Just in case anyone was thinking of trying this, don't waste your time and money.
So the Wii U has had "preloading" for a while now, ever since Super Smash Bros, which was a really nifty feature since the eShop is always slow at downloading and can get tied up when big titles release. Basically, you'd pay the full price right away, and it would download the game to your console, with the caveat that you can't play it before its release date.
Nintendo is doing that on the 3DS now as well. They had it available for Codename STEAM in Japan, and now in the US you can preload Puzzle and Dragons Z + SMB edition. Since I want that game anyway, I went ahead and paid the $30 and downloaded it.
The text on the eShop mentions that the game will have to download a "small update" at launch to be able to run. But I thought I'd look into it anyway.
Dumped and decrypted my tickets and used CDNto3DS to download it. Tried a .3ds first, and it did show up on my Gateway - it even had the "manual" icon (which the preloaded version does not, it only has Open like old software, and when you click it it tells you it isn't out yet). But when I clicked on Manual it gave me "The game card has been removed" error. If I tried to launch the game itself, I get a "Licensed by Nintendo" on the bottom screen and the top just has the Nintendo 3DS animation playing forever until I do a hard shutdown of the system. It completely hangs. And my emuNAND is on 9.7 so it's not a firmware issue.
I tried installing the .cia version next. Same thing happens, and it does something I've never seen before (since I don't take my SD out of the system when it's on...) when I try to open the manual it says "The SD card has been removed" instead of game card.
So is it possible to get a preloaded game to run before it's officially released? Maybe, who knows. I might try using CDNto3DS again with the same values once the game is out officially and see if it creates a different file. It could just be stubbed on the CDN to prevent people from hacking it, since Nintendo is well aware we can do that now.
Just thought I'd post this to share my findings, and in case anyone was considering trying it, now you know it won't work, if you want the game anyway go ahead, but don't waste your money buying a game just to try to hack it to play early if you weren't going to pay for it anyway.
Edit: I should mention, on the preloaded version it has text on the bottom of the top screen saying "Days until distribution starts: 8", the same font/placement as use-limited demos. When you click Open it connects to the Internet and just says to wait. If you turn the wireless switch off it simply tries to connect and gives error 003-0299 saying wireless communication is disabled. Pic
So the Wii U has had "preloading" for a while now, ever since Super Smash Bros, which was a really nifty feature since the eShop is always slow at downloading and can get tied up when big titles release. Basically, you'd pay the full price right away, and it would download the game to your console, with the caveat that you can't play it before its release date.
Nintendo is doing that on the 3DS now as well. They had it available for Codename STEAM in Japan, and now in the US you can preload Puzzle and Dragons Z + SMB edition. Since I want that game anyway, I went ahead and paid the $30 and downloaded it.
The text on the eShop mentions that the game will have to download a "small update" at launch to be able to run. But I thought I'd look into it anyway.
Dumped and decrypted my tickets and used CDNto3DS to download it. Tried a .3ds first, and it did show up on my Gateway - it even had the "manual" icon (which the preloaded version does not, it only has Open like old software, and when you click it it tells you it isn't out yet). But when I clicked on Manual it gave me "The game card has been removed" error. If I tried to launch the game itself, I get a "Licensed by Nintendo" on the bottom screen and the top just has the Nintendo 3DS animation playing forever until I do a hard shutdown of the system. It completely hangs. And my emuNAND is on 9.7 so it's not a firmware issue.
I tried installing the .cia version next. Same thing happens, and it does something I've never seen before (since I don't take my SD out of the system when it's on...) when I try to open the manual it says "The SD card has been removed" instead of game card.
So is it possible to get a preloaded game to run before it's officially released? Maybe, who knows. I might try using CDNto3DS again with the same values once the game is out officially and see if it creates a different file. It could just be stubbed on the CDN to prevent people from hacking it, since Nintendo is well aware we can do that now.
Just thought I'd post this to share my findings, and in case anyone was considering trying it, now you know it won't work, if you want the game anyway go ahead, but don't waste your money buying a game just to try to hack it to play early if you weren't going to pay for it anyway.
Edit: I should mention, on the preloaded version it has text on the bottom of the top screen saying "Days until distribution starts: 8", the same font/placement as use-limited demos. When you click Open it connects to the Internet and just says to wait. If you turn the wireless switch off it simply tries to connect and gives error 003-0299 saying wireless communication is disabled. Pic
He/them/IT does