DS Game Maker Library (dsgmLib)

dsgmLib is an object-orientated C library for Nintendo DS game development. Although it's designed specifically for DS Game Maker (which generates dsgmLib code files), it's ideal for general Nintendo DS homebrew games as well.

In particular dsgmLib is a successor to PAlib and an alternative to NightFox’s Lib.

What it does

Nintendo DS games are generally written in C, but C isn't a language which directly supports object-orientated programming. dsgmLib provides an object-orientated layer for game development, allowing you to write clean, modular code whilst avoiding God objects.

DS Game Maker generates dsgmLib code like this:

void ball_touch(ballObjectInstance *me) {
    me->x += 32;
    me->y += 32;
}

It's clear that when any instance of ball is touched, it is moved down and right by 32 pixels.

Importantly we didn't have to rely on the sprite number of our object instance to update its position - this would be ugly, and it's how older versions of DS Game Maker worked:

DSGM_SetSpriteXY(
    me->screen,
    me->spriteNumber,
    DSGM_GetSpriteX(me->screen, me->spriteNumber) + 32,
    DSGM_GetSpriteY(me->screen, me->spriteNumber) + 32
);

Dealing with sprite numbers directly is clunky; the end user shouldn't have to do this. A key feature (or principle) of dsgmLib is providing an abstraction from the OAM (Object Attribute Memory). You don't have to care about sprite numbers or rotation sets - only object instances (which could have any sprite numbers). We've designed this abstraction to make common tasks such as moving a sprite (object instance) as easy as possible.

dsgmLib is feature rich. It supports: high level object oriented programming, wireless DS to DS multiplayer (NiFi), saving and loading, 3D (support for MD2 models with animation and texturing, as well as abstractions for complex 3D math such as quaternions), drawable backgrounds, rotatable and scalable backgrounds, custom fonts, scaling and rotating of sprites, sound effects, and music.

As a PAlib Replacement

PAlib is ridiculously old - it was last updated in 2008 - and bloated (it includes things which DS Game Maker has never used such as Mode 7 3D). PAlib also requires an old or modified version of the devkitARM toolchain. As a result, PAlib is very difficult to maintain and a replacement is long over due.

Read more: PAlib on the devkitPro wiki

devkitARM Installation

You will need the devkitARM toolchain from the vendor devkitPro. You can read the instructions from the devkitPro wiki in full or get going right away as follows.

Windows

Download and run devkitProUpdater-1.5.3.exe. Only "Minimal System" and "devkitARM" are required; install devkitPPC and devkitPSP only if you want to develop for the Nintendo Wii/Sony PSP respectively. Log out and log in again if there are compilation problems.

OS X, Linux, etc.

Download devkitARMupdate.pl to your home directory (/Users/(username) on OS X or /home/(username) on Ubuntu); it's a Perl script. Open a terminal and run this:

cd ~
perl devkitARMupdate.pl
export DEVKITPRO=~/devkitPro
export DEVKITARM=~/devkitPro/devkitARM

Great! We're done.

Getting Started

Download dsgmLib, and extract the archive to your devkitPro directory (for example C:\devkitPro), then rename the directory from dsgmLib-master to dsgmLib.

Additionally, dsgmLib requires a fork of dswifi called dsgmDSWiFi which enables support for local DS to DS multiplayer (NiFi). Download the latest version from here. Extract the files in include to your libnds include directory (for example C:\devkitPro\libnds\include) and the files in lib to your libnds lib directory (for example C:\devkitPro\libnds\lib\).

Now open a terminal in the dsgmLib directory. Run ls to (hopefully) print this list of files and directories:

examples
include
lib
source
template
LICENSE
Makefile
README.md

cd to examples and run ls to list the examples:

Basic3D
Collision
CustomFont
DrawableBackground
LargeBackground
MarioKart
NiFi
RoomPersistency
RotationBackground
TopDownShooter
Priority
RotsetEffects
Saving
Unpossible
Worms
Makefile

Let's compile the Collision example.

cd to Collision and run make:

cd Collision
make

You'll see Collision.nds is generated which you can run with an emulator like NO$GBA (for Windows) or DeSmuME (for Windows/OS X/Linux).

Additionally, you can compile all of the examples at once by running make on the examples directory.

Recompiling the Library

If you make changes to the library's source code (dsgmLib directory), you'll need to recompile it by running make in the directory. Now recompile any projects that link against the library.

FAQs

###Compile error of "cannot find -ldsgmdswifi9" This is occurs when dsgmDSWiFi has not been installed. Download dsgmDSWiFi and extract the lib and include files to your libnds paths (for example C:\devkitPro\libnds\lib and C:\devkitPro\libnds\include).

###Game works fine in the emulator but when playing on a DS with a flashcard there is just a black screen DS Game Maker uses NitroFS, a method of loading data (sprites, backgrounds, music, etc...) for homebrew games from inside of the compiled .nds file. Unfortunately, many flashcards are designed soley for running pirated games and do not support this homebrew feature. Either you can make your game without using NitroFS (store files in RAM instead), or you can use the Homebrew Menu (which supports NitroFS) on your flashcard.

Getting Help

There's a forum specifically for discussing bugs/feature requests, or create a GitHub issue.

Acknowledgements

• devkitARM and libnds by devkitPro team,
• MaxMod by devkitPro team,
• dswifi by Stephen Stair,
• MD2 loading code by David Henry,
• MD2 DS optimisation by Smealum,