Homebrew SNES9x for Old 3DS

[Clydefrosch]

v0.35 released.

Some minor fixes:

• Fixed Super Mario Kart grass area texture outside of the track. This fix should work for all cases.
  Would appreciate if someone could test and confirm that I've nailed the problem.
• Some minor performance and UI adjustments

yep, its green now. however, the back mirror view seems to be broken a bit now. check other drives in the mirror as you take turns

 

[bubble2k16]

@Clydefrosch - Yup I saw that, thanks for pointing out. Will fix that in my next release.

 

[Wargla]

@bubble2k16 I am trying to install cia (v0.35) using BigBlueMenu but systematically import is failing. Is it a known issue ?
And (maybe a noob question ), will it be possible to emulate SA1 chip one day, or considering O3DS hardware, that will not be possible ?

 

[Clydefrosch]

@bubble2k16 I am trying to install cia (v0.35) using BigBlueMenu but systematically import is failing. Is it a known issue ?
And (maybe a noob question ), will it be possible to emulate SA1 chip one day, or considering O3DS hardware, that will not be possible ?

might have been a bad download. redownload. and maybe, remove an older version of the emulator first.
at least for me, it installed fine. though, i used the latest fbi myself

as for chips, technically, its gonna be possible to make them run. however, it'd probably never run close to 60frames.i think on a psp, chip games run at constant 30 frames. that is probably as good as it could possibly get.

 

[Wargla]

might have been a bad download. redownload. and maybe, remove an older version of the emulator first.
at least for me, it installed fine. though, i used the latest fbi myself

as for chips, technically, its gonna be possible to make them run. however, it'd probably never run close to 60frames.i think on a psp, chip games run at constant 30 frames. that is probably as good as it could possibly get.

I downloaded again and try to install cia using BBM again but it doesn't work.
I will check with FBI, but might be good to check why it is not working with BBM, in case other guys try the same

 

[Clydefrosch]

its possible that you have some other homebrew installed that uses the same titleid or something. can you install other cias?


also, i noticed another tile order issue, this time, characters are hidden behind tiles they shouldn't, instead of poking through tiles that should hide them.

and just out of curiosity, i wanted to ask if you know why this fade to black effect is taxing the emulator so much. even with 4 skipped frames, it drops down to about 30 fps.
it cant be they made every single black line an individual sprite being moved, can it?

 

[Wargla]

its possible that you have some other homebrew installed that uses the same titleid or something. can you install other cias?

I just installed FBI.cia with BBM without issue.
But that's really weird, when I am tring to install snes9x_3ds.cia (v0.35) with FBI, I have also an error !

I am seeing the following error:
Failed to install CIA file.
result code: 0xD8E08025
Level: Permanent (27)
Summary: invalid argument (7)
Module: AM (32)
Desc: Invalid NCCH (37)

Does someone have an idea why I have this issue ? That is the first time I am trying to install snes9x for 3ds, it was never installed before on my o3ds...

 

[astronautlevel]

I just installed FBI.cia with BBM without issue.
But that's really weird, when I am tring to install snes9x_3ds.cia (v0.35) with FBI, I have also an error !

I am seeing the following error:
Failed to install CIA file.
result code: 0xD8E08025
Level: Permanent (27)
Summary: invalid argument (7)
Module: AM (32)
Desc: Invalid NCCH (37)

Does someone have an idea why I have this issue ? That is the first time I am trying to install snes9x for 3ds, it was never installed before on my o3ds...

Well, the error is right in the message: Invalid NCCH

In other words, the CIA is probably corrupt.

 

[Clydefrosch]

very curious. did you download the cia from the first post?
if so, maybe that one is corrupted.
i installed the one from https://gbatemp.net/threads/snes9x-for-old-3ds.435568/page-19#post-6628190
on two o3ds with latest fbi without a problem

 

[Wargla]

Well, the error is right in the message: Invalid NCCH

In other words, the CIA is probably corrupt.

Yep, but Clydefrosch succeeded to install it using last version of FBI (like me).
It's been 3 times I downloaded the archive v0.35 (in case previous one was corrupted) to get the cia in it. i really don't understand why I have this issue.

Edit: Yep @Clydefrosch, I installed from thread like you

Edit2: I don't know if that's important, but I am not using a CFW. I am using Gateway with FW 4.1B...

 

[LongTimeLurker]

Yep, but Clydefrosch succeeded to install it using last version of FBI (like me).
It's been 3 times I downloaded the archive v0.35 (in case previous one was corrupted) to get the cia in it. i really don't understand why I have this issue.

Edit: Yep @Clydefrosch, I installed from thread like you

Edit2: I don't know if that's important, but I am not using a CFW. I am using Gateway with FW 4.1B...

Hello, I usually just lurk here. The issue is the way the CIA is built, this is a known issue for Gateway users. See here for more info if interested.

I hope the dev (thank you so much for all your hard work BTW) can find a way to build the CIA in a way that's compatible for GW users. It's sad how little GW supports some features that everyone seems to have but us.

Another solution is to just use Luma, or the 3dsx. Both options are easy to use/setup.

 

[astronautlevel]

Ah, yeah, I remember hearing about that, that Gateway doesn't patch all signatures properly.

Unfortunately, I'm not sure if it'll be possible to build it in such a way to avoid that.

 

[LongTimeLurker]

Unfortunately, I'm not sure if it'll be possible to build it in such a way to avoid that.

Anywhere I could read why? This is the first homebrew I've encountered the issue with.

From my little knowledge I gather there are CFA and CXI containers. This app presumably uses CFA. I'm assuming Gateway supports CXI (because most things work, and those seem to be the only options). Is there any reason this homebrew couldn't use the CXI container?

Edit: I'm reading from here BTW.

 

[cvskid]

Anywhere I could read why? This is the first homebrew I've encountered the issue with.

From my little knowledge I gather there are CFA and CXI containers. This app presumably uses CFA. I'm assuming Gateway supports CXI (because more things work, and those seem to be the only options). Is there any reason this homebrew couldn't use the CXI container?

Edit: I'm reading from here BTW.

I had the same problem that you have. Since i am using menuhax/lesshax with ctrbootmanager i was able to load up luma3ds to install the emulator and then switch back to gateway 3ds and it runs fine then. It just won't install using gateway 3ds for some reason. It's the main thing i have trouble with myself installing with gateway 3ds.

 

[LongTimeLurker]

I had the same problem that you have. Since i am using menuhax/lesshax with ctrbootmanager i was able to load up luma3ds to install the emulator and then switch back to gateway 3ds and it runs fine then.

That's a great temporary solution, thanks. For now I'm just using the homebrew launcher.

It just won't install using gateway 3ds for some reason. It's the main thing i have trouble with myself installing with gateway 3ds.

The posts above ours explain why . Gateway just doesn't patch the signature checks for CFA containers it seems. I don't see any reason this app would need to use the CFA format though, so hopefully we get a CXI CIA in a future release (if it is possible).

The CFA format seems to be for bundling with extra files or something (IE: Manuals). As far as I know, snes9x for o3ds doesn't utilize this, so I'm thinking it was just an error when setting up the CIA build flags.

 

[bubble2k16]

About the CIA issue, the main problem that I have is that even though I built the CIA with a proper icon and banner, FBI doesn't seem to be able to display it, even though it is able to install it without problems. I think must be building it wrongly... I uploaded my RSF. If any one can give me some pointers, that will be great.

@Clydefrosch - In SNES, games uses Windowing to achieve such effects. Examples of Windowing in place are: Contra III's Invincible sphere, full-screen bomb, Super Mario World's circular window at the intro and the out-tro at the completion of every stage, and yes, in BOF2's battle transition, and the Glimmer Galleon stage with the torchlight effect in DKC2.

In the original Snes9x, when it encounters such windowing effects, the screen is drawn scanline-by-scanline at those lines the effect occurs. Since I've tried not to make too much changes to the original renderer, such effects are still drawn scanline by scanline in the 3DS port. This places a heavy load on the software code that generates the 3D hardware GPU instructions. Blargsnes does it very differently - it does it by constructing a stencil mask to mimic the window effect, and then drawing the screen tile-by-tile below the stencil mask, so that t's masked by the mask above. The keyword is that it still draws tile-by-tile that's why it's so fast.

At some point I do intend to adopt Blargsnes's approach, but seeing as it will require a lot of work and testing, I've put it off for now, until I can fix up other stuff.

 

[seijinshu]

This has came so far! I am a new 3ds user just waiting to play Star Fox 2 at 60fps without audio issues.

 

[LongTimeLurker]

About the CIA issue, the main problem that I have is that even though I built the CIA with a proper icon and banner, FBI doesn't seem to be able to display it, even though it is able to install it without problems. I think must be building it wrongly... I uploaded my RSF. If any one can give me some pointers, that will be great.

Hello! Just to confirm, like in the CXI example here, the file ends in ".cxi", not ".cfa"? If you can get a CXI build CIA going, even without an icon or anything, I'd still love to be able to install. I'll continue to research, maybe make my own builds too as soon as I have time.

Thanks again!

 

[bubble2k16]

@Wargla - SA-1 chip support will not be likely. The SA-1 chip is 3x faster than the main SNES CPU and the 3DS is already close to its limits emulating the main CPU. I've mentioned this in some earlier posts.

@LongTimeLurker - Hi! I have really very limited knowledge of CXI, CFA stuff. I don't really understand most of the stuff that I read at your link. I simply just cut and paste configuration and run command lines just to get the CIA generated.

 

[Chris.ca96]

I thank the developer of the emulator.
I wonder if any part of the next update will be possible to emulate Super Mario RPG.
Saludos