carts:nintendo:3ds

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Nintendo 3DS

Check the dumping hardware overview for a list of known preservation hardware.

If you need help, please come chat with us on the VGPC or No-Intro discord servers.


Important Notes

  • Unopened games should have their ROM and save data dumped before attempting to play them. This avoids inadvertent modification of the data and helps preserve the game in its unused/“factory” state. Note in your submission whether the physical media was sealed and include a photo of the cart/packaging in its sealed state, if possible.
  • You should clean the physical media's electrical contacts before trying to dump it, and dump it twice, checking if both dumps match using a file comparison tool or calculating the SHA256 of each file and comparing those values.

Dumping Nintendo 3DS carts is fairly easy, and can either be done through homebrew software, or by using a DS flashcart.

You will need an SD card 8GB or larger for this.

  1. SkyDock (todo)

The following method work on all models of the 3DS, 2DS and New 3DS handhelds.

Follow the instructions over at 3DS Hacks Guide for more details on how to get your handheld ready, by enabling it to run 3DS-mode bare metal ARM9 homebrew, and make sure the latest stable GodMode9 is installed/present (v2.0.0 or later).

Note that you do not necessarily need to install custom firmware to run GodMode9 - you can stop following the 3DS Hacks Guide once you get to the point of being able to run a .firm file (or equivalent file for that particular exploit). But for convenience, you may want to follow the 3DS Hacks Guide to the end, so you can easily run GodMode9 at boot.

Dumping

  • Launch GodMode9 by pressing (Start) and then the power button
  • Navigate to [C:] GAMECART
  • Copy the .3ds file without trim in its name and the .txt file to the SD card. If split files show up (for 3DS games that are 4GB or larger), copy all the split parts to the SD card. Note that you can clear the clipboard by pressing select.
  • If you copied the .3ds file in split form, you need to combine them using copy /b part1 + part2 combined on the Windows command line or cat part1 part1 > combined on the Mac OS or Linux terminal. Otherwise, you're done.

TGGRMYVRRR

T = Type
GG = Game code (e.g. DA = nintendogs + cats: Golden Retriever & New Friends)
R = Region (J = Japan, E = USA, P = Europe)
M = Manufacturing month (numbers, then after Sep its X,Y,Z for Oct,Nov,Dec)
Y = Manufacturing year (2010 + value OR 2020 + value, depending)
V = Version (starts at 0)
R = Manufacturing run

Easy way to remember where the version number is: fourth character from the right - this works for DS/i carts too.

Download ctrtool and run

ctrtool --intype=cci --verify dump.3ds > ctrtool_log.txt

(replace dump.3ds with the name of your dump). This will create a file called ctrtool_log.txt, which you should keep alongside the dump.

See Gathering and Submitting Dump Info (Basic)

Based on this No-Intro wiki page and Psykopat's back-of-cart serial research

  • carts/nintendo/3ds.1662899048.txt.gz
  • Last modified: 2022/09/11 12:24
  • by hiccup