Problems testing ISO

I just have to anounce that I finally start testing levels.

But I have problems with my iso file. Within the first 4 levels before finishing the castle it crashed two times ("An error occured. Remove the disc" Something like that, you will know that message). Crashes at random times, crashed a third time while just runing on the intro screen where intro movie starts when not pressing buttons.

Built with partition builder 1.1 and Wiiscrubber 1.4, used all Worlds 1-8 SMB1, tileset package, the two background packages (newest ones), all 4 files within region specific files topic of Download Center (EU Versions), Changed Title ID and Game Title of Iso File, then transferred to NTFS HDD. Used With Wiiflow and CFGLoader (Wiiflow first 2 crashes, CFG the third one).

In the staff only area theres a topic about an readymade iso. But I have to be in SMB Team group to get it (says the first post). Does this file run without crashes?

Well, I have to redo my iso before I can start again. Seems to have errors, my first try on this. Any idea whats the problem? Is any of that files buggy, maybe beacause the other guys did already testing, maybe anyone knows about buggy files. Well, I will redo Tomorrow or Thursday.

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Posts Merged
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Please take note of this:

I found a mistake in SMB1 World 2 when I just opened Level 2 to find out what tiles you used for underwater stages as I am making SMB2 World B-2 right now.

Big error with World 2: Levels 01-05.arc (SMB1 W2 L2) contains SMB1 W2 L3. It's just identical with the file of Level 01-06.arc. Both files show up as the same level. Can you please upload the correct SMB1 W2 L2 and fix the World 2 package.
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Addition:

Nighttime backgrounds don't work with my iso. I replaced the tilesets used in SMB World 3 again in my iso just to make sure, there's no data error caused by replacing process. I used Wiiscrubber and the iso just worked without any problems through SMB Worlds 1 and 2. So tilesets should be OK. Well, The ice tileset (standard suite in reggie, first selection) was not used in Worlds 1/2 so could have also a problem.
But after replacing backgrounds back to original ones, SMB World 3 now loads properly. So ice tileset is okay.

Does anyone saw this problem? Do they work in riivolution? Nighttime backgrounds + SMB World 3 in first part of World 2 + tilesets? Maybe only one of them is faulty, any ideas?

vbusfan wrote:

But I have problems with my iso file. Within the first 4 levels before finishing the castle it crashed two times ("An error occured. Remove the disc" Something like that, you will know that message). Crashes at random times, crashed a third time while just runing on the intro screen where intro movie starts when not pressing buttons.

Built with partition builder 1.1 and Wiiscrubber 1.4, used all Worlds 1-8 SMB1, tileset package, the two background packages (newest ones), all 4 files within region specific files topic of Download Center (EU Versions), Changed Title ID and Game Title of Iso File, then transferred to NTFS HDD. Used With Wiiflow and CFGLoader (Wiiflow first 2 crashes, CFG the third one).

In the staff only area theres a topic about an readymade iso. But I have to be in SMB Team group to get it (says the first post). Does this file run without crashes?

I'm not 100% what the problem is, but here are some things to try. If I think of anything else, I'll update this post. Make sure to let us know if you find a way to fix it, or if any of these work:

• When using the Region Specific files, you removed the [EU] from the filename, correct? For example, when you download save_banner[EU].arc, you rename it to save_banner.arc? If so, make sure there are no spaces left over, or anything funny like that.
  
  
• Try using Partition builder 1.2 (I don't know what the difference is between 1.1 and 1.2, but here is a link to it)
  
  
  
• What are you renaming the TitleID to?
  
  
• When using partition builder, you need partition.bin, apploader, boot.bin, bi2.bin, and main.dol. Are you using our partition.bin and boot.bin when rebuilding the ISO, or the original ones?
  
  
• If you keep having problems, try rebuilding the ISO without our Partition.bin, boot.bin, or save_banner.arc, and see if the crashing persists.

Cant test now, but here what I used as I said in the post above, again:

All 4 files from Region Specific files, of course renamed/removed the [EU] (otherwise the game wouldn't even boot, when they are missing or can't be found beacause of wrong names with [EU] in it, I think, I have overwritten all 4 original files); boot.bin, and the other 3 files have been overwritten. Game boots normally but crashes then, some time after boot.
Using changed files from here with Partitiion Builder 1.1.

TItle ID changed to MRRP01

Title of Iso to NSMBWii Retro Remix
(Well after replacing partition, it showed this in Wiiscrubber already when opening iso because of changed boot.bin and the others, so I also renamed it to this in Wii Backup Manager to see title on USBLoader, but now I remember, USBLoaders show the internal iso title, so it would show NSMBWii Retro Remix without renaming the game title on WBFS.
Maybe the Wii Backup Manager did something wrong at this point, next time, I will only change the ID (otherwise it would overwrite my normal NSMBWii on my WBFS HDD)

At first, I will try to leave out renaming, then I'll try to leave out boot files and banners, if it keeps crashing, as you say. I'll try first one this evening.

Sorry for all of the stupid questions, just making sure.

Try updating Partition Builder from 1.1 to 1.2. Maybe there was some glitch in 1.1, I mean, they had to make a new version for some reason.

I use Riivolution, so I can't test the save banner or other Region Specific files (other than the title screen). I'll try building an ISO over the next few days to see if I have a similar problem.

Can you please upload your riivolution script. Seems not to be in the Download Center yet.
If I get further problems with the iso, if it can't solve the problems within the next builds, then I can test that way.

I think this would save some time, instead of making a patchfile myself and adding lines for all the files. I don't know, is it possible to replace files without wiriting them all into the patch-xml? A sort of replacing just when the file is present in the riivolution directory on the SD?

vbusfan wrote:

is it possible to replace files without wiriting them all into the patch-xml? A sort of replacing just when the file is present in the riivolution directory on the SD?

Thats exactly how Riivolution works, you NEVER need to list the files being used in the xml. It always just replaces what is present.

I just use the default xml provided here. You just make a folder called "nsmb", put your files in there, and they load. If a file is in a folder on the ISO, don't worry about it. Just put everything directly into that nsmb folder on your SD card.

Ok, thank you. I just saw that you can specify specific files to be replaced and was not sure if its possible without specifiing files.

Well, but maybe I got the iso working yesterday.

What happened:
Without savebanner/title/boot/partition files, two test isos variants (first try, Partitionbuilder 1.2, and then, second try, Partitonbuilder 1.1 - like the first one but without these files this time) stopped working right at the point where the worldmap should appear when a save file has been selected (in case of new save files, the point where the intro movie ends). Instead of showing the worldmap of world 1, I just got a black screen.
I also tried to leave out title renaming in Wii Backup Manager und moved the original game just somewhere to have the modded one with unchanged name and ID. So I copied that two isos more than one time to test out that thing, but it didn't made any difference, just black screen at the same point.
What I think about renaming:
That thing what is renamed by Wii Backup Manager, I think it's not even in the iso, it's just a custom title which the program writes into both a program internal file to save custom titles and show them up when loading the iso later again and it is written into the WBFS information file that is on the harddisk along with the game file itself, and it's used as filename.
So I had Riivolution left over, or replacing files with wiiscrubber one by one. I did it, was not so interesting but I just replaced about 50 files one by one with Wiiscrubber.
And It ran properly to the worldmap, that thing. I managed to play SMB1 World 1 without crash.

Today, i'll check out the next Worlds and I'll find out if it crashes when letting it run without doing anything and while playing more than just less than 15 minutes and 4 levels.

When this works, title customization goes in again and I'll see if this crashes the game randomly as with my first iso or if Wiiscrubber solves both problems at one time.

Do you have any ideo why it stopped working when leaving savebanner/title/boot/partition files away? They don't relate to levels or tileset or backgrounds as I know. And it should go better, not providing more problems. And I had all tilesets in.
Well, I think, that maybe just that partiton builder mechanics is too buggy.

One another thing. My first level SMB2 B-2 is quite ready. And I found out most things about how to use Reggie, I think. When starting B-2 I was confused about certain things, but I found them out now. So creating the rest of B and C will be easy to do for me now.

That is strange. I only really have 3 ideas for why it would be having problems:

1) Partition Builder is just buggy, as you said.

2) I've heard that some people have to open the ISO with Wiiscrubber, right click the partition, and click Resize partition. Then, make the partition bigger. This gives more space for the new files and things, since oftentimes they are bigger than in the original game. The game itself won't complain about some files being larger, but they no longer fit within the expected partition size. At least, I think thats how it works.

3) There is a file, think its called fst.bin, that has the filesize of everything listed inside of it. The old method for replacing the title screen logo would make it larger than the original file, and we had to edit the fst.bin to get it to stop freezing. The game doesn't seem to mind too much when we make other files different sizes, but maybe these problems are related.

All I can say Is that the Wiiscrubber method works.

I did not had to change partition sizes or other things, only the files.

I added openingtitle and opening.bnr into theworking iso and it still works. I let it run for over 1 our without doing anything - still runs.

But when adding also partition/boot/save_banner into the working iso, I'm not able to even boot the game, USBLoaders crash when loading the game. Without savegame related things, works as said.

So it seems that there are problems with them partition.bin or boot.bin file. I don't know. But, well, this is not the problem to share the save. I just don't have anyone else in the house who plays this game.

vbusfan wrote:

So it seems that there are problems with them partition.bin or boot.bin file. I don't know.

I've only ever tried it on my personal ISO, maybe these files aren't the same on every ISO?

vbusfan wrote:

Big error with World 2: Levels 01-05.arc (SMB1 W2 L2) contains SMB1 W2 L3. It's just identical with the file of Level 01-06.arc. Both files show up as the same level. Can you please upload the correct SMB1 W2 L2 and fix the World 2 package.

FIxed

vbusfan wrote:

Nighttime backgrounds don't work with my iso.
[...]
Does anyone saw this problem? Do they work in riivolution? Nighttime backgrounds + SMB World 3 in first part of World 2 + tilesets? Maybe only one of them is faulty, any ideas?

I currently have an ISO with all of our custom content, it all works fine for me.
Have you edited the levels at all?
Are you sure that you put the backgrounds in the proper place on the iso?

vbusfan wrote:

Addition:

Nighttime backgrounds don't work with my iso. I replaced the tilesets used in SMB World 3 again in my iso just to make sure, there's no data error caused by replacing process. I used Wiiscrubber and the iso just worked without any problems through SMB Worlds 1 and 2. So tilesets should be OK. Well, The ice tileset (standard suite in reggie, first selection) was not used in Worlds 1/2 so could have also a problem.
But after replacing backgrounds back to original ones, SMB World 3 now loads properly. So ice tileset is okay.

Does anyone saw this problem? Do they work in riivolution? Nighttime backgrounds + SMB World 3 in first part of World 2 + tilesets? Maybe only one of them is faulty, any ideas?

I'm a little confused what problem you are having. Its a little confusing on the topic, but there are two versions to the nighttime background. You are only using version 2, right?

I use all levels of SMB1 at the moment plus tilesets plus backgrounds + openingtitle + opening.bnr. This works prefectly now,, All files replaced with wiiscrubber. partitionbuilder versions produced all crashes or problems. Adding boot/partition.bin and save_banner in Wiisrubber crahes at game boot.

Nighttime background is v2, you're right. And I'm sure that I replace all files at the right place.
Do you mean, I should try v1? But, that one replaces not the currently used backgrounds.

What did you use to build your iso? Wiiscrubber or partitionbuilder?
Or can you maybe send a PM to me with a link to your iso? In the staff only section there's a topic about your iso, if i remember that right. But nobody posted there for two months.

vbusfan wrote:

Nighttime background is v2, you're right. And I'm sure that I replace all files at the right place.
Do you mean, I should try v1?

Oh no, you are doing it right. I was making sure that you were NOT using version 1, because it replaces different backgrounds and would cause problems.

I've only been using Riivolution, so I'm not sure about the ISO problems. I've only built like 1 or 2 ISOs, and that was to test some stuff we were doing a while back. Seems everyone is having problems with partition builder..

Can you send me a link to the iso per PM, just to stay legal, if it's ok this way.

I saw a topic about that iso in Staff Only section at the bottom of the forum but there no one posted for about two months or more.

The ISO he made is extremely outdated - we've made a lot of changes in that 2 months.

Also, I don't have an ISO. I use only Riivolution to load our levels. CanadaX21 might be able to help you, though 300 MB is still a lot of data to upload. Sometime when I get some more freetime, I'll work on making an ISO and a patch to make distribution easier.

Well, I think it is not that problem, I just leave the backgrounds out for now (Overground one is in and works). Or I try it with riivolution. I'm not home this weekend so I can only play iso format with my friend until Sunday, so Ill create a riivolution folder on Sunday. And play NSMBWii coop play on our mod this weekend. A 2-player test game with SMB1.

I'm really interested in finding out if it works with riivolution. I think, the crashes are caused by the different mechanics between different methods to create isos. I'll see it on sunday.



And just one thing: I think, we discussed that problem enough in this topic, as this topic is meant to be to report about SMB1 level testing.
If you have an idea about why partition.bin/boot.bin crash usbloaders when adding them with wiiscrubber, let me know in the topic "I Plan to do Leveltesting" in SMB1 Forum area. I think it's better when keeping this here free for level testing reports.

And I'll write here what I find out about Worlds 3-8 when testing goes on this weekend.

Ah, Ok thank you. I looked at the Download Center and all my posts were missing. So they are here

note: all posts relating to problems with ISO have been merged into a single topic

I have one big great message for you:

I just found out why my iso file built with partitionbuilder did not work.

Read what happened so far:

I was playing my Retro Remix iso with a friend on his Wii by USB, and two times after about 10 minutes of playing, I got the error ("Take out the disc ...) as I had it with my first iso built with Partitionbuilder. That iso contained everything (Stages/Backgrounds/Title Logo/Opening.bnr) except SMB2 LL and the save changing files (also no staffroll or music changes), built with Wiiscrubber, files replaced one by one as described in my last post(s). And this iso worked flawless when I tested it the evening before. The only thing I had to take out were the nighttime backgrounds, having them in crashed the SMB1 World 3 stages.

Before playing the iso with my friend, I just changed level 1-05 as it has been accidently uploaded to the download center with the content of 1-06 so both levels have been the same level (SMB 1 W2-3). AND I renamed the Title ID of my iso to MRRP01 in Wii Backup Manager before transferring to my HDD. And this thing crashed as my first partitionbuilder try (same content like this one, but with save changing files, too, and with the double level ).

And what did I do? Only changed the ID and fixed double level. Double level could not be the problem, would have crashed the level itself if reason for problem. So only the renaming thing left.

So I decided to try partitionbuilder again although I thought, partitionbuilder caused the problems because of bugs inside the partition creation process. I had a folder with the extracted data partiton with all changed files to access them to replace with wiiscrubber and added/replaced the save changing files. As written above in earlier posts these files did not work when replacing in wiiscrubber, crashed the USBLoaders when booting the game. The other changes have already been inside the folder. I compiled the folder into a partition, replaced it into a plain NSMBWii iso and transferred it to my HDD, but WITHOUT renaming title or ID in Wii Backup Manager.

And now what do you expect from this one?

That s**t, it works! All the damn problem that crashed the first iso randomly, it was simply nothing more than a faulty renaming of the game file by Wii Backup Manager. But to find it out, it required my to have that random iso, made with Wiiscrubber file by file, and working without problems to notice that the renaming by Wii Backup Manager is the problem.

AND! The nighttime backgrounds also WORK! The problem mentioned in the last posts, it has also been solved by trying again with Partitionbuilder. So again, all the problem was WII Backup Manager renaming process.

REMEMBER:
NEVER rename games with Wii Backup Manager

Try other programs, maybe they do it without crashing NSMBWii.

Wow, thats interesting. I only have 1 more week of school, then I'll get a break. I'll try to look into that and figure out why exactly that is causing a crash. That's really, really strange o.O

Thanks for all the hard work figuring out the problem though! That is all very useful information.

Just to have an abbreviation of all post before: The whole story into one text:

At the beginning, I had many factors, why a crash could occur. Save chaning files, title banner/opening.bnr or the stages or partitionbuilder building bugs. So I just tried as suggested to build again and use other versions, leave out save changing files.

Then I tried with Wiiscrubber (replacing file by file) and this worked, so I just thought, it was that, buggy partiton building with partitionbuilder. But I just never tried to leave out renaming during the first phase. I just thought, that could not be as it should be only on WBFS level outside of the iso, that changes. But loading again just the iso brings back the renamed title so this is done somewhere inside the file, not only outside. And that casues the crashes.

Then I just added back save changing files and title/opening, but save thing crashed and nighttime backgrounds. Well, I could not really decide what the problem was, just left them out.

Why I found that remaning thing out was because I decided to try to rename again, I left it out with the wiiscrubber isos to prevent not being able to detect filespecific problems. Well, as this worked, I wanted my original NSMBWii back in as parallel to the mod and renamed the mod.

And I played with my friend, and It crashed, one time, two times, and I did only the renaming (and a stage fix, too) but It must have been the renaming. Built again partitionbuilder iso, NO RENAMING, WORKED!

At all, it just required a working iso so I was able to notice the solution.



In general solutions can't be properly found If you have just to much possibilities like when creating such isos the first time.

Just a little report:


Compiled yesterday an iso with SMB1 and SMB2 LL (Worlds 1- including my test versions of Worlds B2 to B4. Works without any poblems.

So partitionbuilder is NOT the problem. It was really that renaming.


And: I don't get riivolution to work. Added tilesets, Backgrounds, some stages and Openingtitle into nsmb folder, but game stops with blackscreen after pressing 2 on startscreen. Disc slotlight flashes (loads files), screen stays black. Flashing stops, no home button sign on pressing home button, game does not go on. Removing backgrounds/Openingtitle does not help.

hmm.. thats strange. Are you loading files off an SD card, or streaming over your wireless network?

If you are streaming over the wireless network, you can only really do levels and other small files. Idk why, it gives blackscreens if I try to load anything too large.

I've never had any problems loading anything off the SD card, unless a tileset is missing or something like that.

Tried both variants, wireless and SD.

SD Card is 1 GB. Fileset with backgrounds, tilesets, openingtitle and stages reaches 4,66 MB.

I wonder because NEWER Super Mario Bros Wii will use Riivolution and that seems to work for them who create it and their files will be surely larger than just 5 MB.

After RiiFS did not work, I just took the XML File from the PC to the SD the same that has been accessed through the server. That file was just a template pointing to the NSMB Folder with the patch name changed to "Reggie Personal Server". But the name can't be the problem, the rest of the XML just pointed to the folder placed in the riivolution folder called nsmb as said. Just like any other Riivolution template does.

I used the template here on my SD card (I think).

When using the SD card, the filesize shouldn't matter at all.

When using wireless, its the individual filesizes that matter. RiiFS will tell you which file it is trying to send, and for some reason sending stuff like 200 kb backgrounds freezes it up. No problem sending the small 2-4 kb levels though.

If I'm trying to test a level, I'll put all of the backgrounds / tilesets / etc onto the SD card, and stream just the levels over wifi. However, for now, just try to get it all to work from the SD card.