melonDS

DS emulator, a real one.

This a fork of the original melonDS with a single unique difference : a new icon. It was built and tested on macOS ARM64 (Apple Silicon). You can also build it from source with the shiny new icon. See the wiki for instructions.

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Features

• New icon, obviously.
• Native ARM64 build.
• Believe or not, built-in Nintendo WFC (Not my work though, not taking credits for it)

How to use

• Home menu boot requires a BIOS/firmware dump from an original DS or DS Lite.
• DS firmwares dumped from a DSi or 3DS aren't bootable and only contain configuration data, thus they are only suitable when booting games directly.
• As of today, there is no gamelist on melonDS, just open your .nds file directly to load a game.

Possible firmware sizes

• 128KB: DSi/3DS DS-mode firmware (reduced size due to lacking bootcode)
• 256KB: regular DS firmware
• 512KB: iQue DS firmware

DS BIOS dumps from a DSi or 3DS can be used with no compatibility issues. DSi BIOS dumps (in DSi mode) are not compatible. Or maybe they are. I don't know.

As for the rest, the interface should be pretty straightforward. If you have a question, don't hesitate to ask, fill an issue or pull a request!

How to build (macOS ARM64)

1. Install the Homebrew Package Manager
2. Install dependencies: brew install git pkg-config cmake sdl2 qt@6 libarchive enet zstd
3. Download the melonDS repository and prepare:

   git clone https://github.com/melonDS-emu/melonDS
   cd melonDS

4. Compile:

   cmake -B build -DCMAKE_PREFIX_PATH="$(brew --prefix qt@6);$(brew --prefix libarchive)"
   cmake --build build -j$(sysctl -n hw.logicalcpu)

If everything goes well, melonDS.app should now be in the build directory.

Self-contained app bundle

If you want an app bundle that can be distributed to other computers without needing to install dependencies through Homebrew, you can additionally run ../tools/mac-libs.rb . after the build is completed, or add -DMACOS_BUNDLE_LIBS=ON to the first CMake command.

Credits

• Martin for GBAtek, a good piece of documentation
• Cydrak for the extra 3D GPU research
• limittox vale on macOSicons for the icon
• All of you comrades who have been testing melonDS, reporting issues, suggesting shit, etc

Licenses

melonDS is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.

External

• Images used in the Input Config Dialog - see src/frontend/qt_sdl/InputConfig/resources/LICENSE.md
• Used the original Nintendo Font for the new icon because why not.