[Tutorial] How to build Pokeruby/Pokeemerald using devkitPro's MSys2

Lunos · Oct 3, 2019

I'll be as quick as possible.
My objective here was to build the decomps as fast as possible, so forget about having me explain the meaning behind these steps.
It's not hard to figure out what are we doing here though.

Before starting, I want to give a quick shout-out to UltimaSoul who told me the process of building libpng from its source code.

Alright, let's do this.

Instructions:
1) Download and install devkitPro.
Note: If for some strange reason you get an error, try again after following these instructions.
To make things easier for everyone, I will assume that you installed it or will install it in its default location, which is C:\devkitPro.

2) Open C:\devkitPro\msys2\msys2_shell.bat and type the following commands:

pacman -Sy msys2-keyring
pacman -S make gcc zlib-devel git

3) Download libpng.

4) Uncompress the folder that you just downloaded (libpng's) twice. libpng-1.6.34.tar.gz first, and then libpng-1.6.34.tar which is inside of it.
That will give you access to a folder called libpng-1.6.34 that contains the source code of libpng.
EDIT: Alternatively, you can try out a newer version like libpng-1.6.37 instead.
It should also work just fine, but I haven't tested it myself, so keep that in mind.

5) Back to msys2_shell, go to the libpng-1.6.34 folder by using the cd command and then type the following commands in order:

./configure --prefix=/usr
make check
make install

6) Type cd to go back to your Home folder and then just use the following commands in order:

git clone https://github.com/pret/agbcc
git clone https://github.com/pret/pokeruby (or git clone https://github.com/pret/pokeemerald)
cd agbcc
./build.sh
./install.sh ../pokeruby (or ./install.sh ../pokeemerald)
cd ../pokeruby (or cd ../pokeemerald)
make -jN

Note: "N" stands for the number of CPU Threads you want to assign to the compiler. The more threads, the faster it'll go.

Note: You can create an Environment Variable called "HOME" and give it a desired folder path in order to change the Home folder that MSys2 uses.
To create an Environment Variable, open Windows' Run command (Win Key + R), type "sysdm.cpl" and go to Advanced -> Environment Variables.
Here's an example of how I have it set up.
If you don't have a HOME variable, MSys2 will use your User Account's folder found in C:\Users to store stuff by default.

I also recorded a quick video showing the whole process, just in case.

What can you do now? Well, whatever you want really. You have the source code of Game Freak's Pokémon Emerald in front of you, so go wild.
A lot of people like to inject DizzyEgg's works into their projects. Updates to many core parts of the game like the battle system, amount of items and amount of Pokémon.
If you want to learn how to do this, you can visit my tutorial.
https://www.pokecommunity.com/showthread.php?t=432321

And that's pretty much it.

dioxias · Dec 4, 2019

this is a flawless tutorial. very helpful. for those coming from TheRisingSean's post regarding merging the different pokeemerald branches, you don't need to clone pokeemerald again.

I do have one question, i was able to get this to compile into a 32mb .gba file, but when i load it up in VBA (2005 revision or VBA-m), the screen is white and stays that way. do you have any idea for a solution?

EDIT: I forgot about changing the save type to flash128kb! for those who have the same issue, this is how you fix it! options>emulator>save type> flash 128kb

carameix · Dec 14, 2019

Hi there, thanks for the tutorial! I've followed it exactly up to the 'make check' command, but it doesn't seem to be working - I don't get the same result as on the video tutorial. Here's what I get from 'make check':

Spoiler:

Any help or advice with this would be really appreciated! Thanks

Lunos · Dec 14, 2019

carameix said:
Hi there, thanks for the tutorial! I've followed it exactly up to the 'make check' command, but it doesn't seem to be working - I don't get the same result as on the video tutorial. Here's what I get from 'make check':

Spoiler:

$ make check
rm -f pnglibconf.c pnglibconf.tf[45]
gawk -f ./scripts/options.awk out=pnglibconf.tf4 version=search\
./pngconf.h ./scripts/pnglibconf.dfa\
./pngusr.dfa 1>&2
gawk -f ./scripts/options.awk out=pnglibconf.tf5 pnglibconf.tf4 1>&2
rm pnglibconf.tf4
mv pnglibconf.tf5 pnglibconf.c
rm -f pnglibconf.out pnglibconf.tf[12]
test -d scripts || mkdir scripts || test -d scripts
gcc -E -DHAVE_CONFIG_H -I. \
-DPNGLIB_LIBNAME='PNG16_0' -DPNGLIB_VERSION='1.6.34' -DSYMBOL_PREFIX='' -DPNG_NO_USE_READ_MACROS -DPNG_BUILDING_SYMBOL_TABLE pnglibconf.c > pnglibconf.tf1
gawk -f "./scripts/dfn.awk" out="pnglibconf.tf2" pnglibconf.tf1 1>&2
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:176: sub(/
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:176: ^ unterminated regexp
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:177: sub(/
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:177: ^ unexpected newline or end of string
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:177: $/, "", line)
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:177: ^ unterminated regexp
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:178: $/, "", line)
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:178: ^ unexpected newline or end of string
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:179: if (sort) {
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:179: ^ syntax error
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:180: if (split(line, parts) < sort) {
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:180: ^ syntax error
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:182: print "line", lineno ": missing sort field:", line
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:182: ^ unexpected newline or end of string
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:183: err=1
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:183: ^ unexpected newline or end of string
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:185: array[parts[sort]] = line
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:185: ^ unexpected newline or end of string
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:189: print line >out
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:189: ^ unexpected newline or end of string
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:194: print "line", NR, "incorrectly formatted PNG_DFN line:"
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:194: ^ unexpected newline or end of string
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:196: err = 1
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:196: ^ unexpected newline or end of string
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:200: if (out_count > 0 || err > 0)
gawk: ./scripts/dfn.awk:200: ^ unexpected newline or end of string
make: *** [Makefile:2209: pnglibconf.out] Error 1

Any help or advice with this would be really appreciated! Thanks

Hmm... that's very strange.
Google led me to this post in SourceForge. Would you mind trying out the solution written there?

carameix · Dec 30, 2019

Thanks - I ended up completely re-starting and re-downloading everything and it's all working fine now

s_grayh1 · Jan 13, 2020

Help!! I get to the last step and when I type the command make -j2 i get "make: *** No targets specified and no makefile found. Stop." If it helps I'm coming from TheRisingSean's post. Where did I screw up?

Lunos · Jan 14, 2020

s_grayh1 said:
Help!! I get to the last step and when I type the command make -j2 i get "make: *** No targets specified and no makefile found. Stop." If it helps I'm coming from TheRisingSean's post. Where did I screw up?

Can you post a pic of your shell/terminal?
The error is saying that, in the folder that it's currently pointing to, there isn't a makefile (the file that tells make what it's supposed to do).

s_grayh1 · Jan 14, 2020

That's what I was thinking so I looked into my pokeemerald folder and a make file was there so I was even more confused. I will post a picture once I am out of work

s_grayh1 · Jan 14, 2020

Lunos said:
Can you post a pic of your shell/terminal?
The error is saying that, in the folder that it's currently pointing to, there isn't a makefile (the file that tells make what it's supposed to do).

Lunos · Jan 14, 2020

s_grayh1 said:
-Snip-

Just so we're clear, you did install all the packages required and as instructed in the main post, yes?
You also did build and install agbcc into your Pokeemerald folder, which is also explained there, right?

I'm honestly not really sure what is causing your problem. The only thing I can suggest is to start from scratch and follow every step carefully and as they're written.

s_grayh1 · Jan 15, 2020

Lunos said:
Just so we're clear, you did install all the packages required and as instructed in the main post, yes?
You also did build and install agbcc into your Pokeemerald folder, which is also explained there, right?

I'm honestly not really sure what is causing your problem. The only thing I can suggest is to start from scratch and follow every step carefully and as they're written.

Don't I need to put an emerald rom somewhere before I use the make command? I think that's where I screwed up

Lunos · Jan 15, 2020

s_grayh1 said:
Don't I need to put an emerald rom somewhere before I use the make command?

No, you don't. If you did need one, I would have mentioned it in the main post.
Baserom calls in Pokeemerald have been killed a year ago or two, so a base ROM is not needed at all.

s_grayh1 · Jan 17, 2020

Lunos said:
No, you don't. If you did need one, I would have mentioned it in the main post.
Baserom calls in Pokeemerald have been killed a year ago or two, so a base ROM is not needed at all.

So I ran through the process again and I got the same error. I think where I could be messing up is is step 6 where we have to go back to the "home folder". Is that referencing the pokeemerald folder or the or my user file which for you would be C:/Users/Lunos

AsparagusEdu · Jan 17, 2020

I'm having the same problem as s_grayh1, followed every single step but when excute the command ./configure --prefix=/usr it caused an error

Lunos · Jan 18, 2020

s_grayh1 said:
So I ran through the process again and I got the same error. I think where I could be messing up is is step 6 where we have to go back to the "home folder". Is that referencing the pokeemerald folder or the or my user file which for you would be C:/Users/Lunos

The home folder is the folder where you have agbcc and Pokeemerald stored.

In the notes at the end of the post, I quickly explain how to define a Home folder using Windows' Environment Variables if you want to have a specific location for it, but by default, the "Home" folder of MSys2 is "C:\Users\USER".

AsparagusEdu said:
I'm having the same problem as s_grayh1, followed every single step but when excute the command ./configure --prefix=/usr it caused an error

Do you have an AntiVirus operating at the same time you're compiling libpng?
After Googling a little bit, I found out that AntiViruses may interfere with the comftest.exe file and thus not allowing it to do its part to compile libpng.

Splitnonemore · Mar 18, 2020

Awesome I was done until I found this tutorial. Which is better, cygwin or Msys2?

Lunos · Mar 19, 2020

Splitnonemore said:
Awesome I was done until I found this tutorial. Which is better, cygwin or Msys2?

Personally, I use Cygwin because MSys2 gave me a small issue I could never fix, but both are okay so use whatever you want.

dazblue · Apr 29, 2020

Hi, I'm at the last step trying to make pokeemerald and I'm getting errors saying scaninc.exe and other tools are not there. I have previously successfully made pokeruby, but at the time there was a separate 'pokeruby-tools' repository which included scaninc and other tools that aren't present in my pokeemerald tools folder. I'm now not sure what to do because I've followed the steps exactly up to this point. Thanks for your time!

Lunos · Apr 29, 2020

dazblue said:
Hi, I'm at the last step trying to make pokeemerald and I'm getting errors saying scaninc.exe and other tools are not there. I have previously successfully made pokeruby, but at the time there was a separate 'pokeruby-tools' repository which included scaninc and other tools that aren't present in my pokeemerald tools folder. I'm now not sure what to do because I've followed the steps exactly up to this point. Thanks for your time!

Pokeruby-tools was taken down sometime ago, because the tools are now built along with the rest of the game's source code when you use make. It looks like they're not building on your end though, and that's weird.
You can force-build them by using the make tools command.

dazblue · Apr 29, 2020

Lunos said:
Pokeruby-tools was taken down sometime ago, because the tools are now built along with the rest of the game's source code when you use make. It looks like they're not building on your end though, and that's weird.
You can force-build them by using the make tools command.

Thanks for your help, ah I see that makes sense. "make tools" results in this (sorry I don't know how to format code in a forum post):

$ make tools
cc -Wall -Wextra -Wno-switch -Werror -std=c11 -O2 main.c extended.c -o aif2pcm -lm
cc -Wall -Wextra -Werror -std=c11 -O2 bin2c.c -o bin2c
cc gbafix.c -o gbafix
cc -Wall -Wextra -Werror -Wno-sign-compare -std=c11 -O2 -DPNG_SKIP_SETJMP_CHECK main.c convert_png.c gfx.c jasc_pal.c lz.c rl.c util.c font.c huff.c -o gbagfx -lpng -lz
convert_png.c:5:10: fatal error: png.h: No such file or directory
5 | #include <png.h>
| ^~~~~~~
compilation terminated.
make[1]: *** [Makefile:18: gbagfx] Error 1
make: *** [Makefile:162: tools/gbagfx] Error 2

I have been through each folder within 'tools' and used 'make' individually, and they all make successfully apart from gbagfx and rsfont which both give the same error message

[Tutorial] How to build Pokeruby/Pokeemerald using devkitPro's MSys2

More options

Lunos

Random Uruguayan User

dioxias

carameix

Lunos

Random Uruguayan User

carameix

s_grayh1

Lunos

Random Uruguayan User

s_grayh1

s_grayh1

Attachments

Lunos

Random Uruguayan User

s_grayh1

Lunos

Random Uruguayan User

s_grayh1

AsparagusEdu

AsparagusEduardo

Lunos

Random Uruguayan User

Splitnonemore

Lunos

Random Uruguayan User

dazblue

Lunos

Random Uruguayan User

dazblue