Hacking How To make USB Game Channels

[Dantarion]

@Howard:

I used your tool to unpack and pack the opening.bnr to fix the header...

Like this

u8tool -file opening.bnr -folder BANNER\ -extract -DVD

u8tool -file opening.bin -folder BANNER\ -pack -IMET -Title "PES 2009"

Channel displays as full black once installed. Opening.bnr was 307,288 bytes, after packing Opening.bin became 307,200 bytes..

any idea why?

Thats exactly the way I did it, except I am batching it and don't have the -title param.
It worked fine for me

 

[wi_takeru]

i tryed it with DB3, the Banner is fine but i start the Channel, the Screen turn black and nothing happend. Whats wrong?

 

[wiiman123]

.........

 

[WiiCrazy]

Well by the way, unpacking and packing is only needed if you want to change the channel name, otherwise it's not needed... Sd card copying and stuff all working...

 

[Sahduk]

JUst wow O_O

 

[Dermy]

Right, I have been able to get my Opening.bnr though ftpii eventually. My question now is, how do i get the GameID for each channel.

Is it possible to make these channels without actually having the ISO on your computer??

I've been using this http://www.usbgecko.com/codes/

 

[Don Killah]

Nice tut, really.
But i'm still wondering about all this usb channel's craze... Doesn't it eats up nand blocks for nothing?

 

[spiritofcat]

Nice tut, really.
But i'm still wondering about all this usb channel's craze... Doesn't it eats up nand blocks for nothing?

The channels I have use 4-7 blocks each.
I have 650 blocks free, so I think I'll survive.
Especially considering that there's only 4 pages of system menu, with 12 slots each.
That's only a maximum of 48 channels, so even if they were 10 blocks each that would be 480 blocks.

Anyway, this thread is ancient history now. People shouldn't have to craft USB game channels by hand anymore.
HowardC has made an excelent app to do it automatically: http://gbatemp.net/index.php?showtopic=146177

 

[troa11]

Nice tut, really.
But i'm still wondering about all this usb channel's craze... Doesn't it eats up nand blocks for nothing?

The channels I have use 4-7 blocks each.
I have 650 blocks free, so I think I'll survive.
Especially considering that there's only 4 pages of system menu, with 12 slots each.
That's only a maximum of 48 channels, so even if they were 10 blocks each that would be 480 blocks.

Anyway, this thread is ancient history now. People shouldn't have to craft USB game channels by hand anymore.
HowardC has made an excelent app to do it automatically: http://gbatemp.net/index.php?showtopic=146177

Unfortunately not everyone can use that yet...I myself still have incompatibility problems.

Either way, you didn't mention the SD menu. In testing the channel wads I've shared I had over 8 pages of loader channels on it. Even with a 2gb sd card, emulators and roms up the wazoo, I still have a ton of free space to play with.

 

[spiritofcat]

Nice tut, really.
But i'm still wondering about all this usb channel's craze... Doesn't it eats up nand blocks for nothing?

The channels I have use 4-7 blocks each.
I have 650 blocks free, so I think I'll survive.
Especially considering that there's only 4 pages of system menu, with 12 slots each.
That's only a maximum of 48 channels, so even if they were 10 blocks each that would be 480 blocks.

Anyway, this thread is ancient history now. People shouldn't have to craft USB game channels by hand anymore.
HowardC has made an excelent app to do it automatically: http://gbatemp.net/index.php?showtopic=146177

Unfortunately not everyone can use that yet...I myself still have incompatibility problems.

Either way, you didn't mention the SD menu. In testing the channel wads I've shared I had over 8 pages of loader channels on it. Even with a 2gb sd card, emulators and roms up the wazoo, I still have a ton of free space to play with.

Does BNRBandit also not work for you? http://gbatemp.net/index.php?showtopic=146057&st=0

I didn't mention the SD menu because I'm on 3.2
But then again, if you have an SD menu, you also have compatibility with 32GB SD cards, and that's a LOT of space to play with, so once again there's no problem.

 

[troa11]

BNRBandit probably works...but since I do a bunch at once it's actually been faster to do it my old fashioned way. At any rate you're right, the guide is out of date, but you only mentioned HowardC's tool before so that's why I pointed out what I did. I'm sure BNRBandit is a good app for that. I just like to be able to control which loader dol I use and exactly what my channel ID is going to be, and no one's been able to answer me if these automated apps support control over either of those.

 

[TeenTin]

BNRBandit is NOT WORKING for me. Poor compatibility. Stickly to U8Tool is vital !!!

 

[Fat Cow]

how many channels actually display as ??? when you just rename opening.bnr to 000000.app?

 

[jebrown19]

Hey Great Tutorial, works like a charm.

I've got one question,

Is it possible to Hard code A Force NTSC Mode into these channels, I'm trying to create a NSTC Channel to play the PAL version of Family SKi.

Is this something that can be done through VC or is it more complicated then that?

I've looked around for some information on how to Force Mode but can only find how to do it in launchers not how to actually code it into a channel.

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks.

 

[jebrown19]

Any ideas on this?

I'm assuming it would be in the Initial dol file used, but I'm not sure.

Thanks again.

 

[WiiCrazy]

@jebrown19
If you can test I may compile one of the video mode forcing stuff to be usable with Crap...
Could you test one of the open source ones and tell me which one works for the specific case you mentinoned...

ps: by the way, did you tested YAL with region override?

 

[jebrown19]

Thanks WiiCrazy,

I was able to successfully create channels for all my other games (deadly creatures NTSC, NPPL Paintball NTSC to name a few) with the Yal.dol provided in this tutorial and I can use the NTSC channels that are being posted on a few of the threads here.

The issue I'm having is with Family Ski PAL and Mario Tennis PAL, which will load through a USB loader if it is in FORCE NTSC mode, I just can't seem to replicate those results through a channel.

I tried using VC to change the region codes in YAL if that's what you mean, but with no success.

Thanks

 

[WiiCrazy]

Ok, currently working on one of the mods that has ocarina, force modes and language selection... I'm currently working on them to make them all configurable from my Crap application... hang on if you want to test them on channels...

ps: I want to incorporate parental controls into the wad I create with the Crap tool... any info in this regard appreciated... I don't think anyone tested this on wads though...hmm or were they checked in the games? I should possibly try this on house of the dead overkill..

 

[jebrown19]

Hey,

sorry about the delay in response, damn work gets in the way of everything these days. Let me know when you're complete your mod. I'll give it a whirl and see how it works.

As for the parental controls, what are you looking for?? I'm the only one who uses my wii (besides my Girlfriend to watch movies or play boom blox every once and a while) so I haven't dabbled with them too much but I'll test out anything you need testing.

 

[WiiCrazy]

I finished modding Sorg's usb loader mod.. you can test it...
here :
http://gbatemp.net/index.php?showtopic=147019

As for parental controls that was a question for the public, it seems I failed to express that so

Channels has specific attributes in their tmd file regarding parental controls... dunno how they work tough... I should wiibrew them...