Help:Using mods

Welcome, players! This article will walk you through setting up BotW to play with mods. There are three different platforms you can play on:

• Wii U console
• Cemu, the Wii U emulator, on your computer
• Switch console

Almost all Wii U mods should work on both the console and Cemu, but most Switch mods aren't cross-compatible. In addition, many mods are only compatible with version 1.5.0 of BotW.

Note that any mods which edit any of the same files as each other will probably be incompatible and cause issues. Sometimes, mods that edit different files can also be unexpectedly incompatible. If you are using multiple mods and you find glitches, please figure out which mod / combination of mods is causing the issue before reporting it to the mod creator(s).

Wii U Console

Setting up homebrew

Follow this guide to set up your Wii U console to use homebrew software.

Setting up SDCafiine

SDCafiine is a Wii U homebrew program that will load modded game files from your SD card.

1. Download the latest stable release of SDCafiine (not a "nightly" version) from here.
2. Extract the contents of the .zip into the root of your SD card.
3. Create a new folder in the root of your SD Card, named sdcafiine.
4. Within that folder, create a new folder with the name of your game's Title ID. On Wii U, the JP version of BotW uses 00050000101C9300, the US version uses 00050000101C9400, and the EU version uses 00050000101C9500.
5. Within that folder, you can create any number of folders named after the mods you want to use. When you boot the game, a menu will appear allowing you to select one to use.
6. Inside each of those folders, create a folder named content. Your mod files will go in here. (Mods will often include a content folder already to make things clear.)

To use mods, you just need to select the SDCafiine option from the Homebrew Launcher, then boot your game immediately afterwards.

Cemu Emulator

Download Cemu Emulator

You can find the latest version of Cemu Emulator on the Official Cemu Website

Setting up homebrew

Follow this guide to set up your Wii U console to use homebrew software, in order to allow you to dump the game files from your console to your PC.

Dumping the game files

To play BotW on Cemu, you'll need to dump the game files from the console to your computer. Then run the U-King.rpx file from Cemu to boot the game.

Installing the DLC

If you dumped the game's add-on content (aoc) files, follow this guide to install them in Cemu.

Setting up and Maximising Performance

Now that you have Cemu and your games files, it is recommended you use Serfrosts Cemu Setup Guide to maximise performance on your hardware before installing mods.

Installing mods with the graphic pack menu

Cemu uses "graphic packs" to install mods without overwriting any of the base files, allowing you to easily install or uninstall mods without leaving any trace.

Graphic packs are installed by placing the unzipped folder in Cemu/graphicPacks/. Note that most newer mods will come packaged as a graphic pack, or have a graphic pack option.

To check that the mod is a graphic pack, open the mod folder within Cemu/graphicPacks/. A graphic pack will have a file called rules.txt next to the content and/or aoc folder.

If a mod is not packaged as a graphic pack you will have to package it yourself, otherwise skip to the end of this section. This method works for versions of Cemu 1.15.1+

1. Create a new folder inside Cemu/graphicPacks/ named after the mod you want to use.
2. Inside that folder, create a folder named content. Your mod files will go in here. (Mods will often include a content folder already to make things clear.)
3. Create a file named rules.txt next to the content folder (if the downloaded mod doesn't already include one). Use this example as a template:

[Definition]
titleIds = 00050000101C9300,00050000101C9400,00050000101C9500
name = <Mod Name>
path = "The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild/Mods/<Mod Name>"
description = <Mod description here>
version = 3
fsPriority = 100

version must be set to 3 to work correctly. fsPriority determines the order in which mods are prioritized - higher numbers prioritize that mod's files over other mods. Mods without an fsPriority entry specified will default to 100.

Once a mod has been added, simply enable it from Cemu's graphic pack menu to use it. You can find this menu in Options > Graphic Packs or by right-clicking a game and selecting Edit Graphic Packs. Note that most mods should not be enabled or disabled while the game is running.

Installing mods using BCML

Mods that are already packaged as a graphic pack can also be installed using BCML, a mod loading tool. In addition to being simpler than manually extracting and enabling the mod, BCML is designed to resolve certain kinds of conflicts between different mods. Mods that modify the Resource system, the same SARC files, or Message archives will not function properly together unless the changes are merged. BCML does this automatically. To install mods with BCML:

1. Install BCML using the instructions here.
2. Command line version: Install a mod by running bcml install path\to\mod.zip.  ^[help] BCML will ask you to specify the directory where Cemu is installed first.
3. Graphical version: Open the GUI by running bcml-gui. ^[help] Select the directory where Cemu is intalled. Then click "Install" and select the mod you want to install.

BCML should automatically enable installed mods in Cemu, but check to make sure by opening the Cemu graphic pack menu and looking in the "BCML Mods" category.

Switch

Setting up homebrew

Follow this guide to set up your Switch console to use homebrew software.

This tutorial uses Atmosphère Custom Firmware (CFW). It is strongly recommended not to use other CFWs as they tend to be outdated, unsafe and/or use stolen code from Atmosphère.

Running homebrew on your console may lead to it getting banned from Nintendo's online services (including eShop and game updates). Enabling Airplane Mode will not help, as telemetry reports are saved and sent to Nintendo the next time you connect to the internet.

However, this risk is very minimal as long as you are sensible and only use a safe, sane CFW (Atmosphère) and mods on offline games (don't install NSPs or pirate games!) as Atmosphère does not leave any trace on the system and disables some system telemetry.

If you are paranoid, turn on Airplane Mode before running homebrew for the first time, then make a full system backup, and always stay offline until you restore that clean backup.

Disabling telemetry reports

The Switch version of Breath of the Wild sends many telemetry reports so when you are using mods that modify gameplay in a detectable way or add new content in any way, it is strongly recommended to disable telemetry reports because they are used by Zelda developers to understand how people play BotW and also to help them fix bugs.

Mods that modify actors are especially dangerous as they might cause the game to use the ActorSystem emergency heap and trigger many memory-related play reports.

To disable problematic telemetry reports:

• For 1.5.0, download this patch and put it in /atmosphere/exefs_patches/botw_no_telemetry/16A91992BBA71201E98756F3BC8F5D2F.ips. This patch works for the Switch 1.5.0 executable only (build ID: 16A91992BBA71201E98756F3BC8F5D2F).

• For 1.6.0, download this patch and put it in /atmosphere/exefs_patches/botw_no_telemetry/8E9978D50BDD20B4C8395A106C27FFDE.ips. This patch works for the Switch 1.6.0 executable only (build ID: 8E9978D50BDD20B4C8395A106C27FFDE).

Installing mods

1. In the root of your MicroSD card, there should be a folder named atmosphere, sxos, or reinx, depending on which CFW you are using.
2. Within that folder, there should be a folder named titles. Inside that, create a folder with the name of your game's Title ID. For BotW on Switch, the Title ID is 01007EF00011E000.
3. Inside that, make a folder called romfs. Your mod files will go in here. (Mods will often include all or part of this folder structure already, to make things easy.)

To use the mod, simply boot the console into CFW, then boot the game, and the mod will be active.

Note that mods are not permanently installed on the console. To remove all installed mods, simply delete /atmosphere/titles/01007EF00011E000.