Homebrew Save Nintendo WiFi - A project to save online servers for DS (and Wii) games

[Toad King]

UPDATE: We got a custom server up an running: Instructions on how to use it are at http://altwfc.net/. Also hop on IRC if you want to help or contribute at #altwfc on Rizon.

UPDATE 2: The new altwfc server IP is 104.131.93.87! Be sure to update your DNS settings!

http://save-nintendo-wifi.com/

I'm starting this project in response to the announcement of Nintendo Wi-Fi servers shutting down in May. Eventually this project hopes to have enough information so myself or other hackers have enough information to reverse engineer the Nintendo Wi-Fi servers and make emulated servers to live long after the May 20th cutoff date. What I plan to do is until the servers get shut down, is collect as many packet dumps from as many of these games as I can. That is where you can come in.

Right now we only have a little less than three months to gather data on all the games being shut down. Pure manpower is needed at this point, because a lot of games are going away and although initial analysis seems to indicate games use very similar protocols, there might be some differences between games we'll have to save and document.

If you have a capable router and one of the games being shut down, you can help. I have a guide on how to configure a DD-WRT or Tomato router on the project page, and it is possible to get packet logs from emulators as well. If someone can contribute a guide for that that would be really helpful to get people on.

Goals right now:
* Get packets from as many games as possible before it goes down, with focus on games we don't have any information on yet.

This thread is for discussing DS games. The thread for Wii games is here: http://gbatemp.net/threads/save-nin...e-online-servers-for-wii-and-ds-games.362716/

 

[bobmcjr]

Dumped and sent packets for WarioWare D.I.Y.

 

[Toad King]

Dumped and sent packets for WarioWare D.I.Y.

Thanks for those.

I guess I should also post this in this thread: I am currently trying to hack DS ROMs so I can dump SSL-encrypted communication. WW: DIY uses these pretty heavily for downloading microgames and all games use them for authenticating with a central Nintendo server, and without getting plaintext dumps of these, reverse engineering these packets will be next to impossible. It also has to be done before any custom servers can be used. I started some very early investigation in this thread but could always use some help.

 

[Scyther_Grovyle]

Just for your info, i found some sites trying to list wi-fi compatible games, put them to good use!
http://www.nintendolife.com/forums/dsiware/what_dsi_ware_games_have_wifi
http://ds.mmgn.com/Articles/Nintendo-DS-WiFi-Games-Listing
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Nintendo_DS_Wi-Fi_Connection_games
http://www.nintendo.com/consumer/gameslist/games-wifi.jsp
Hope it helps our cause.

 

[BroBuzz]

^Nintendo's Official List seems to be the most completely. I'd use that.

 

[Toad King]

I've made patches for the USA versions of Metroid Prime Hunters and Mario Kart DS. With these patches the normally encrypted authentication portion of the connection sequence is now unencrypted, which will help in reverse engineering. If you plan on making packet dumps of these games please use the patches for them. You can find them on the game pages on the site. Also, if ROM hackers want to help and supply patches for other games, making patches is fairly easy: Find the overlay that has the network code in it (not too difficult to find), and for every instance of "https://nas.nintendowifi.net/ac", simply delete the s in https and add another null byte at the end of the string. After injecting this new overlay, communication should be unencrypted.

 

[madeinair]

Im going to capture alot of packets for Jump Ultimate Stars Wifi, will try to thouroughly capture many packets.
Ive got a question tho, is there a possibility to someone retrieving my IP address from the capture packets ?

 

[madeinair]

Its all too sad, Nintendo just threw the customers away just like that, what they should've done is what were doing now, they should've released a software to allow open-source servers for multiplayer, really sad how they're just closing their servers without consideration.

 

[Necron]

What about games like Jam with the band or its Japanese counterpart? Can anything be done with those?

 

[bobmcjr]

What about games like Jam with the band or its Japanese counterpart? Can anything be done with those?

For flash cart users, http://jwtb.wikia.com/wiki/BDX_Mega_Pack
It may or may not contain the DLC songs.

 

[Subtle Demise]

Im going to capture alot of packets for Jump Ultimate Stars Wifi, will try to thouroughly capture many packets.
Ive got a question tho, is there a possibility to someone retrieving my IP address from the capture packets ?

There is nothing anyone can do with an IP address except figure out your service provider and a VERY general area of where you're connecting from.

 

[Toad King]

Im going to capture alot of packets for Jump Ultimate Stars Wifi, will try to thouroughly capture many packets.
Ive got a question tho, is there a possibility to someone retrieving my IP address from the capture packets ?

For games that do matchmaking, one part of the protocol does send your IP to the other players in the game.

 

[Necron]

For flash cart users, http://jwtb.wikia.com/wiki/BDX_Mega_Pack
It may or may not contain the DLC songs.

Yes, I know about that. The thing is, on wifi there are over 9000 songs, and with a single original cart you can only download 100. I wonder if there is any way to trick the system and dump all the songs.

 

[bobmcjr]

Can't the songs be downloaded, copied/transcribed to a flash cart, and then wipe the original cart to get more downloads? If the counter didn't reset that would be a terrible decision to hurt resale value..

 

[Necron]

No, you can't do anything, the limit is saved in the server, since each cart has a unique ID.

 

[Acidflare]

I don't know if this was said at all or not and i'm pretty sure this could be something to go towards the end of the project but what about creating a pc app that applies wifi fixes or can we modify the connection tool in nds firmware to connect to a different server, Keep in mind I am only giving ideas as to things that maybe possible, I don't know much about coding I know basic HTM(L) currently working on learning C++ in my spare time which is very limited these days

 

[madeinair]

I've kept trying to capture packets from Desmume on wireshark, but the tutorial you provided doesn't work for me.
I've got desmume wifi working correctly, but having problems with picking up packets.
Please help me out.

 

[Toad King]

I've kept trying to capture packets from Desmume on wireshark, but the tutorial you provided doesn't work for me.
I've got desmume wifi working correctly, but having problems with picking up packets.
Please help me out.

Make sure you're recording packets from the right ethernet device if you have multiple ones. Other than that if you can connect online through DeSmuME then winpcap is installed and Wireshark should work.

 

[guard]

I don't know if this was said at all or not and i'm pretty sure this could be something to go towards the end of the project but what about creating a pc app that applies wifi fixes or can we modify the connection tool in nds firmware to connect to a different server, Keep in mind I am only giving ideas as to things that maybe possible, I don't know much about coding I know basic HTM(L) currently working on learning C++ in my spare time which is very limited these days

Don't know if this is what you mean, but the method used for similar projects like the PBSDS Flipnote and the hacked Pokemon GTS is to connect through a proxy or alternative DNS server, so that the DS thinks it's connected to Nintendo when it isn't. The main problem with that is probably SSL I think.

 

[madeinair]

Ive managed to get the correct packets, how can I export it properly, for it to be readable and contain all the packet info.
Btw, as the packets are recorded, i wrote a detailed log, logging which (approximate) packet number triggered an action (e.g. player found/lost, starting new game). I think that will help when re-reading the packet info later on.