Hacking Luma3DS LayeredFS lag issue (Dragon Quest 8)

[8BitWalugi]

Hi there,
So I'm trying to use Luma's LayeredFS to play my cart copy of DQ8 with the Japanese orchestral soundtrack (yet keeping the English voices). The issue I'm coming up with is that every time the game is loading music/voice (off SD and cart), it starts to freeze and jump intermittently. I've tried several different methods (Just music files, music+voice files, a packed romfs file, the entire game's romfs but with orchestral music, etc) with no luck.
I was wondering if anyone's experienced this issue before, and if there's a fix. Thanks in advance

EDIT: Just figured I'd add, when I used a romfs file (luma\titles\000400000018F200\romfs (just file, no extension) nothing happened. No music replacement at all.

 

[8BitWalugi]

I hate to do this, but uh, bump? I don't know if it's an issue other games have too but it might be helpful to look into.

 

[nl255]

Did you report it as an issue on Luma's github page?

 

[PrincessLillie]

This is an issue with LayeredFS itself and not Luma. It tends to lag and there's nothing we can do about it. Sorry!

 

[8BitWalugi]

This is an issue with LayeredFS itself and not Luma. It tends to lag and there's nothing we can do about it. Sorry!

Hm, damn. Any idea how hard it would be to make an NTR plugin to swap the audio files?

 

[PrincessLillie]

Hm, damn. Any idea how hard it would be to make an NTR plugin to swap the audio files?

That would be no use. Your best bet is to rebuild the CIA of the game with the music files replaced.

 

[8BitWalugi]

That would be no use. Your best bet is to rebuild the CIA of the game with the music files replaced.

I'll probably end up doing that. Damn

 

[Aurora Wright]

Loading files from SD takes longer than the romfs, especially if it's a lot of files (modern SDs have very high read and write speeds but crappy latency/random access time). Maybe reformatting with a large cluster size (I use 64K) would help

 

[nl255]

Loading files from SD takes longer than the romfs, especially if it's a lot of files (modern SDs have very high read and write speeds but crappy latency/random access time). Maybe reformatting with a large cluster size (I use 64K) would help

I could have sworn I have seen several posts about NTR being better at not having lag (or as much lag) as Luma's layeredfs. Is that no longer the case?

 

[8BitWalugi]

Loading files from SD takes longer than the romfs, especially if it's a lot of files (modern SDs have very high read and write speeds but crappy latency/random access time). Maybe reformatting with a large cluster size (I use 64K) would help

Hrm, I'll try that out and report back. It sounds like it'll help

Edit: Okay, formatted to 64kb cluster usinh GodMode9. Time to copy my stuff back on, eta 10 hours... (That's what I get for using a 64GB micro SD card)

Edit 2: Windows was lying, 1 hour to go

 

[8BitWalugi]

Alright finally finished.

The good news is I didn't mess up my SD card. The bad news is is that nothing changed. The game's still jumping when loading BGM off SD.

 

[Aurora Wright]

I could have sworn I have seen several posts about NTR being better at not having lag (or as much lag) as Luma's layeredfs. Is that no longer the case?

I didn't really compare but Luma's approach can't really be improved, literally all it does is mounting SD once and then use fsOpenFileDirectly every time the game tries to open a file from SD...

 

[8BitWalugi]

I didn't really compare but Luma's approach can't really be improved, literally all it does is mounting SD once and then use fsOpenFileDirectly every time the game tries to open a file from SD...

I used NTR to play Dragon Quest 7 with the orchestral soundtrack with no issue. DQ8 on the other hand is loading the voice files from cart, with music from SD. I did test voice files on the SD but still had the same issue. How do I make a plugin for NTR to test this approach? Or alternatively, would creating a romfs file help?

 

[PrincessLillie]

I used NTR to play Dragon Quest 7 with the orchestral soundtrack with no issue. DQ8 on the other hand is loading the voice files from cart, with music from SD. I did test voice files on the SD but still had the same issue. How do I make a plugin for NTR to test this approach? Or alternatively, would creating a romfs file help?

I don't believe LayeredFS is compatible with romfs files.

 

[8BitWalugi]

I went and re-structured my sound files, and to my surprise it worked perfectly!

All I did was put the bmg off SD card, turns out the voice files were also there.

So to recap
64kb cluster+orchestral BGM files (no voice) = smooth gameplay experience off cartridge

Hopefully this helps anyone in the future that might encounter this issue

 

[PabloMK7]

I went and re-structured my sound files, and to my surprise it worked perfectly!

All I did was put the bmg off SD card, turns out the voice files were also there.

So to recap
64kb cluster+orchestral BGM files (no voice) = smooth gameplay experience off cartridge

Hopefully this helps anyone in the future that might encounter this issue

You could give OnionFS (NTR plugin) a try, but since it does almost the same thing as luma, you will most likely experience the same problem.

 

[8BitWalugi]

You could give OnionFS (NTR plugin) a try, but since it does almost the same thing as luma, you will most likely experience the same problem.

No no I just said I solved it. I was loading voice and orchestral BGM on 64kb cluster and gettting lag.

32kb cluster (assumed previous SD card cluster type)
-BGM only, romfs folder = lag
-BGM+voice, romfs folder = lag
-BGM romfs file = didn't work

64kb cluster (new SD card cluster type)
-BGM only = worked perfectly
-BGM+voice = lag