Wii Homebrew - Part 1 and Part 2

So this is the start of my journey with Wii homebrew - this will probably go on for a while as i keep learning about the Wii architecture and how to get stuff working with it - down below is basically the steps i took here to get everything working with the Wii (this is a blogpost, not a tutorial)

Introduction:

Started off with an SD card, and looked through all of the methods online on getting the Homebrew Channel installed, but overall str2hax seemed like the easiest method for me as it didn't require an SD card at all - so I could save the SD card for later - that, and it overall just seemed like the fastest method for setting up. Worth noting that ModMii is better for customizability as well as having the ability to work with the Wii Mini and the WiiU's vWii, but I used the str2hax method instead as I was just doing this on a regular Wii.

Unfortunately, there was 1 thing I had not accounted for during this process; the batteries in my WiiMote! Luckily I had a TV remote nearby to save the day, but it would've been rough to be stuck on the final str2hax screen lol!

Once that had all been set-up, I had to backup my NAND with BootMii (included in the channel), but unfortunately I accidentally backed up my NAND to the same SD card with BootMii on it - so now the SD card is corrupt and I can't access it on my PC - which kinda sucks. With this done however, it was finally time to install some apps.

str2hax method main screen pictured above ^

Setting Up Homebrew Apps:

Since my SD card was now cooked, I had to make do with using a USB for most of the Homebrew Channel stuff, luckily this was a very smooth transition, with barely any setbacks through the whole process using USB.

First app that I had to install was Priiloader - since it adds an extra layer of brick protection to the Wii, and is just overall very useful to have installed - luckily this worked flawlessly, only catch being that the Wii froze when I hit "System Menu" - luckily I did that last!

Once Priiloader was installed, the next thing to do was trying to access the Open Shop Channel - firstly I tried the Homebrew Browser, but that unfortunately didn't work like I was expecting - so then I tried downloading the Linux version of it (since I primarily use Arch Linux for doing things) - unfortunately this didn't work either, as I ran into a few issues installing one of the packages it needed - so I eventually had to settle for using it on Windows, which worked perfectly - just put in my USB and downloaded the apps I needed.

Basically downloaded all of the apps that were necessary for me to get started, but the thing I was most interested to set up now was WiiLink24 - since it brings back some of the old Wii Channels such as the CheckMiiOut channel and the Food Channel - as well as setting up RiiConnect24 - an online service for the Wii (still need to set up Wiimmfi tho!)

WiiLink24 main site page ^

WiiLink24 main video ^

Setting Up WiiLink24:

So I did basically the same method as before with setting up Priiloader, and used one of the apps - WADMii - as a way to download the patched WAD files onto the Wii, so that it could be set up with WiiLink24 successfully - luckily using this app was a really straightforward process, all I had to do was download the System Menu WAD first and then watch the rest download as well.

Next step was using the WiiLink Mail Patcher - this really didn't take long at all, just needed to load the app and let it do the work - after all of that, I had some new, fully-functional channels on my Wii!

Using a Custom Theme:

So next up, the last thing I wanted to do on the Wii for this part was add a custom theme on the Wii to truly solidify the Wii Homebrew experience - I just felt that the main menu looked a bit too vanilla otherwise.

Luckily I managed to find a site solely dedicated to Wii themes - so I managed to pretty easily find a custom theme that I liked, selected the CSM file for my console's region, and downloaded the theme that I wanted to put on my Wii.

I also decided to get a new theme for the Homebrew Channel as well, which was incredibly straightforward as I just installed the theme as I would any other app on the channel, just load it up and voila!

Anyway to install the CSM file that I had downloaded, I needed to use the app CSM installer, luckily I had already installed this beforehand so I had a good idea of how it worked - just needed to make a "themes" folder on my USB drive and put it in there, then load up CSM installer on my Wii with the USB plugged in - then CSM installer recognised the theme in the folder and I started installing it - and it worked perfectly! I now had a fully homebrewed Wii!

Custom theme works! ^

Wii Homebrew - Part 2:

Setting up devkitPro:

So the first thing that I did here was set up devkitPro - I originally wanted to use Linux for this, but I had one problem - there wasn't enough space on my root for packages! Since I was struggling a bit with this at first, I decided to install it on my Windows machine as a back-up, just in-case I couldn't get it to work on my Linux machine - luckily, I managed to get the packages installed (turns out I had just downloaded 1 too many flatpaks! lol)

Setting up Eclipse IDE to compile DKP code:

Transferring the files to the Wii:

The final step was transferring the files to the Wii - I had initially started off trying to use the Linux terminal to transfer files to the Wii's IP - but this was too much of a hassle and I couldn't tell if it was working - I may retry this method in the future as it would be very convenient for building projects, but for now I switched to using the Windows program TransmitMii - since that was very easy to set-up, and all I needed to do was put in the Wii's IP and the compiled file, and voila! It worked without a hitch.

TransmitMii Logo ^

Conclusion:

Overall this was a pretty fun project to work on - I'm hoping I can experiment a bit more with stuff like this in the future, but I think for now I'm going to work a bit on other things (stay tuned!)

Disclaimer: This is a blogpost, not a tutorial - this is just a personal project and I am not responsible for the software used here - this is just for experimental purposes and not to infringe on Nintendo's copyright in any kind of way (plz dont sue me Nintendo!)