Hacking Make firmware child friendly?

[memrat]

Hi all,

I'm running YSmenu (1.17a07) on lads R4 and wanted to know if there was a way to make it more child friendly?

I would like to be able to have it so that they can choose a game, and play it, and that is it. No cheats, DMA or reset. Also, not having the option to delete the game would be good too!

Thank you for any help with this,

M.

 

[injected11]

Why not just teach your kid? Show them every feature, and give a brief explanation, and tell them if they delete the game, they won't ever get it back. People tend to do fewer stupid things when it's clearly explained that it will cause them to lose something.

Either that, or use a less-capable firmware.

 

[rockstar99]

use moonshell 2

 

[memrat]

Hi injected11,

thanks for the reply.

The problem is that he is only four, and most of the games on there are educational/learning, and although we try to use the DS with him, there are times when he does use it on his own (mum making dinner etc.).

Can you recommend a less capable firmware that plays all of the latest games/titles at all please?

Thank you.

 

[memrat]

Hi Rockstar,

I was under the impression that Moonshell was for video watching only? maybe things have moved on in since I was last in the 'scene' (it has been a few years

).

I'll check it out...

Thanks bud.

 

[Jakob95]

Hi Rockstar,

I was under the impression that Moonshell was for video watching only? maybe things have moved on in since I was last in the 'scene' (it has been a few years

).

I'll check it out...

Thanks bud.

It is only for video/music. There is just a special way to let it boot ROMS threw YSmenu

EDIT: You could use this.
http://www.mediafire.com/?zitzwnmynz3

Download it and put it into your MicroSD.

 

[memrat]

Hi Jakob95,

Thanks for the file, I'm grabbing now

Is this all I need on the MicroSD, or does this have to be used in conjunction with what's on my card now, or something else?

Again, thanks for taking the time, appreciated.

 

[twiztidsinz]

Moonshell2 will not load commercial ROMs itself, but Moonshell 2.06 (or older) can use linoul's YSLoader for Moonshell.

It's fairly easy to set up, simply extract the Moonshl2 folder and auto-loading Moonshel2_DirectBoot.nds file to a location you'll have easy access to, like your desktop.

You will now need to DLDI patch the Moonshel2_DirectBoot.nds.
The patcher is here, and the DLDI file is here.
Simply extract the patcher to a folder and put the DLDI file into that folder.
Run the executable file and drop your Moonshel2_DirectBoot.nds onto the window.
Make sure that the top drop down says R4(DS) - Revolution for DS, then click "Patch".

Next we need to 'encrypt' the NDS file so that the R4 will load it as firmware.
For this you'll need r4denc. Just extract it to a folder, and drop the DLDI patched Moonshel2_DirectBoot.nds file onto the r4enc.exe file.
You'll end up with a file called Moonshel2_DirectBoot.nds.DAT, simply rename it to _DS_MENU.DAT

Almost done, now you'll want to make a new YSMenu as an .NDS file since yours is somewhat dated and won't have full compatibility.
You can simply just re-build the YSMenu as you did earlier, but put 1.17a12's DSTT.7z into the YSMenu folder of a2h's YSMenu Generator or into the main R4YSAuto.
This will create all the updated files you'll need, including the R4Patch.dat.
After you built the new YSMenu, place the YSMenu.nds into your TTMenu folder.

Finally all that's left is a little file organization and to copy the files to your card.
If you have both a YSMenu and a TTMenu folder, copy all the files from YSMenu to the TTMenu folder.
Now open the YSLoaderForMS2.rar and you'll see some folders, one of them being Moonshel2, inside that you'll see extlink with two files inside, config.ini and nds.YSLoaderForMS2.nds.
You need to edit the config.ini in your moonshel2\extlink folder.
There are two entries, one for YSMenu.nds, the other for YSMenu.ini.

YSMenu=/ysmenu/ysmenu.nds

YSini=/ysmenu/ysmenu.ini

Change it to read:

YSMenu=/ttmenu/ysmenu.nds

YSini=/ttmenu/ysmenu.ini

Now you can go ahead and copy the Moonshel2 and TTMenu folders to your card, as well as the _DS_MENU.DAT file.
The first time you run Moonshell2 you'll be presented with a small setup window that has some basic options you can set to your liking.

One of the things I like most about Moonshell2 is that it has a great GUI interface, not a simplistic text interface like YSMenu.
Hope this (or another post) helps!

 

[twiztidsinz]

EDIT: You could use this.
http://www.mediafire.com/?zitzwnmynz3

Download it and put it into your MicroSD.

Is that FairyWings Moonshell?

It kind of loks like it, but it has two problems:
1). It can load cheats, which memrat doesn't want.
2). It's somewhat dated, and might not load new games.

 

[memrat]

Hi Twiztidsinz,

Thanks for the detailed writeup!

I'll give it a go and let you know how I get on.

Following the instructions you've posted, will this run all the latest games, and is there anything against running a DS with this setup you know of?

Thanks again,

M.

 

[twiztidsinz]

Hi Twiztidsinz,

Thanks for the detailed writeup!

I'll give it a go and let you know how I get on.

Following the instructions you've posted, will this run all the latest games, and is there anything against running a DS with this setup you know of?

Thanks again,

M.

To the best of my knowledge, as someone who uses Moonshell2 w/ YSMenu loader, the negatives are:[*]"Slower" load time.

• You need to load Moonshell, at boot, then load YSMenu for the game. But honestly, the difference is negligible.

[*]No cheats, No reset, No DMA, Cannot delete files.

• These are all positives for you as they are things you've requested.

[*]Cannot boot Slot-2 or GBA Roms (?)

• Not 100% sure on this, but I've not seen a way to do so, though the later may be possible with a loader.

There seems to be one more negative that I can't seem to recall, but I don't believe it to be anything major.


One thing that I think will be a bonus for you is, Moonshell2 has a 'Favorites' or 'Recently Used' which will list the last 5 loaded NDS files.
This makes the picking the more popular games quicker and easier as you don't have to find them in the games folder.

 

[memrat]

Hi again,

Just followed the instructions and it booted to setup window as you described, but it was all in Chinese/Japanese. Could you tell me how to change the default language to English please?

Thanks again.

 

[twiztidsinz]

Hi again,

Just followed the instructions and it booted to setup window as you described, but it was all in Chinese/Japanese. Could you tell me how to change the default language to English please?

Thanks again.

The Language Select didn't appear on first run? Odd, but not a problem!
If you start at a screen with 4~5 icons (or none), press the L button to change to "Accessory" and run the Language Select tool.
English is "000", all the way at the top (just keep pressing Up).

If you start at the File Browser, press Select and then select the tool.


If for some reason you have another issue, like Moonshell fails at startup, let me know.

 

[memrat]

Hi,

Again, thanks for taking the time...

When I switch on I get the options screen you mentioned (I guess, it's in Japanese I think).

Whilst on this screen, if I press 'A', it takes me to a screen similar to your screen grab above. If I select the language select tool however, I get an error: not found /ysmenu/ysmenu.nds

I'm just about to hit the sack here, but I'll continue this tomorrow. If you can think of where I may of gone wrong, and can point me in the right direction then that'd be great.

Maybe a silly question, but can this be downloaded 'as is' without me compiling it myself, or is there a need to do it this way?

Thanks again for any help.

 

[twiztidsinz]

Hi,

Again, thanks for taking the time...

When I switch on I get the options screen you mentioned (I guess, it's in Japanese I think).

Whilst on this screen, if I press 'A', it takes me to a screen similar to your screen grab above. If I select the language select tool however, I get an error: not found /ysmenu/ysmenu.nds

I'm just about to hit the sack here, but I'll continue this tomorrow. If you can think of where I may of gone wrong, and can point me in the right direction then that'd be great.

Maybe a silly question, but can this be downloaded 'as is' without me compiling it myself, or is there a need to do it this way?

Thanks again for any help.Sorry! Oversight on my part!!
I forgot to mention a step that you'll need.
First, you need to edit the config.ini in your moonshel2\extinfo extlink folder.
There are two entries, one for YSMenu.nds, the other for YSMenu.ini.

YSMenu=/ysmenu/ysmenu.nds

YSini=/ysmenu/ysmenu.ini

Change it to read:
CODEYSMenu=/ttmenu/ysmenu.nds

YSini=/ttmenu/ysmenu.ini

You also need to build YSMenu as an NDS file and place the NDS file into your TTmenu folder

 

[h8isgr8]

Forgetting moonshell for a moment.......

I can help with at least one of the original requests. You can turn off the file delete feature in YSMenu by editing the INI.

; Disable File Deletion
NO_DEL=true

 

[memrat]

Hi again twiztidsinz,

Thanks for the extra info regarding the config.ini.

I have been out visiting relatives all day, but I'm back now and will be trying out again from scratch.

There are a couple of things though, firstly, my config.ini file is in a folder called 'extlink' not 'extinfo', is this correct? Secondly, what would be the easiest way of building YSmenu as an .nds file?

Thanks again.

Ah, btw, h8isgr8, thanks for the info. I'm kinda intrigued in this Moonshell project now, but will bear this in mind, cheers.

 

[twiztidsinz]

There are a couple of things though, firstly, my config.ini file is in a folder called 'extlink' not 'extinfo', is this correct?Yes, I'm an idiot

extinfo = extinfo.dat, it's a DSTT file.
extlink = external link for files not natively supported by moonshell.

QUOTE(memrat @ Dec 28 2009, 02:14 PM) Secondly, what would be the easiest way of building YSmenu as an .nds file?

I personally use R4YSAuto, but a2h's YSMenu Generator is probably easier to use as it has a GUI interface.
You can find the updated DSTT v1.17a12 here: http://www.mediafire.com/?wy0mmjqyqew

Be sure that after you finish making your YSMenu that you put the YSMenu.nds file into your TTMenu folder.
I've also gone back and updated the previous posts with the additional and corrected information so the 'guide' should be accurate.

 

[memrat]

Twiztidsinz,

Just a quick post to say thank you. All has gone well, and the new menu looks great.

Thanks for taking you time to explain (with pictures) everything for me. I have already pointed your post out to others that I know who would like to do something similar, and I'm sure that your post will be helpful to others too...

All the best,

M.

 

[twiztidsinz]

Twiztidsinz,

Just a quick post to say thank you. All has gone well, and the new menu looks great.

Thanks for taking you time to explain (with pictures) everything for me. I have already pointed your post out to others that I know who would like to do something similar, and I'm sure that your post will be helpful to others too...

All the best,

M.

Congrats and you're very welcome!
Glad everything worked out for you.