nxnative-easy/AGENTS.md

Notes for agents

• This repository runs Nintendo Switch games natively on Apple platforms: the game's own code runs, rewritten only where Apple's kernel requires it. Fifty-eight games are playable on the iPhone: Super Mario Bros. Wonder (update 1.2.1, profile 010015100B514000), Fire Emblem Engage (update 2.0.0, 0100A6301214E000), Metroid Dread (update 2.1.0, 010093801237C000), 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim (update 1.10, 01003FC01670C000), Super Mario 3D World + Bowser's Fury (update 1.2.2, 010028600EBDA000), The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (update 1.9.0, SDK 20, 01007EF00011E000), The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening (update 1.1.0, SDK 8, 01006BB00C6F0000) Super Mario Odyssey (update 1.4.1, SDK 7, 0100000000010000), Hades (update 1.0.38233, SDK 9, 0100535012974000), Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity (update 1.3.0, SDK 9.6, 01002B00111A2000), Fire Emblem: Three Houses (update 1.2.0, SDK 6.5, 010055D009F78000), Super Mario Galaxy (update 1.3.1, SDK 18, 010099C022B96000) The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom (update 1.4.3, SDK 20, 0100F2C0115B6000) Monster Hunter Rise (update 16.0.2, SDK 11.4.3, 0100B04011742000), Ace Attorney Investigations Collection (update 1.0.0.2, SDK 17.5.3, 010005501E68C000), Hades II (base game, SDK 19.3.9, 0100A00019DE0000), Unicorn Overlord (update 1.05, SDK 16.2.4, 010069401ADB8000), Rhythm Heaven Groove (base game 1.0.0, SDK 21.4.0, 0100D9F01D474000), Octopath Traveler 0 (update 1.0.5, SDK 19.3.13, 01005270232F2000), Pokémon Legends: Z-A (update 2.0.2, SDK 19.3.11, 0100F43008C44000), Cuphead (update 1.3.7, SDK 5.5.0, 0100A5C00D162000), Super Mario Galaxy 2 (update 1.4.0, SDK 18.3.5, 0100FD8022DAA000), FINAL FANTASY TACTICS - The Ivalice Chronicles (update 1.4.0, SDK 19.3.9, 010038B015560000), Absolum (update 1.1.1, SDK 18.3.2, 0100A83022A22000), Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker (update 1.4.2, SDK 8.2.0, 01009BF0072D4000) and Brain Memory Training Academy (base game 1.0.0, SDK 16.2.4, 0100F5D01DA3A000), The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles (base game 1.0.0, SDK 10.4.1, 010036E00FB20000), STEINS;GATE RE:BOOT (update 1.0.3, SDK 20.5.17, 01008BC024FDE000), Big Brain Academy: Brain vs. Brain (update 1.2.0, SDK 11.4.3, 0100620012D6E000), Patrick's Parabox (update 1.0.1, SDK 13.3.7, 0100E44016C22000), Celeste (update 1.4.1.1, SDK 15.3.2, 01002B30028F6000), DRAGON QUEST XI S: Echoes of an Elusive Age – Definitive Edition (update 1.0.4, SDK 7.3.2, 01006C300E9F0000), Monster Train 2 (update 1.1.1, SDK 18.3.5, 010051701FB46000), Raging Loop (base game 1.0.0, SDK 7.3.2, 010020400E1C2000), DARK SOULS: REMASTERED (update 1.0.3, SDK 4.5.0, 01004AB00A260000), Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door (update 1.0.1, SDK 15.3.2, 0100ECD018EBE000), Hollow Knight: Silksong (update 1.0.30000, SDK 20.5.8, 010013C00E930000), Catherine: Full Body (update 1.0.1a, SDK 8.2.1, 0100BF00112C0000), Digimon Story Cyber Sleuth: Complete Edition (update 1.0.3, SDK 6.4.0, 010014E00DB56000), Animal Crossing: New Horizons (update 3.0.3, SDK 20.5.4, 01006F8002326000), DRAGON QUEST VII Reimagined (update 1.2.0, SDK 19.3.1, 0100A9D01C446000), FINAL FANTASY RESONANCE (update 1.0.1, SDK 20.5.17, 0100606026F12000), Luigi's Mansion 3 (update 1.4.0, SDK 7.3.2, 0100DCA0064A6000), AI: THE SOMNIUM FILES (update 1.0.1, SDK 6.4.2, 010089B00D09C000), ANIMAL WELL (update 1.0.10, SDK 20.5.7, 010020D01AD24000), AI: THE SOMNIUM FILES - nirvanA Initiative (update 1.0.2, SDK 13.3.5, 0100713016CCC000), Mario Kart 8 Deluxe (update 4.0.0, SDK 4.4.0, 0100152000022000), Balatro (update 1.1.3, SDK 18.3.2, 0100CD801CE5E000), ROMANCE OF THE THREE KINGDOMS 8 REMAKE (update 1.1.3, SDK 17.5.3, 0100C2A01A730000), Taiko Risshiden V DX (update 1.1.1, SDK 12.3.3, 0100346017304000), Super Smash Bros. Ultimate (update 13.0.5, SDK 8.2.1, 01006A800016E000), Bayonetta 3 (update 1.2.0, SDK 13.3.2, 01004A4010FEA000), Advance Wars 1+2: Re-Boot Camp (base game 1.0.0, SDK 10.4.1, 0100300012F2A000) Pokémon Sword (update 1.3.2, SDK 7.3.2, 0100ABF008968000), Pikmin 4 (update 1.1.1, SDK 10.4.8, 0100B7C00933A000), Stardew Valley (update 1.6.15.13, SDK 20.5.27, 0100E65002BB8000), BALL x PIT (update 1.293, SDK 20.5.19, 010086A022444000) and Mario vs. Donkey Kong (update 1.0.1, SDK 15.3.0, 0100B99019412000). Hades renders with Vulkan, which the host implements on Metal (dm/gfx/vk/hle_vk.m; main imports Vulkan, not NVN). Age of Calamity is Koei Tecmo's KTGL engine: files in RDB archives, shaders as GLSLC outputs (shader_split.py idrk_shaders). Three Houses is KTGL too; 9 of its shaders exist only as compiles of the game's own GLSLC at run time, captured once on the Mac (its main holds GLSL sources and imports glslcCompile). Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom run at 60 fps through a frame step the host decides in whole vsyncs (FRAME_STEP in their profiles' patches.py, nvn_fstep.h, profile keys fps_target and frame_step); Tears of the Kingdom has a 5 GB guest layout, and its sdk build (Breath of the Wild's) has the SDK's address-region node area cut (sdk_patches.py): without it the resource heaps ran out of alias region at the first descent from the Great Sky Island and the game played its memory-shortage Blood Moon, which put Link back at the start (its log shows MSF). Monster Hunter Rise is Capcom's RE Engine: files in KPKA PAK archives (shader_split.py kpka_jobs, shaders in SDF files), the base game an XCI, its GPU heap a 64 GB sparse virtual pool (hle_nvn.c vpool_*, a 4 KB page table the replay reads textures through); it runs at 60 fps (30 on the Switch). Super Mario Galaxy is the Wii game on NERD's Hagi layer (PowerPC code recompiled into main), renders with Vulkan, and generates its shaders at run time, which the NSP script captures on the Mac (no SPIR-V file in its RomFS); its pointer is the touch screen in handheld mode (profile key op_mode). Ace Attorney Investigations Collection is Unity 2022 IL2CPP: its shaders keep their parameters as blob entries of their own (shader_split.py unity_code_blobs), and its C# file API goes through the SDK's C library, whose path checks the host answers (hle_fs.c IsPathMounted and the length limits). Hades II, unlike Hades, renders with NVN; its shaders bind textures at fixed slots up to 34 (slot 34's handle lies in the driver's image table, dmsh_build.py), and the two long lines through Melinoë while the staff's Omega attack charges are the game's own aim lines, not a rendering bug. Unicorn Overlord is Vanillaware's engine like 13 Sentinels (shaders compiled into main); both need the profile key alloc_big_align, which aligns large allocations to 64 KB so the ring heaps the engine cuts from a memory pool fit. Rhythm Heaven Groove is Nintendo's own 2D engine on SDK 21, the newest SDK so far (its DSP command list has no magic, hle_audren.c); it plays handheld with Boost (profile keys op_mode handheld, perf_mode boost), which skips its TV latency calibration and keeps its 1920x1080 draw size. Octopath Traveler 0 is Unreal Engine 5: everything in one pak with an AES-encrypted index whose key is found in main (dm/gfx/tools/uepak.py), its shaders Oodle-compressed in the pak's shader code archives and decoded once on the Mac by the game's own Oodle (any game with Unreal paks, DM_OODLE_JOB), its allocator replaced by the host's because Unreal's reserves 37 GB of address space (a cut in its patches.py, hle_uemalloc.c), its address region capped by the game's own argument (profile key game_args), and the particle shaders that pick a texture slot at run time bound by slot (profile key tex_dyn_slots); it runs at 60 fps (30 on the Switch) because the host writes Unreal's t.MaxFPS and rhi.SyncInterval in game memory (hle_fpslock.c, profile key fps_target). Pokémon Legends: Z-A is Game Freak's Trinity engine: everything in the packs of arc/data.trpfs (FlatBuffers, every file Oodle-compressed), which the shader split decodes with the game's own decoder in the Mac host's tool mode (shader_split.py trinity_shaders, hle_oodle.c DM_OODLE_SERVE); its 12 GB StandardAllocator is cut to 4 GB to fit a 5 GB guest layout, and the host refuses maps past the pool as Horizon does (profile key mem_map_limit); its characters are skinned with transform feedback (dmsh_build.py vs_tf, nvn_mtl.m tf_draw), and its occlusion queries, which decide how characters are animated, need the draw's base instance in the driver segment (c0 + 0x644, encode_args). Cuphead is Unity 2017.4 IL2CPP on SDK 5.5.0: Unity 2017's serialized and Shader formats are read by unityfs.py / shader_split.py, its rewritten modules (80 MB) need the profile key mem_used above the default 64 MB, or its SetHeapSize fails, and its NVN pool allocator breaks on a zero-size block, so the host never reports a ZCull storage size of 0 (hle_nvn.c zcull_size). Super Mario Galaxy 2 is Galaxy's Hagi layer with Galaxy's sdk build; its movie player reserves 384 MB of virtual address memory, which fits only because a rewriter cut on that sdk build shrinks the SDK's address-region node area to 62 MB (sdk_patches.py; the profile's alias region is 512 MB). FINAL FANTASY TACTICS - The Ivalice Chronicles is Square Enix's engine on NVN: its shaders are GLSLC outputs in loose technique files, which shader_split.py reads in any RomFS file no other reader takes; its UI textures are written by the CPU into uncached pools (profile keys tex_flush_upload, tex_dirty_upload); and two job-pool workers share one auto-clear event, so a build cut makes a worker woken in another's place pass the wake on (its patches.py). Absolum is FNA (XNA 4 in C#) on .NET NativeAOT with SDL3 and FNA3D's NVN driver: its main starts its text with 1.7 MB of data the rewriter leaves alone (nso_code.py), its shaders are GLSLC outputs in shaders.nx.bin, its picture is flipped by a viewport swizzle the host applies, and everything lives in virtual address memory: malloc's 40 GB StandardAllocator is cut to 2.5 GB and the SDK's node area and large-region alignment are cut (its patches.py and sdk_patches.py), and the .NET GC's region range is 1.5 GB (profile key game_env), to fit a 5 GB guest layout. Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker is Nintendo EPD Tokyo's engine (the al library over sead / agl, as 3D World and Odyssey) and needed no host change: it plays handheld because its pointer is the touch screen there (the Joy-Con gyro docked; profile key op_mode), and agl's post-effect program that samples its own attachment reads a snapshot (profile key feedback_snap). Brain Memory Training Academy is Unity 2022.3 IL2CPP with no bundles: its serialized files carry no type trees and nothing lends it a Shader tree, so unityfs.py has Unity 2022.3's Shader layout written out (KNOWN_TREES), and like Ace Attorney Investigations Collection it needs the SDK's address-region node area cut on its sdk build (sdk_patches.py). The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles is Capcom's MT Framework: files in ARC archives of zlib entries, its 460 shaders in one shader package inside one of them (shader_split.py mtspk_shaders); it copies its textures into a CPU-cached pool after creating them and never flushes (its main has no cache maintenance at all), so it needs tex_flush_upload and tex_dirty_upload like FINAL FANTASY TACTICS. STEINS;GATE RE:BOOT is M2's ADV engine (E-mote characters, PSB archives, H.264 movies through the SDK's movie library): it needed nn::audio::SetAudioOutVolume (hle_audio.c), and because it decodes every picture into one reused region of a pool that lives for good, the storage-sharing texture table now drops an entry whose storage another texture takes over (nvn_mtl.m alias_take_over); it draws 1280x720 in both modes by its own choice. Big Brain Academy: Brain vs. Brain is NintendoWare Bezel Engine 1.56: nearly all of RomFS is in Bezel Engine archives of zstd entries, its shaders in their .bfsha entries (shader_split.py bea_members); its nninitStartup sets a heap or a 60 GB virtual address region by IsVirtualAddressMemoryEnabled, so the host reports the NPDM's system resource (profile key sys_resource, 0 here); its activity previews loop the movie decoder with Flush and Start from four threads (hle_movie.c); and it plays handheld with Boost (profile keys op_mode handheld, perf_mode boost), because only handheld does it read the touch screen. Patrick's Parabox is Unity 2020.3 IL2CPP with no bundles: unityfs.py has Unity 2020.3's Shader layout written out (KNOWN_TREES), it needs the SDK's address-region node area cut on its sdk build like Brain Memory Training Academy (sdk_patches.py), and Unity's player hands the shared fonts straight to FreeType, so a game that imports no ScalableFontEngineHelper::Decode gets the TTF itself (hle_sdk16.c font_skip). Celeste is MonoGame for the Switch, its C# compiled to C++ by Sickhead's BRUTE: its shaders are MonoGame effects (MGFX) in its XNB files and in main (shader_split.py mgfx_effect), and it needed no host change. DRAGON QUEST XI S is Unreal Engine 4.18: legacy paks with LZ5 blocks, decoded on the Mac by the game's own LZ5 (uepak.py, hle_oodle.c), its shaders inline in the cooked packages (shader_split.py ue_legacy_jobs), and the slice-writing geometry shader of its colour-grading LUT folded into the vertex shader (dmsh_build.py gs_slice, nvn_mtl.m prog_fold_gs); Square Enix's sound driver never waits on the renderer event, so audio catch-up frames wait for queue space (hle_audren.c); its movie player plays only once every track holds a decoded output, so audio movie decoders keep 32 (hle_movie.c); and its Unreal region is capped at 4064 MB (profile key game_args, MB up to 4095) with the node area and large-region alignment cut on its SDK 7.3.2 build (sdk_patches.py) for a 5 GB guest layout; it runs at 60 fps (30 on the Switch) because the host writes Unreal's t.MaxFPS and nvn.SyncInterval in game memory (hle_fpslock.c, profile key fps_target). Monster Train 2 is Unity 2022.3 IL2CPP on Super Mario Galaxy's SDK 18.3.5 sdk build: Unity creates a thread only when nn::os::GetFreeThreadCount (svcGetInfo type 24, hle_svc.c) is at least 1; its MP4 intro needs a movie audio decoder with more output slots than a video one, because Unity's player holds about half a second of audio before it plays (hle_movie.c MD_NOUT); and its post-processing compute shaders (the colour grading LUT among them) are Unity ComputeShader objects, which shader_split.py reads (unity_compute) with Unity 2022.3's layout written out in unityfs.py. It reads no touch, so it stays docked with the 3D pad layout, and it runs at 60 fps (30 on the Switch) with the profile key present_interval display, as its animations follow the time that passed. Raging Loop is Unity 2018.3 IL2CPP with no bundles on DRAGON QUEST XI S's sdk and subsdk0 builds: unityfs.py has Unity 2018.3's Shader layout written out (KNOWN_TREES, an older form than the 2020 and 2022 layouts, with the parameters in each subprogram), and it needed no host change; it reads no touch, so it stays docked with the 2D pad layout. DARK SOULS: REMASTERED is FromSoftware's engine on SDK 4.5.0, the oldest SDK so far: its shaders are GLSLC outputs in BND3 archives inside the dvdbnd archives (shader_split.py bdt_shaders), and SDK 4's GLSLC outputs are read through their section headers (glslc_section); it keeps 12 sampler pools with different samplers under the same IDs, so handles a shader reads from a uniform buffer take the base of the pool bound at replay (nvn_mtl.m ubo_tex_id / ubo_samp_id); and it runs at 60 fps (30 on the Switch) with two rewriter cuts, its frame limiter's 30 and its frame update's fixed 1/30 s step (its patches.py). Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door is Intelligent Systems' engine on NintendoWare, on Celeste's SDK 15.3.2 sdk build: nearly every RomFS file is zstd (.zst, which shader_split.py decompresses by magic); its AngelScript call bridges leave sp misaligned, which a general rewriter rule rounds up (site_sp_align); it runs at 60 fps (30 on the Switch) by the host's frame step (FRAME_STEP, with the floor of its vsync step cut from 2 to 1); and its three job workers poll the job list with no SVC, which held it at 24 fps on an iPhone until the general spin wait rule (patch_nso.py "Spin waits", hle_thread.c dm_spin_wait). Hollow Knight: Silksong is Unity 6 (6000.0.50f1) IL2CPP, the newest Unity so far: its bundles carry their own type trees, so unityfs.py needed no layout; Unity 6 polls nn::hid::GetDebugPadStates every frame (hle_hid.c), and it takes all its memory itself through nn::os::AllocateAddressRegion / AllocateMemoryPages with no heap, so it runs in the 5 GB guest layout that profile_guess.py now gives every game with an NPDM system resource, with the SDK's address-region node area cut on its sdk build (sdk_patches.py). Catherine: Full Body is Atlus's GFD engine with CRI middleware (CPK archives, ADX2 sound, Sofdec2 movies through movie::Decoder, whose player reads nv12-uv-stride, hle_movie.c): its 3,128 shaders are GLSLC outputs in data/shaders_binary, main and two compiles of its own GLSLC at boot, which the host lets run by reporting at least that GLSLC's GPU code version (hle_glslc.c); that GLSLC writes every vertex shader as a VertexA part (shader type 0, the position) and a VertexB part, which dmsh_build.py merges as Ryujinx does (vertex_ab; the screen was black without it), and because the game reuses a copy's staging memory a frame after recording it, the host commits a segment at the first pass boundary after a buffer → texture copy (nvn_mtl.m g_cut_copy). Digimon Story Cyber Sleuth: Complete Edition is Media.Vision's MVGL engine and renders with NVIDIA's desktop OpenGL 4.5 through EGL, not NVN, which the host implements on Metal (dm/gfx/gl/hle_gl.m: the 13 EGL imports and the 79 GL functions its code calls of the 2,956 its glad loader fetches, counted with dm/tools/loader_census.py; profile_guess.py gives graphics gl when main imports eglCreateWindowSurface and names glShaderSource); its shaders are GLSL ES 3.20 source in its MVGL archives (dm/gfx/tools/mvgl.py: MDB1 with doboz entries) and in main, which gl_shaders.py translates offline with glslang and SPIRV-Cross (packing needs brew install glslang) and the host finds by the hash of its text. Animal Crossing: New Horizons is Nintendo EPD's engine (sead / agl / gsys) on SDK 20.5.4: its main links its own HIPC client for olsc:u (cloud backup settings), which the host answers with sessions of its own (hle_sf.c), its island lives in device save data (MountDeviceSaveData, hle_fs.c), it skips clears with conditional rendering (profile key render_cond), its 63 MB main needed halfword jump tables padded only to their largest entry (patch_nso.py half_count), and its SaveProc builds a new island in grid walks that yield once per cell, so a yield whose loop moved its callee-saved registers since the last one now returns at once instead of backing off, for every game (hle_thread.c thr_yield; the island showed after 77 s of black screen, now about 10 s). DRAGON QUEST VII Reimagined is Unreal Engine 4.27: IoStore containers beside one pak, its shaders LZ4 blocks in the pak's shader code archives, which uepak.py decodes itself (lz4_shaders), and its allocator replaced as Octopath Traveler 0's (a cut and an observation gate in its patches.py, hle_uemalloc.c layout UE4_27) in a 2 GB engine region (profile key game_args); its audio renderer runs at 32 kHz, resampled by the host on the CPU path (hle_audren.c); and Unreal's volumetric lightmap merge sizes its indirection texture with a query on the image it writes, so a texture slot that shares its c2 word with an image slot reads the bound image (nvn_mtl.m tex_slot_h) and the translator types such a query from the image (dmsh_xlate ImageTypesOf): without them every character in the opening cutscene glowed white; it runs at 60 fps (30 on the Switch) because the host writes Unreal's t.MaxFPS and rhi.SyncInterval in game memory (hle_fpslock.c, profile key fps_target), the same two limits a 60 fps mod for the base game lifts with code patches (UEngine::SetMaxFPS returning at once, the name r.VSync broken). FINAL FANTASY RESONANCE is Unreal Engine 5.6.1, the newest Unreal so far: its shader libraries are IoStore chunks in its container, not in its pak, two layers of Oodle that uepak.py reads through the game's own decoder in the Mac host with no boot (Toc, io_archive, OodleHost); its 94 MB main is 95% without unwind entries, so the rewriter analyses long functions in pieces (patch_nso.py pieces; one 82 MB function took 100 GB of memory) and treats code before the first unwind entry as a function; its allocator is replaced as Octopath Traveler 0's (UE 5.6's 32-slot FMalloc, hle_uemalloc.c layout UE5_6), and its engine region is 4064 MB (profile key game_args), because the engine's own page allocator never gives address space back (2 GB aborted in the first battle); 2,077 particle shaders need tex_dyn_slots; it runs at 60 fps (30 on the Switch) by the host's rhi.SyncInterval write (hle_fpslock.c, profile key fps_target). Luigi's Mansion 3 is Next Level Games' own engine on NVN: its RomFS files are in the engine's .dict / .data archives, and update 1.4.0 ships .patch files beside the base ones, which shader_split.py applies as the game does (nlg_shaders); the game patches texture handles into its recorded command buffers in place, at the command start + 0x10 it took from GetCommandMemoryUsed, so single texture binds are recorded in the hardware's layout (OP_BIND_TEX1, every game; without it the title showed a stretched icon and a new game a white screen); its G-buffer is two integer targets, which its pixel shaders write through a second, integer-output entry point (dmsh_build.py fs_uint, every game); and it runs at 60 fps (30 on the Switch) because the host writes its frame limiter's 33.333 ms, a constant in read-only data, as 1000 / fps_target less half a millisecond (hle_fpslock.c, with present_interval display). Its tessellated draws are skipped (Metal 4 has no tessellation stage) and its geometry shaders do not build; neither was drawn in play so far. AI: THE SOMNIUM FILES is Unity 2017.4 IL2CPP (Cuphead's Unity layout) with FMOD: its 168 movies are H.264 MP4s that Unity's player copies into NV12 texture pairs, and its Spike Chunsoft logo movie held the game before the title until a released output slot also went on with the H.264 decoder's drain at the end of a stream (hle_movie.c: Unity holds all 16 video outputs by then); it binds its vertex and fragment programs apart, and the precompile prediction reused the ring slot of the combined program the replay had saved, so a draw ran with another pair's shaders until each restore of the replay state took the combination again from the per-stage bindings (nvn_mtl.m prog_resolve, every game); it plays docked with the 3D pad layout (the investigation's view is on the right stick). ANIMAL WELL embeds all its assets and 46 BNSH shaders in main; its base and update Program NCAs have no data section, which nx_extract represents as an empty RomFS directory. It needed no host change; its profile uses the 2D pad layout. AI: THE SOMNIUM FILES - nirvanA Initiative is Unity 2020.3 IL2CPP (Patrick's Parabox's Unity) with Addressables bundles and FMOD, and needed no host change: Unity 2020.3 keys a compute shader kernel's variants by keyword set (shader_split.py unity_compute, variantMap); its nninitStartup hands pool − used to StandardAllocator as virtual address memory and Unity reserves its own regions beside it, so it has the SDK's address-region node area cut on its sdk build (sdk_patches.py) and a 1 GB pool, which the NSP script's heap check now sets for such a game (profile_guess.py heap_signals: the alias region nearly full within seconds and no heap); it plays docked with the 3D pad layout (the investigation's view is on the right stick). Mario Kart 8 Deluxe is Nintendo's sead / agl / gsys engine on SDK 4.4.0, the oldest SDK so far: it lists the six default Miis at boot and builds Mii heads from the console's MiiModel system data, so the host answers the Mii database itself (hle_mii.c: the six default Miis, none of the console's own) and mounts a stand-in of that archive with every part empty (dm_mii_standin, hle_fs.c MountSystemData; the firmware is not the host's to ship, so Mii heads draw nothing); its DLC licence is decrypted in a 0x3130-byte heap that also holds the mount cache, now sized as Horizon's RomFS working memory (romfs_work_size); it mounts device and account save data, which are now two host saves for a game whose main imports both (at boot it deletes CommonSave:/userdata.dat); SDK 4's DeviceSink is command 0xf of 0x130 bytes, and the audio renderer's update lock is read off each SDK's own AudioRenderSystem::Update (hle_audren.c update_lock: it was SDK 16's for every SDK before 20); it evaluates its conditional rendering (profile key render_cond) and runs at 60 fps. Balatro is LÖVE 11.4 (love-nx: Lua source in the RomFS, LuaJIT's interpreter, SDL) on NVIDIA's desktop OpenGL through EGL, like Digimon: main imports vkGetInstanceProcAddr only for SDL's Vulkan loader, which profile_guess.py leaves out of its Vulkan count; LÖVE takes its core-profile paths when the GL layer says core (GL_CONTEXT_PROFILE_MASK): persistently mapped vertex streams fenced per frame, attribute bindings and current values, uniform queries, texture storage, 3D and array textures, swizzles and mipmaps, about 150 GL functions in all (hle_gl.m, counted with loader_census.py, which now follows LÖVE's glad through registers; DM_GL_STUBS=1 names a missing one at its first call); its 35 shaders are GLSL that LÖVE puts together at run time, captured by the NSP script on the Mac (profile gl_capture.tsv, capture_shaders), with bool uniforms keeping their type (gl_shaders.py); it opens the audio renderer without an event, which started no render thread before (hle_audren.c ar_open: it was silent); and it plays by touch in handheld mode (profile keys op_mode handheld, pad_layout touch: the iPhone gamepad's Tap layout sends every touch to the game). Any Lua error makes it quit, and love-nx then crashes in its video worker's teardown (main+0x339c00): look for the Lua error first. ROMANCE OF THE THREE KINGDOMS 8 REMAKE is Koei Tecmo's KTGL on SDK 17.5.3, with a newer RDB than Age of Calamity's: .fdata files (a PDRK header, then IDRK entries) whose entries are LZ4 or zlib in 16 KB chunks of a new form (shader_split.py idrk_data: flag 0x400000, LZ4 with 0x100000 too), 59,363 shaders in all; its update is a multi-program patch that carries a whole second program (…0001, started with nn::oe::ExecuteProgram(1)) beside the game's, so nx_extract takes program index 0's NCAs (it took the second program and failed); SDK 17.5.3's OpenAudioRenderer with an event calls the form without one through the PLT, which the host's hook now passes straight to the SDK (hle_audren.c t_in_open); it plays at 30 fps with a controller (it reads a USB mouse, not the touch screen). Taiko Risshiden V DX is KTGL on SDK 12.3.3, mostly 2D, in Japanese and Chinese only (the NSP script packs Japanese): its 212 shaders are GLSLC outputs in main and one G2S container (eff/KTGLEffect.g1s), read as before; it needed nn::oe::SetCpuOverclockEnabled (hle_oe.c: its first boot crashed in apm); it plays by touch in handheld mode (profile keys op_mode handheld, pad_layout touch), taking its taps, drags and flicks only from nn::hid::GetGestureStates, which the host now recognizes from the touch points for every game (hle_touch.c gesture_sample, yuzu's rules plus an 8 px slop; unit test t_gesture; the DM_CTL line drag tests pans on the Mac); and its frame end slept in 2 ms rounds until 1/60 s had passed, which ended at 18.2 ms (55 fps), so a build cut skips that wait and the presents hold 60 (its patches.py). Super Smash Bros. Ultimate is Bandai Namco / Sora's engine on Catherine: Full Body's SDK 8.2.1 sdk build: everything is in one data.arc of Hash40-named zstd files (dm/gfx/tools/smash_arc.py; the split reads its current files, 35,012 shaders); its fighters' code is 98 NROs in that archive, loaded and unloaded per battle with nn::ro::LoadModule, which the NSP script collects by the SHA-256s its NRRs list and rewrites (dm/tools/nro_collect.py), the host loads by the image's hash and binds main's lua2cpp imports to (hle_ro.c, loader.c "NRO modules"), and the iOS app carries packed into three sections of the executable (gen_embed.py, loader.c nro_pieces); its engine reserves 62 GB of address space, cut to 4 GB in its patches.py with the SDK's node area and 1 GB alignment cut on that sdk build (sdk_patches.py) for the 5 GB guest layout; and it fetches nvnSetExternalDebuggerEnabledNVX, a no-op. Bayonetta 3 is PlatinumGames' engine: everything in PKZ archives of DAT archives whose entries are Oodle Kraken, which the shader split decodes with the game's own streaming decoder (main has no OodleLZ_Decompress, so hle_oodle.c drives OodleLZDecoder_*), its shaders the engine's own shader objects (shader_split.py pg_shader); the engine refuses shader code newer than the driver reports, so the NVN layer's newest GPU code version follows the SDK (hle_nvn.c, 1.16 from SDK 13). Advance Wars 1+2: Re-Boot Camp is Unity 2020.2 IL2CPP on The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles' SDK 10.4.1 sdk build, which takes the node-area and 1 GB alignment cuts (sdk_patches.py) for its virtual address memory, with a 2 GB pool (the heap check's 1 GB ran its malloc dry at the first loading screen, and Unity's GPU pool allocation then spun for good); its Bink 2 movies draw with 32 shaders whose control sections and code areas lie loose in main, paired by data records or by the code that builds their addresses (shader_split.py raw_shaders; every movie drew white without them). Pokémon Sword is Game Freak's engine before Trinity, on Super Mario Odyssey's SDK 7.3.2 sdk and movie builds: its shaders are BNSH entries of GFPAK archives (LZ4, shader_split.py gfpak_members) and Silicon Studio's YEBIS post effects, a .tfxo file in a zlib stream in main (tfxo_streams); its G-buffer writes float and integer targets at once, which takes a pixel shader entry point that returns only the integer outputs as integers (dmsh_build.py fs_uint, main0_m; nvn_mtl.m pso_mixed_uint), its cube views of fewer than 6 layers count layers in cubes (tex_by_id), and it writes beside its packaged textures in host pages they share, which no longer re-uploads them when the texture's own bytes are unchanged (nvn_mtl.m pkg_edges_clean; frames went from 33 to 75 ms without it); it asks for a Poké Ball Plus (Palma, hle_hid.c) and the Let's Go play statistics (hle_offline.c), both answered as absent. Pikmin 4 is Unreal Engine 4.26.2 with IoStore (its shaders LZ4 in the pak's shader code archives, as DRAGON QUEST VII Reimagined's) and Wwise: its allocator is replaced as DRAGON QUEST VII Reimagined's (hle_uemalloc.c layout UE4_27), but this build reserves its engine region only when -SwitchVirtualAddressSpaceSize= is absent, so a cut in its patches.py lowers the 62 GB default to 4064 MB instead of game_args; the rewriter now re-encodes an adrp inside an exclusive window (window_adrp) and accepts a gate before a ret (scratch_dead); and a network request now stays on hold for 50 ms, as Horizon's asynchronous one (hle_net.c): answered at once, its BCAT thread could finish before its creator stored "started", and about one boot in six waited at the black loading screen for good. Stardew Valley is MonoGame on Sickhead's BRUTE like Celeste (C# compiled to C++, a Boehm collector) with XACT sound, on SDK 20.5.27: 3,535 of its 3,549 XNB files are compressed (LZ4, 8 LZX), which shader_split.py decompresses (xnb_decompress) to reach its one content effect beside the 64 shaders in main; it draws nearly everything with SpriteBatch (a prewarm list of 2 shaders and 4 pipelines), reads only the pad, and its character creation names the farmer and the farm through the software keyboard, whose Mac text box releases the buttons that opened it (front_mac.m, found on this game); its profile uses the 3D pad layout (the D-pad in menus, the right stick for the cursor), and it needed no other host change. BALL x PIT is Unity 6 (6000.0.62f1) IL2CPP with FMOD and Rewired, as Hollow Knight: Silksong: it needed no host change, only the SDK's address-region node area cut on its SDK 20.5.19 sdk build (sdk_patches.py); its loose serialized files have no type trees and borrow the Shader tree its bundles carry, and it draws 1280x720 into 1920x1080 window textures with a window crop (a Mac shot shows the crop only with DM_NVN_SHOT_OUT); it plays docked with the 3D pad layout (the right stick aims). Mario vs. Donkey Kong is Nintendo's sead / agl / gsys engine on SDK 15.3.0, its base game a cartridge dump (.xci), its cutscenes MP4 files (H.264 and AAC) through the SDK's movie library and an AudioOut of its own: its movie player keeps the outputs it holds in a ring of 32 per track with no bounds check, so AAC movie decoders offer 32 outputs (Vorbis keeps 64), and it sizes its sound buffers by GetOutputBufferSize and appends each whole, so an AAC decoder reports one frame (hle_movie.c: with 64 outputs the opening movie overran the heap, with the 128 KB answer it froze); it skips clears under render conditions (profile key render_cond), sets the advanced blend mode SRC_OVER, which the replay now blends with the Porter-Duff factors it amounts to (nvn_mtl.m adv_blend), and plays docked with the 2D pad layout. README.md is the player-facing page (games, packing, playing); docs/development.md has the internals, the script's options, building by hand, prewarm lists and per-game notes.

• Each game's constants and shader tables form a game profile in dm/games/<id>/, where <id> is the base game's title ID: game.tsv plus the tables (and patches.py when the rewriter has patches for its builds). Mario's profile is 010015100B514000. Tools pick the profile with DM_GAME; make -C dm/host and build_ipa.sh pick it with GAME. There is no default game: set it every time (the tools stop and list the profiles otherwise). Put per-game values in the profile, not in code (dm/games/README.md).

• Prefer general optimizations and fixes to game-specific rules. Performance work (frame pacing, power, caches, load times) counts here as much as correctness. First look for a change that holds for every game: Horizon / NVN / Vulkan semantics, or what the binary, its SDK version, its imports or its files show. Use a game-specific rule (a profile key, a rewriter cut, a build-ID gate, a per-game branch in the host) only when it is absolutely necessary, that is, when no general rule can do it.

• Per-build knowledge is keyed by the NSO build ID: rewriter cuts, observation gates and frame-step stubs in the profile's patches.py (a game's own modules) or dm/tools/sdk_patches.py (Nintendo's sdk modules, which several games ship), which dm/tools/patch_nso.py (the general rewriter) loads, the profile's build rows (the builds the game was brought up on, and their display versions; the NSP script packs any other version from a derived profile, without those builds' fixes), and host behaviour that uses fixed module addresses checks module_t.build_id (from fixups.tsv; dm_main_build()). When a new game build appears, carry addresses over with dm/tools/nso_fnmap.py and check them by disassembly; never let fixed addresses run on a build they were not found in.

• To analyse or port another Switch title, first run scripts/build_ipa_from_nsp.py on its NSP folder. With no matching profile, it writes a survey to <NSP folder>/<title ID>_survey/survey.md, then a provisional profile guessed from the game files (dm/games/profile_guess.py; <NSP folder>/<title ID>_build/profile/<title ID>/, found by the tools through DM_GAMES_DIR), with a short heap check on the Mac when the game has virtual address memory, and a best-effort IPA that may not boot. Then follow docs/agents (extraction, binary survey, host bring-up failure catalogue, graphics specifics, debugging recipes) and add a profile.

• Scripts the user runs live in scripts/ at the repository root (now build_ipa_from_nsp.py). Each one runs both in Spyder (F5, configured by the settings block at its top) and from a terminal (command-line options override those settings; non-zero exit on error). Tools that only agents or other scripts call stay under dm/.

• Game files, keys and anything extracted from them live in the game's NSP folder, never in this repository and never in the home folder (it is nearly full): the work folder <NSP folder>/<id>-work for extraction, runs and analysis, beside the NSP script's <id>_build/. Tool venvs and other large scratch data go on that drive too. Do not print key values.

• Language: everything is in English: README.md, docs, code comments, log messages, script output and other files. Red log lines (something unimplemented or wrong) start with [RED] . Text that must match a game's own Chinese data is written as escapes ("\xE8\xB5\xB7"), never as characters.

• The shader translation chain has one version for every game, DMSH_CHAIN in dm/gfx/nvn/dmsh_chain.h, which the host is compiled with and loads only libraries of. It covers the chain's tools: dm/gfx/tools/dmsh_* (dmsh_build.py, dmsh_chain.py, dmsh_fetch.py, dmsh_vin.py, dmsh_geometry.py, dmsh_facts.py), Program.cs, ios_metal.py and dmsh_chain.lock. A profile's own inputs (shader_map.tsv, shader_facts.tsv, shader_pairs.tsv, bf_want.tsv, its shader_* / nvn_* keys) are not part of it: they are in each shader's cache key, and their digest stamps the libraries (b-<V>/inputs.tsv). The procedure:

  1. After changing a chain tool, run dmsh_chain.py --header once and commit dm/gfx/nvn/dmsh_chain.h with the change (dm/tools/tests/test_nsp_chain.py fails on a stale one).
  2. After that, or after changing a profile's inputs, rebuild that profile's shaders: a full dmsh_build.py run (Mac and, with IOSOUT, iOS) stamps its libraries and writes the profile's c1_full.tsv and cb_extent.tsv from its Mac outputs (git ignores them; the host takes them only beside the stamp they name). Give each game its own output directory.
  3. Rebuild the host.

  The translator is dm/gfx/tools/dmsh_xlate_bin, which matches dmsh_chain.lock; a fresh dotnet publish does not.

• iOS builds are unsigned IPAs that the user sideloads and tests; diagnostics come back as the app's Documents/log.txt. Do not sign or install builds on the user's devices.

• Commit only when asked, with git -c user.name=seedds -c user.email=seedds@gmail.com commit.