A compression/decompresson script (with optional GUI) that allows user to compress/decompress Nintendo Switch dumps loselessly, thanks to zstd compression algorithm. The compressed file can be installed directly with supported NSW Homebrew Title Installers.
A Swiss mirror of this repository is maintained under https://gitlab.nicobosshard.ch/nicoboss/nsz
This will be the new home in case GitHub ever takes down nsz. Please bookmark it.
- This project does NOT incorporate any copyrighted material such as cryptographic keys. All keys must be provided by the user.
- This project does NOT circumvent any technological protection measures. The NSZ file format purposely keeps all technological protection measures in place.
- This project shall only be used for legally purchased games.
- This project is MIT licensed. Check LICENSE for more information.
There are several ways the install this tool. You can find details on installation for all of them below.
You need to have a hactool compatible keys file in a suitable directory to use this tool.
The keys file must be located as prod.keys file in %USERPROFILE%/.switch/(Windows)/$HOME/.switch/(UNIX) or keys.txt in the working directory. You must legally obtain your keys!
You can also use the Windows binaries. They do not require any external libraries to be installed and can be run without installing anything. You can find the binaries in the release page.
Methods listed below requires you to have Python 3.6+ and pip3 installed.
Use the following command to install the console-only version:
pip3 install --upgrade nsz
Use the following command to install the GUI version:
pip3 install --upgrade nsz[gui]
- Install "Pydroid 3" and the "Pydroid repository plugin" from the Play Store
- Open "Pydroid 3" and navigate to "Pip"
- Enter "nsz" and unselect "use prebuild" then press install
- Navigate to "Terminal" to use the "nsz" command
- The first time it will tell you where to copy your prod.keys which you should do using the "cp" command
- Use any command line arguments you want like "nsz -D file.nsz" to decompress your game
The tool can also be run by cloning the repository, installing the requirements and then executing nsz using python3 nsz.py
Use the following command to install the console-only versions requirements:
pip3 install -r requirements.txt
Use the following command to install the GUI versions requirements:
pip3 install -r requirements-gui.txt
nsz.py --help
usage: nsz.py [-h] [-C] [-D] [-l LEVEL] [-L] [-B] [-S] [-s BS] [-V] [-Q] [-K]
[-F] [-p] [-P] [-t THREADS] [-m MULTI] [-o [OUTPUT]] [-w] [-r]
[--rm-source] [-i] [--depth DEPTH] [-x]
[--extractregex EXTRACTREGEX] [--titlekeys] [--undupe]
[--undupe-dryrun] [--undupe-rename] [--undupe-hardlink]
[--undupe-prioritylist UNDUPE_PRIORITYLIST]
[--undupe-whitelist UNDUPE_WHITELIST]
[--undupe-blacklist UNDUPE_BLACKLIST] [--undupe-old-versions]
[-c CREATE]
[file ...]
positional arguments:
file
options:
-h, --help show this help message and exit
-C Compress NSP/XCI
-D Decompress NSZ/XCZ/NCZ
-l LEVEL, --level LEVEL
Compression Level: Trade-off between compression speed
and compression ratio. Default: 18, Max: 22
-L, --long Enables zStandard long distance mode for even better
compression
-B, --block Use block compression option. This mode allows highly
multi-threaded compression/decompression with random
read access allowing compressed games to be played
without decompression in the future however this comes
with a slightly lower compression ratio cost. This is
the default option for XCZ.
-S, --solid Use solid compression option. Slightly higher
compression ratio but won't allow for random read
access. File compressed this way will never be
mountable (have to be installed or decompressed first
to run). This is the default option for NSZ.
-s BS, --bs BS Block Size for random read access 2^x while x between
14 and 32. Default: 20 => 1 MB
-V, --verify Verifies files after compression raising an unhandled
exception on hash mismatch and verify existing NSP and
NSZ files when given as parameter. Requires --keep
when used during compression.
-Q, --quick-verify Same as --verify but skips the NSP SHA256 hash
verification and only verifies NCA hashes. Does not
require --keep when used during compression.
-K, --keep Keep all useless files and partitions during
compression to allow bit-identical recreation
-F, --fix-padding Fixes PFS0 padding to match the nxdumptool/no-intro
standard. Incompatible with --verify so --quick-verify
will be used instead.
-p, --parseCnmt Extract TitleId/Version from Cnmt if this information
cannot be obtained from the filename. Required for
skipping/overwriting existing files and --rm-old-
version to work properly if some not every file is
named properly. Supported filenames:
*TitleID*[vVersion]*
-P, --alwaysParseCnmt
Always extract TitleId/Version from Cnmt and never
trust filenames
-t THREADS, --threads THREADS
Number of threads to compress with. Numbers < 1
corresponds to the number of logical CPU cores for
block compression and 3 for solid compression
-m MULTI, --multi MULTI
Executes multiple compression tasks in parallel. Take
a look at available RAM especially if compression
level is over 18.
-o [OUTPUT], --output [OUTPUT]
Directory to save the output NSZ files
-w, --overwrite Continues even if there already is a file with the
same name or title id inside the output directory
-r, --rm-old-version Removes older versions if found
--rm-source Deletes source file/s after compressing/decompressing.
It's recommended to only use this in combination with
--verify
-i, --info Show info about title or file
--depth DEPTH Max depth for file info and extraction
-x, --extract Extract a NSP/XCI/NSZ/XCZ/NSPZ
--extractregex EXTRACTREGEX
Regex specifying which files inside the container
should be extracted. Example: "^.*\.(cert|tik)$"
--titlekeys Extracts titlekeys from your NSP/NSZ files and adds
missing keys to ./titlekeys.txt and JSON files inside
./titledb/ (obtainable from
https://github.com/blawar/titledb).
--undupe Deleted all duplicates (games with same ID and
Version). The Files folder will get parsed in order so
the later in the argument list the more likely the
file is to be deleted
--undupe-dryrun Shows what files would get deleted using --undupe
--undupe-rename Renames files to minimal standard:
[TitleId][vVersion].nsz
--undupe-hardlink Hardlinks files to minimal standard:
[TitleId][vVersion].nsz
--undupe-prioritylist UNDUPE_PRIORITYLIST
Regex specifying which dublicate deletion should be
prioritized before following the normal deletion
order. Example: "^.*\.(nsp|xci)$"
--undupe-whitelist UNDUPE_WHITELIST
Regex specifying which dublicates should under no
circumstances be deleted. Example: "^.*\.(nsz|xcz)$"
--undupe-blacklist UNDUPE_BLACKLIST
Regex specifying which files should always be deleted
- even if they are not even a dublicate! Be careful!
Example: "^.*\.(nsp|xci)$"
--undupe-old-versions
Removes every old version as long there is a newer one
of the same titleID.
-c CREATE, --create CREATE
Inverse of --extract. Repacks files/folders to an NSP.
Example: --create out.nsp .\in
- To compress all files in a folder:
nsz -C /path/to/folder/with/dumps/ - To compress all files in a folder and verifying integrity of compressed files:
nsz --verify -C /path/to/folder/with/dumps/ - To compress all files in a folder with 8 threads and outputting resulting files to a new directory:
nsz --threads 8 --output /path/to/out/dir/ -C /path/to/folder/with/dumps/ - To compress all files in a folder with level 22 compression level:
nsz --level 22 -C /path/to/folder/with/dumps/ - To decompress all files in a folder:
nsz -D /path/to/folder/with/dumps/
To view all the possible flags and a description on what each flag, check the Usage section.
NSZ files are functionally identical to NSP files. Their sole purpose to alert the user that it contains compressed NCZ files. NCZ files can be mixed with NCA files in the same container.
As an alternative to this tool NSC_Builder also supports compressing NSP to NSZ, and decompressing NSZ to NSP. NSC_Builder can be downloaded at https://github.com/julesontheroad/NSC_BUILDER
XCZ files are functionally identical to XCI files. Their sole purpose to alert the user that it contains compressed NCZ files. NCZ files can be mixed with NCA files in the same container.
These are compressed NCA files. The NCA's are decrypted, and then compressed using zStandard.
The first 0x4000 bytes of an NCZ file is exactly the same as the original NCA (and still encrypted). This applies even if the first section doesn't start at 0x4000.
At 0x4000, there is the variable sized NCZ Header. It contains a list of sections which tell the decompressor how to re-encrypt the NCA data after decompression. It can also contain an optional block compression header allowing random read access.
All of the information in the header can be derived from the original NCA + Ticket, however it is provided pre-parsed to make decompression as easy as possible for third parties.
Directly after the NCZ header, the zStandard stream begins and ends at EOF. The stream is decompressed to offset 0x4000. If block compression is used the stream is splitted into independent blocks and can be decompressed as shown in https://github.com/nicoboss/nsz/blob/master/nsz/BlockDecompressorReader.py. CompressedBlockSizeList[blockID] must not exceed decompressedBlockSize. If smaller the block must be decompressed. If equal the block is stored in plain text.
class Section:
def __init__(self, f):
self.magic = f.read(8) # b'NCZSECTN'
self.offset = f.readInt64()
self.size = f.readInt64()
self.cryptoType = f.readInt64()
f.readInt64() # padding
self.cryptoKey = f.read(16)
self.cryptoCounter = f.read(16)
class Block:
def __init__(self, f):
self.magic = f.read(8) # b'NCZBLOCK'
self.version = f.readInt8()
self.type = f.readInt8()
self.unused = f.readInt8()
self.blockSizeExponent = f.readInt8()
self.numberOfBlocks = f.readInt32()
self.decompressedSize = f.readInt64()
self.compressedBlockSizeList = []
for i in range(self.numberOfBlocks):
self.compressedBlockSizeList.append(f.readInt32())
nspf.seek(0x4000)
sectionCount = nspf.readInt64()
for i in range(sectionCount):
sections.append(Section(nspf))
if blockCompression:
BlockHeader = Block(nspf)NSZ pip package: https://pypi.org/project/nsz/
Forum thread: https://gbatemp.net/threads/nsz-homebrew-compatible-nsp-xci-compressor-decompressor.550556/
SciresM for his hardware crypto functions; the blazing install speeds (50 MB/sec +) achieved here would not be possible without this.
Thanks to our contributors: nicoboss, blawar, plato79, eXhumer, Taorni, anthonyu, teknoraver, KWottrich, gabest11, siddhartha77, alucryd, seiya-git, drizzt, 16BitWonder, 2weak2live, thatch, maki-chan, pR0Ps