Hacking DSTWO Skins

[CannonFoddr]

{Just bumping the thread to let other know it's not 'dead'}

New skins added during December:
Alterbaer, Alterbaer Red, Tree Red/Blue/Pink, Magic Tree, Heart on Ice, Bubble Heart, Bubble Heart (Animated), Final Fantasy IV Rydia, Spongbob Squarepants (Yellow/Green/Blue) animated

 

[vernacular]

Update: Added my new Cyrax skin to the Wiki.

EDIT: Just noticed I now have contributed the most skins to the wiki. Too much spare time FTW!

 

[Invisible Man]

Would it be possible for one of the talented DSTWO skinners to make a nice GBAtemp style skin which would go well with the limited edition GBAtemp SCDS2. I'm kinda surprised that one wasn't made and released with the announcement.

 

[Eric345]

When I try to test my own skin I made its not working -_-

 

[CannonFoddr]

When I try to test my own skin I made its not working -_-Check the 'bit-depth' of the graphic (In WinXP - Right click on the graphic > Properties > Summary). Most of the time you need to save the BMP file as '16-bit' and not '24-bit'

Programs like Photoshop and GIMP will allow you to save as 16-bit, but PaintShopPro, MS Paint and (I think) Paint.NET will only save in 24-bit

QUOTEWould it be possible for one of the talented DSTWO skinners to make a nice GBAtemp style skin which would go well with the limited edition GBAtemp SCDS2. I'm kinda surprised that one wasn't made and released with the announcement.

Hmm nice idea.One question - on what 'style' should the skin be made ??

Should it be basically the same as the standard DSTwo skin, but with GBATemp logo's all over it, should it be a 'clean' white-ish skin to match the game card or should it match the GBATemp forum 'skin'... or something totally different (which MIGHT come about as there's been a few suggestion that the Logo on the card MAY indicate a change on the standard GBATemp forum graphics)

Who knows GBATemp may even start a contest up - 'Create a GBATemp skin for the DSTwo Special Edition & win one'

 

[CannonFoddr]

Would it be possible for one of the talented DSTWO skinners to make a nice GBAtemp style skin which would go well with the limited edition GBAtemp SCDS2. I'm kinda surprised that one wasn't made and released with the announcement.

Well it's taken me all this time but I've gone & created 3 'mockups' for GBA DS2 SE screen based on the box cover

Not sure if I'm gonna continue and make a ful set or not yet but I thought I'll post them here so that if anyone want to make a start they can

 

[rockstar99]

Can somebody make a DSi GUI theme skin.Plug in menu resembling DSi firmware.And you can decide on the EOS and loading, try not writing the words Nintendo DSi anywhere on the skin and allow the top screen in the plug in menu to be customized with a photo

 

[Terminator02]

Would it be possible for one of the talented DSTWO skinners to make a nice GBAtemp style skin which would go well with the limited edition GBAtemp SCDS2. I'm kinda surprised that one wasn't made and released with the announcement.Hmm nice idea.One question - on what 'style' should the skin be made ??

Should it be basically the same as the standard DSTwo skin, but with GBATemp logo's all over it, should it be a 'clean' white-ish skin to match the game card or should it match the GBATemp forum 'skin'... or something totally different (which MIGHT come about as there's been a few suggestion that the Logo on the card MAY indicate a change on the standard GBATemp forum graphics)

Who knows GBATemp may even start a contest up - 'Create a GBATemp skin for the DSTwo Special Edition & win one'

it should be clean and match the box/tin/card of the LE DSTwo

QUOTE(CannonFoddr @ Jan 1 2011, 10:38 AM)

Well it's taken me all this time but I've gone & created 3 'mockups' for GBA DS2 SE screen based on the box cover

Not sure if I'm gonna continue and make a ful set or not yet but I thought I'll post them here so that if anyone want to make a start they can

like this, if this asthetic could be skinned onto as much of the dstwo as is possible that would be awesome, either by you or someone else

 

[CannonFoddr]

As mentioned it took me a while - I originally tried to re-create the GBATemp logo (face) as a vector graphic, but just couldn't get the program I was using to do the curves right (I've never used a VECTOR package before), so I cheated & just pasted the logo from the box (after a lot of cropping) directly over a 'dot' background pattern

I've noticed on front page that there is another slightly different version of this, and was wondering - 'what would people prefer?' - my 'attempt' or this other 'cutout' design - as a skin ??

If it's this other one people prefer then I may just wait until the GBATemp 'update' arrives - 'cos usually IIRC the Admin post a copy of it in a larger size for people to use

@Rockstar: just seen your PM to me - Yes I know about the DSi skin post request but as you can see I've been looking into making a LE GBATemp DS2 skin (possibly) & since trying to make a suitable 'copy' of the new GBA logo is taking longer than I thought - it might be better if some1 else has a go

 

[RoMee]

dstwo 'plugin' skin
BlinDedBlack

problem:
missing (down_bk) skin


for some reason Alfadir's street fighter skin is causing my dstwo to freeze with and without imenu
I'll try it wil the ds2tool

 

[CannonFoddr]

@ RoMee: thanks for pointing that out about BlinDedBlack 'down_bk' is missing - I never knew & unfortunately I can't do nothing about it as that skin is hosted 'off-site'.
Unfortunately the 'DS2tool' will download exactly the same skin from the website

The good news is that the ds2skin pack does contain a 'down_bk' graphic
Download the pack & rename the '13025-BlinDedBlack2_12.ds2skin' to '13025-BlinDedBlack2_12.zip' and you can open it up like any other ZIP file to get the required graphic


As for the Streetfighter skin - I've just tried it out myself & it seems to be working OK until I select
[Start] > System Settings > Files > All
- then all I get is the 'IV' (disk icon) flashing

Have you got/had the 'All' selected ?? - if so this could be the reason
Edit 'globalsettings.ini' (in the /_dstwo/ folder) so that 'files=' anything BUT 3 & see if that cures the problem

 

[RoMee]

since my kid is the only one using the dstwo, all my files are always nds only
I went back to alfadir's mario skin and it works fine

I will try the ds2tool and see if I get the same error
alfadir is pretty good with skin so it might just be something I'm doing wrong


as for BlinDedBlack, I'll just alter it, that's what I was gonna do anyways
just wanted to let you so you'll be aware of it

 

[jurassicplayer]

Well I attempted to recreate the GBATemp logo on the front page...and there are various parts that are noticeably not the same...but meh, it was worth a shot.

Spoiler

 

[Terminator02]

As mentioned it took me a while - I originally tried to re-create the GBATemp logo (face) as a vector graphic, but just couldn't get the program I was using to do the curves right (I've never used a VECTOR package before), so I cheated & just pasted the logo from the box (after a lot of cropping) directly over a 'dot' background pattern

I've noticed on front page that there is another slightly different version of this, and was wondering - 'what would people prefer?' - my 'attempt' or this other 'cutout' design - as a skin ??

If it's this other one people prefer then I may just wait until the GBATemp 'update' arrives - 'cos usually IIRC the Admin post a copy of it in a larger size for people to use

@Rockstar: just seen your PM to me - Yes I know about the DSi skin post request but as you can see I've been looking into making a LE GBATemp DS2 skin (possibly) & since trying to make a suitable 'copy' of the new GBA logo is taking longer than I thought - it might be better if some1 else has a go
maybe you could just make a skin using what you previously created for iMenu and then wait to make a skin after the update comes, i just really want a skin for imenu to go with my le dstwo

QUOTE(jurassicplayer @ Jan 7 2011, 03:20 PM) Well I attempted to recreate the GBATemp logo on the front page...and there are various parts that are noticeably not the same...but meh, it was worth a shot.

Spoiler

that's actually pretty good

 

[CannonFoddr]

maybe you could just make a skin using what you previously created for iMenu and then wait to make a skin after the update comes, i just really want a skin for imenu to go with my le dstwo

Erm think you're mistaken - I've never made a skin for iMenu (yet)

 

[Terminator02]

maybe you could just make a skin using what you previously created for iMenu and then wait to make a skin after the update comes, i just really want a skin for imenu to go with my le dstwo

Erm think you're mistaken - I've never made a skin for iMenu (yet)

i think u misunderstood me, maybe you could just make a skin for iMenu using what you previously created, then make a full skin for the rest of the ds2 after the update comes

 

[Alfadir]

for some reason Alfadir's street fighter skin is causing my dstwo to freeze with and without imenu
I'll try it wil the ds2tool

One chinese people had report the same problem as you and his problem was his transflash.
A creepy slow memory ! a fake kingston in his case with a random acces of more than 3ms.

He had changed the transflash and the skin works fine.

Try with the Chuck skin, if you have the same problem, i'm quite sure that is because of your transflash.

Chuck and street fighter skins are using a really big file to be able to make a full screen slideshow so if your memory is really really slow it takes a long time to load this image.

On my transflash and with good and average transflash it's almost instant.

(i hope you will understand my rusty english ^^)

 

[jurassicplayer]

maybe you could just make a skin using what you previously created for iMenu and then wait to make a skin after the update comes, i just really want a skin for imenu to go with my le dstwo

Erm think you're mistaken - I've never made a skin for iMenu (yet)

xD It's obvious you are hiding it somewhere (...well at least half of it):

Spoiler

 

[Terminator02]

maybe you could just make a skin using what you previously created for iMenu and then wait to make a skin after the update comes, i just really want a skin for imenu to go with my le dstwo

Erm think you're mistaken - I've never made a skin for iMenu (yet)

xD It's obvious you are hiding it somewhere (...well at least half of it):

Spoiler

sweet, i love you, i'll put it in my iMenu guide once i can be arsed

Edit: i'll also make this my loading screen

now i just need skins for dsgame, ndsgba, and ndssfc

 

[RoMee]

One chinese people had report the same problem as you and his problem was his transflash.
A creepy slow memory ! a fake kingston in his case with a random acces of more than 3ms.

He had changed the transflash and the skin works fine.

Try with the Chuck skin, if you have the same problem, i'm quite sure that is because of your transflash.

Chuck and street fighter skins are using a really big file to be able to make a full screen slideshow so if your memory is really really slow it takes a long time to load this image.

On my transflash and with good and average transflash it's almost instant.

(i hope you will understand my rusty english ^^)

I'm using a 16GB class 2 sandisk, I guess that is the problem, thanks for clearing that up Shikeishuu .