Spirit Tracks - D-Pad & QoL Hack (Nintendo DS) Romhack

Description

This patch combines d0k3’s QoL improvements with Greiga Master/StraDaMa's D-Pad Patch to address common frustrations in The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks, such as slow train travel and cumbersome mic-blowing. It enhances gameplay without changing the core experience.

Features:

1.5x faster train speeds in 2nd gear and reverse
Boost mode (4x speed) by holding L or R, 8x speed with both L & R in 2nd gear
Mic-blowing replaced by button input (L or R for flute, A everywhere else)
Full D-Pad controls for movement, swordplay, and rolling
A Super Secret Cheat Code for those who actually read readmes

**Warning:**This patch does not work with and may even result in a corrupted savegame on DSTT flashcards. Similar issues with other flashcards are not known, although it may be incompatible. Proceed at your own risk.

Hashes

Filename: Legend of Zelda, The - Spirit Tracks (USA, Australia) (En,Fr,Es).nds
CRC32: 38392357
SHA-1: 1f0921b5e99db9d92d24710f1b004e4f3c997b73
Verified: Nintendo - Nintendo DS (Decrypted) v.20260617-054944 (No-Intro)
Filename: Legend of Zelda, The - Spirit Tracks (Europe) (En,Fr,De,Es,It).nds
CRC32: 84aa2400
SHA-1: 9e99cc803a14ce038eb908db585431f8254f09ee
Verified: Nintendo - Nintendo DS (Decrypted) v.20260617-054944 (No-Intro)

Staff Credits

QoL Patch: d0k3
D-Pad Patch: Greiga Master / StraDaMa

Gallery

Last comments

nanashi89 2025-04-05

Works great so far. Any way to make it so you can play the game WITHOUT using the touch screen?

Mark 2025-04-05

Do you want a total touchless experience?

Simone D. Alemanno 2025-04-05

Why would you want to remove touch controls? Even in Final Fantasy: The 4 Heroes of Light you can move your character around and interact by touching the touch screen.

nanashi89 2025-04-05

I also play this on my Steam Deck. And the alignment on the touch screen is out of whack.

nanashi89 2025-04-05

I also play this on my Steam Deck. And the alignment on the touch screen is out of whack.

d0k3 2025-04-05

It's better to not put an email adress out in the open (would lead to lots of spam, I guess). For small files such as these you could just use file.io.

d0k3 2025-04-05

I understand, but I have my doubts touchless Spirit Tracks would become a reality. It would involve lots of testing, also some stuff would be difficult to do with just buttons (drawing symbols, for example). Is touchscreen alignment only a proble, for DS games? Then it should be some software setting in your DS emulator.

Mark 2025-04-05

https://file.io/abTm1rLJEa2L This is the patch for spirit track. There are some notes: I think i used a trimmed rom for making the patch. The compiler will autotrim the game i guess since i compiled it again. I have the original untouched trimmed rom which i used to compare for this patch. This patch is untested, i just booted the patched game to see if it works. Let me know if you need something else.

Simone D. Alemanno 2025-04-05

Well, play the game a standard DS/3DS console if you have one.

d0k3 2025-04-05

Thanks, got it! I'm having some trouble finding the base rom dump for this BPS patch. It expects CRC ed48917c, however none of the (E) dumps I found, not even in trimmed form, has this. By the way, you may use the online rom patcher to check for the expected CRC and also to check if the BPS patch works.

Mark 2025-04-05

Okay, i did a bunch of tests, the new compiled rom seems to not work as intended since che dpad wont work as a controller. So... i went backward. https://gbatemp.net/threads/legend-of-zelda-spirit-track-d-pad-patch.374773/ In this topic there's also the patch for eu rom contained in the mediafire link. I open xdelta, setted as source the original untouched eu rom, eu patch as patch and i ignored the checksum and it should work. As of my tests.

d0k3 2025-04-05

This one may have bugs, because it does not include the changes from update 2 (see this readme). Regardless, I can try it, but I'd still recommend the (U) version. Know that savegames are compatible between all versions of Spirit Tracks.

Mark 2025-04-05

Do you mean that us save is compatible with eu save?

d0k3 2025-04-05

Yes, that's what I meant. You can switch at any time.

d0k3 2025-04-05

I just uploaded an update, including a BPS for the (Europe) version. I tested it and it seems to contain teh bugfixes from Greiga Masters Update 2, so this should be good to go.

Mark 2025-04-05

Amazing! I'm really happy about this. This quirky game got a real nice upgrade.

d0k3 2025-04-05

Also thank you for your help with this!

joker441 2025-04-05

Hi! Is there any chance that you can include an AP patch aswell in the bps file? I am trying to play the game on TWiLight Menu++ and the dpad patch does work but I can't test the QOL patch out because I get hit with the anti piracy measure during the train tutorial.

dancingbears 2025-04-05

My understanding is that romhackers don't want to add an AP patch to avoid legal troubles. However, you can hack the game to add AP yourself. I used this forum thread to do it myself. FAST6191's posts, especially his third post, was very helpful. https://gbatemp.net/threads/zelda-spirit-tracks-using-ap-patch-and-d-pad-patch-at-the-same-time.536974/

Spirit Tracks - D-Pad & QoL Hack

Description

Hashes

Staff Credits

Gallery

Reviews

Last comments