Hacking Load Flashcart As Single Game?

Plasmaster09 · Feb 20, 2020

There are quite a few games, hacks or translations that no (actual DS-based) firmware supports that I've wanted to play on my DS. The question is, is there a way to use a flashcart (r4isdhc.com r4i gold pro 2020 cart in my case) to boot up as one particular game? No multicart firmware, no infolib... just as one specific game on the cart?
No, autoboot doesn't count. I mean NOT USING EXTERNAL FIRMWARE and just loading as one game.
It doesn't have to appear as that game (most carts fake being something like Bomberman Land anyway), but it has to basically just be that one game.

FAST6191 · Feb 21, 2020

Autoboot, which itself is not the most common feature, is as close as you will get to your repro dreams right now, even more so if you want it to work on DSi or 3ds.

Is there a particular reason autoboot will not do?

The Catboy · Feb 21, 2020

Autobooting is the only option you have on this one. The flashcart needs the kernel in order to boot games, there is no means to getting around this. I actually invested a good part of my time studying how these carts work, even attempted to flash my own custom header to one (, unsuccessfully might I add,) and can safely say that there is no option to fit your needs beyond autobooting.

Plasmaster09 · Feb 21, 2020

FAST6191 said:
Autoboot, which itself is not the most common feature, is as close as you will get to your repro dreams right now, even more so if you want it to work on DSi or 3ds.

Is there a particular reason autoboot will not do?

*sigh* yes. As I said at the start of the post, there are quite a few games, hacks, etc. that most firmware doesn't seem to support or that just doesn't work on any of it.
So no. Autoboot, as I already said, does not count.

The Catboy · Feb 21, 2020

Plasmaster09 said:
*sigh* yes. As I said at the start of the post, there are quite a few games, hacks, etc. that most firmware doesn't seem to support or that just doesn't work on any of it.
So no. Autoboot, as I already said, does not count.

What kernel are you running?
If you are running the stock kernel from their official site, that kernel is complete trash. You should be able to find better compatibility using retro's files
https://gbatemp.net/threads/retrogamefan-updates-releases.267243/

Plasmaster09 · Feb 21, 2020

Lilith Valentine said:
What kernel are you running?
If you are running the stock kernel from their official site, that kernel is complete trash. You should be able to find better compatibility using retro's files
https://gbatemp.net/threads/retrogamefan-updates-releases.267243/

I’m using that.
It isn’t working for the game in question.
Is there at least some tool to generate an infolib/extinfo for the game? I don’t know a damn thing about hex editing to do it myself.

FAST6191 · Feb 21, 2020

Plasmaster09 said:
*sigh* yes. As I said at the start of the post, there are quite a few games, hacks, etc. that most firmware doesn't seem to support or that just doesn't work on any of it.
So no. Autoboot, as I already said, does not count.

Sorry, misread the opening post. Also I did not suggest autoboot, just that it was as close as it gets.

Sounds like you have a bad (as in capability, not hardware defect) cart. Might be worth investing in a better one if there are no replacement firmwares up to the task -- to the best of my knowledge there are no hardware enhancement hacks, hacks that take advantage of emulator bugs on the DS at this point. Closest you tend to get is someone used the wrong compression but an emulator did not care. Some bad carts benefit from having the game unpacked and repacked with ndstool or similar (dsbuff and dslazy are frontends) but I have not seen that for an R4 clone.

Beyond that even if there were options to straight flash something then owing to the way the DS works it would not do anything for you anyway (compared to say some of the older systems where you might have seen an approach like that do something). Or at least it would not work on anything we have seen in DS flash cart world so far; some of the cart emulation/simulation done for the GBA where it properly fakes hardware rather than patching being an example of it for another system.

The Catboy · Feb 21, 2020

Plasmaster09 said:
I’m using that.
It isn’t working for the game in question.
Is there at least some tool to generate an infolib/extinfo for the game? I don’t know a damn thing about hex editing to do it myself.

You might have a ROM issue or another issue. It might be worth taking up this issue with Retro to see if he might able to fix the compatibility. I honestly don't know the tools he uses to update his files, so I am not much help there.

Plasmaster09 · Feb 21, 2020

FAST6191 said:
Sorry, misread the opening post. Also I did not suggest autoboot, just that it was as close as it gets.

Sounds like you have a bad (as in capability, not hardware defect) cart. Might be worth investing in a better one if there are no replacement firmwares up to the task -- to the best of my knowledge there are no hardware enhancement hacks, hacks that take advantage of emulator bugs on the DS at this point. Closest you tend to get is someone used the wrong compression but an emulator did not care. Some bad carts benefit from having the game unpacked and repacked with ndstool or similar (dsbuff and dslazy are frontends) but I have not seen that for an R4 clone.

Beyond that even if there were options to straight flash something then owing to the way the DS works it would not do anything for you anyway (compared to say some of the older systems where you might have seen an approach like that do something). Or at least it would not work on anything we have seen in DS flash cart world so far; some of the cart emulation/simulation done for the GBA where it properly fakes hardware rather than patching being an example of it for another system.

honestly I’m gonna see if I can try try again with twlmenu++ at some point but this cart is pretty darn good otherwise
it’s a standard r4i gold clone but it’s one of the “there’s no such thing as a real r4 but this is the closest ya get” ones
Thankfully the translation patch in question is for a game I don’t strictly NEED to read a lot of so I’m currently playing the original

Hacking Load Flashcart As Single Game?

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