015 0:46:50 GMT -5
Update! Got the Sky3DS, loaded my games, everything worked as expected... EXCEPT I couldn't find any simple way to get my original saves (from the cartridge) transferred to the Sky3DS. Apparently the save that you rip using the browser exploit is not compatible with the format Sky3DS uses. I even bought a Powersaves Pro unit to try to get it to work - but it didn't. Finally I found this thread where some guy wrote a small Perl program that does the hex conversion. I tried it and it worked. All my saves are now transferred, but it took a LOT of work. Not for the faint of heart at all. On the plus side going forward I should be able to easily back up the saves from Sky3DS (individually or all at once). Not sure I can transfer them back to the retail cartridge should I ever need to (not without another Perl program) but I'll worry about that if/when I have to. For now I'm just going to make regular backups on the off-chance the flashcart fails for whatever reason. One cool part: after transferring Mario Kart 7 I wiped the save from the original cartridge and gave it to my daughter. Now she can have her own file and we can play local multiplayer. |
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Post by UsualNoise on Mar 5, 2015 1:19:30 GMT -5
Update 2.
After further discussion over at gbatemp.net I found out the conversion back to a format usable on the original cartridge is fairly simple. I used a free hex editor and chopped off the header (88 bytes) and truncated the end of the file to get it back to the original size. Copied back to the cartridge and it worked! I tried with a couple games to make sure (Crosswords, Link Between Worlds). So for now I'm fairly confident that as long as I keep my current saves backed up I can always go back to the cartridge if 1) the flashcart ever physically fails or 2) Nintendo blocks it with an update.
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Post by UsualNoise on Mar 21, 2015 20:48:04 GMT -5
Update 3.
Been using the Sky3DS flashcart to play all my games over the past couple weeks and I'm happy to report I haven't experienced any significant issues. I've been backing up save files periodically just in case, but thus far it just works as expected. I've played a decent amount of MK7 online with no adverse consequences (bans) so I believe my private ID / header is working as intended. Also, since Sky3DS is firmware-independent (to this point), I have my 3DS on the most current firmware and can continue to access the eShop.
In summary, to this point Sky3DS has lived up to my expectations. I'll post again if anything changes or I encounter any problems.
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Post by fatty on Aug 1, 2015 0:43:31 GMT -5
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Post by UsualNoise on Aug 2, 2015 21:36:35 GMT -5
Thanks for the tip - should be interesting to see how it will end up being used.
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Post by UsualNoise on Sept 29, 2015 23:03:49 GMT -5
FYI - I've used the exploit fatty posted to get homebrew running. Of course, Ironfall is no longer available so I'm glad I got it before the take-down. You can still use the Youtube app to accomplish the same thing though (so far at least) but I prefer Ironfall since you don't have to have internet access. I'm now able to use a homebrew app to FTP into my 3DS SD card to copy files. Way easier than taking out the SD card! Here's hoping some more cool homebrew stuff comes along... In other news, I bought an Amiiqo. I was sick of being unable to get amiibos I wanted so I'll be using this 'cheat' to unlock stuff in games that I otherwise couldn't access. I'll post more about it once I receive it. |
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Post by oldskoolboarder on Sept 30, 2015 2:23:39 GMT -5
I'm curious how long that Amiiqo will stay 'alive' until N figures out 'if' they can stop it.
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Post by UsualNoise on Oct 6, 2015 12:53:21 GMT -5
Received the Amiiqo and used it a bit last night. I can report that it does what it's supposed to do. I downloaded a zip file of all the current existing Amiibos and used that to unlock some stuff. For example, the Villager driving suit in Mario Kart 8 (the only one I was missing) and a few mystery mushrooms in Mario Maker just to test it out more.
The only issue is you need an Android smartphone or tablet with an NFC reader, which is not a given. My wife's phone happened to work (Galaxy 5) so I used that. Software worked pretty simply once I had the Amiibo .bin files copied over to the phone.
I'll still buy Amiibos, but this lets me access stuff that is simply unavailable due to out of stock Amiibos. For that reason, I'm happy with my purchase. Given how the technology works I'd be surprised if Nintendo is able to block it.
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Post by oldskoolboarder on Oct 6, 2015 13:31:07 GMT -5
Oh well, that knocks me out. The only true Android device I have is the original Kindle Fire rooted with www.perfectlyandroid.com/. |
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Post by UsualNoise on Oct 6, 2015 14:02:46 GMT -5
Well, they're actually releasing a USB reader soon (this month) for another $30 which would allow any PC to work.
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Post by oldskoolboarder on Oct 6, 2015 15:59:46 GMT -5
Well, they're actually releasing a USB reader soon (this month) for another $30 which would allow any PC to work. $80!?!? OK, that's getting a bit out of hand. |
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