.NDS graphic ripping

[Wigglytuff]

Hello all, this is my first topic here on the spriters resource. I have only recently started to learn how to rip graphics over the past month or so and i have enjoyed the process. However, i would like to know how to access the original graphic files from games such as Mystery Dungeon Blue and Digimon and save them in a suitable format that can be read by paint. (e.g. .bmp) Before anyone says "They are already ripped for you dummy" i know that, however i would like to learn how to do the process if possible by myself

Thanks in advance,

~Wigglytuff

P.S. This may be the wrong board but for some reason the site wouldn't let me post in the request board

[Previous]

P.S. This may be the wrong board but for some reason the site wouldn't let me post in the request board

I've always been wondering why, on the internet, where text is all and everything, people fail again and again, over and over to read what is in plain sight.

(Members under 20 Posts and have not been on the forums for at least a month cannot post here.)

Besides this is more of a general question than a request anyways so I'll move it to our Questions section

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For the NDS, Tahaxan or Tinke are recommended. Tahaxan is a bit outdated, I think, and Tinke sometimes crashes... Either way, look for a recent version of Tinke. They are programs that can open .NDS roms and list (plus extract) the files within. Then you pretty much have to look through the files and try to find something... Some may be in standard formats that can be directly viewed, others should be extracted and examined with a tile viewer like Barubary's TiledGGD. Some files may be compressed, but Tahaxan and Tinke come with the most common decompression capabilities. Although some games like to be special (FEhadow Dragon for example ).

I don't have those two games you mentioned here myself so I can't give any specific hints taylored to these ROMs.

PS: General advice: PNG should be preferred over BMP

[Wigglytuff]

Cheers, this is really helpful! I have found and made visible the original graphics of Digimon, however i am struggling to find where the graphics are located in Mystery Dungeon :/. If anyone knows where i can look that would be great, everything i find that could be a potential image just looks like random static.

~Wigglytuff

[Previous]

I just took a look at it; the pokémon sprites appear to be in monster.sbin which is a container format of some sort. Up front is a list of "files" with a name (8 bytes), a data offset (4 bytes) counting from the start of the .sbin and a data size (4 bytes). The list is null-terminated (at the end are 16 zero-bytes marking the end of the list).
The palette is the "palet" file and surprisingly uses four bytes per pixel. Yes, it contains only 14 16-colour palettes for all the pokémon.
The pokémon files contain all the sprites of one monster each, but I couldn't figure out the exact format yet... I think they do not only include the graphics (which you can easily view with TiledGGD, but you'd have to adjust the offsets for every single one manually), but also other information of whatever kind. Well, the pokémon files all seem to start with "SIR0" as file identifier.
Well, at least they do not appear to be compressed!

For example, Bulbasaur data starts at 0x1F40, but the first frame is located at 0x7B84 (tiled (press 'F' in TiledGGD), 4 bits per pixel, four tiles width).

[Goemar]

The only game I used Tinke for was Aliens and I got jack with it (well I got the sounds).
I'm guessing it's better for some games than others, but as I'm clueless with TiledGGD (at the moment) I'm no help to anyone.

[Garamonde]

I just took a look at it; the pokémon sprites appear to be in monster.sbin which is a container format of some sort. Up front is a list of "files" with a name (8 bytes), a data offset (4 bytes) counting from the start of the .sbin and a data size (4 bytes). The list is null-terminated (at the end are 16 zero-bytes marking the end of the list).
The palette is the "palet" file and surprisingly uses four bytes per pixel. Yes, it contains only 14 16-colour palettes for all the pokémon.
The pokémon files contain all the sprites of one monster each, but I couldn't figure out the exact format yet... I think they do not only include the graphics (which you can easily view with TiledGGD, but you'd have to adjust the offsets for every single one manually), but also other information of whatever kind. Well, the pokémon files all seem to start with "SIR0" as file identifier.
Well, at least they do not appear to be compressed!

For example, Bulbasaur data starts at 0x1F40, but the first frame is located at 0x7B84 (tiled (press 'F' in TiledGGD), 4 bits per pixel, four tiles width).

It's unfortunate that I have yet to use TiledGGD so I couldn't understand what all this about bytes means if I tried!
Either way... I've also been wanting to rip from PMD DS, but from the sequels, PMD2: Explorers of Time and Explorers of Darkness. Although when I took a look at the tile data it looked compressed and Tinke nor Tahaxan could view the files.

[Previous]

Peeked at explorers of sky. Monster folder, m_ground.bin holds visible graphics. Again, a content list with pointer references up front (though slightly different) and a bunch of SIR0 packets. I couldn't find any palettes, though.
monster.bin and m_attack-bin hold PKDP data with embedded SIR0 that do not look like graphics. Could hold compressed graphics or different data altogether (these SIR0 things seem to hols a ton of weird things). Dunno

[Garamonde]

Explorers of Sky is actually the third installment, but I'd guess they use similar data storage so thanks anyway for looking.

[Previous]

I know, I know.... I'm not completely left behind on games
The other two explorers use pretty much the exact same format but obviously have less data in the files

[gensym]

i would like to learn how to do the process if possible by myself

Get a Nintendo Nitro SDK. It describes most of the formats, like ROM filesystem or file tags, including SDAT, NTTX, NTBG.

[Previous]

I don't think Wigglytuff wanted to go in-depth and write their own extraction and conversion programs but is more interested in how to use the tools available and which pretty much everyone who rips from NDS roms uses

[gensym]

I don't think Wigglytuff wanted to go in-depth and write their own extraction and conversion programs but is more interested in how to use the tools available and which pretty much everyone who rips from NDS roms uses

Beside specs, SDK includes tools.