Taikenban Demo

This is a sub-page of Mario Kart Wii.

This prototype is documented on Hidden Palace.

Watch on YouTubeIn late August 2025, a Japanese Kiosk Demo for Mario Kart Wii was recovered from slack data from a WIS-009 kiosk unit hard drive dump¹. The hard drive was originally dumped in 2021 by Zel of Luckless Heaven, while Rairii extracted the demo build from it.

In said hard drive dump, the build's ISO starts at 0x143D00FE00. There, the update partition was fully present, but the game partition was partly overwritten by Linux updates. Rairii pieced it back into a full, working ISO, which verifies correctly against its internal checksums, thereby proving that this is indeed a correctly reconstructed ISO image.²

Its title ID is DABJ01 (for reference, the title ID for the retail Japanese version is RMCJ01), following a similar pattern to other demos found in the same hard drive. As with other kiosk demos, the game image is devsigned, so it needs to be recrypted in order to work on retail hardware.

Unfortunately no symbol maps nor any other interesting debugging leftovers are present. Build dates are not present either. However, it's likely this is a post-release build. as much of the code from its retail counterpart is present in the demo.

General Differences#

The demo is mostly identical to its retail Japanese counterpart, albeit with most of its features restricted, and a few menus added in.

Demo Introduction#

The demo requires a Wii Remote to be registered as player 2 (otherwise the game won't go past the very first screen), which is intended to be the Wii Wheel the player is supposed to use.

This is likely due to the fact that, in Wii kiosk units, the first Wii remote is attached to the unit by the Nunchuck port, which doesn't allow the player to fit the Wii Wheel in³⁴, therefore needing to use another Wii Remote only for the Wii Wheel.

Besides, the player cannot access the Kiosk Menu / Home Menu. Attempting to access it brings up the "disabled Home Menu" icon.

After the first screen, the player can technically switch controllers by disconnecting the second Wii remote and using another controller instead, though it's unlikely this was possible to do in the actual kiosk unit. If playing using a GameCube controller, it won't vibrate when performing actions such as getting bumped, doing wheelies or selecting menu options.

The Wii remote's main pointer graphic will be invisible (but still usable) for Wii remotes that are not connected as the second one, plus only the second Wii remote is able to attempt to bring up the Home Menu interface. Unlike in the retail builds, none of the Wii remotes will automatically disconnect if idling for too long.

Strap Screen	Controls Screen
The Mario Kart Wii demo uses the Wii Wheel. Please switch from the Wii Remote to the Wii Wheel. Put on and tighten the wrist strap. Hold the Wii Wheel securely and do not let go of it. Press the A button on the Wii Wheel.	Controls Use Item (Automatic Drift) / Drift (Manual Drift) (B) Back (1) Confirm / Accelerate (2) Use Item (D-Pad) Steer (Wii Wheel) Red: in menus White: during races

When booting up the demo, new screens explain the player how to use the Wii Wheel as well as basic controls (these screens are meant to be displayed in 16:9 aspect ratio). The controls screen features a graphic for the Wii Wheel's B button, which is not found in any other version of the game. Likewise, the strap screen shows the Wii Remote with a jacket outline (in the retail version, the Wii remote graphic doesn't have a jacket).

Title#

Demo	Retail

• The title screen has a new icon with the word 体験版 (taikenban, meaning "Demo" or "Trial").
• Unlike in the retail version, idling on the title screen won't bring up the opening movie nor the attract mode.
• Pressing B on title screen returns us to the controls explanation screen again.
• The "PRESS (A) BUTTON" text was changed to "PRESS (2) BUTTON" in the demo (with the "2" being an icon instead of text). Pressing this button in the title screen doesn't play a sound effect when transitioning to the next menu, unlike in retail builds.
• If the player enters the main menu, the Title music will sound quieter, but unlike in the other versions, if the player goes back to the Title screen, the music's volume won't be restored back, so it will still be quiet even on the Title screen. Going to the controls screen and then entering the Title screen again fixes this.

Main Menu#

This version is not meant to save its data, so the license selection screen doesn't show up, plus the license Mii will always be the guest Mii with the red shirt.

In fact, going to the main menu from the Title screen resets all current progress in the demo.

Demo	Retail

The bottom instruction text was changed to say "You can only play the Single Player mode in the demo version", therefore only the Single Player mode is selectable with the other buttons greyed out.

Single Player Menu#

Demo	Retail

The bottom instruction text was changed to say "You can only play the Grand Prix mode in the demo version", therefore only the Grand Prix mode can be selected with the other buttons greyed out. There is also nothing unlocked in this demo.

The loading times when entering this menu (as well as transitioning between courses during gameplay) are slightly faster in the demo, mostly due to the fact that it doesn't load the staff ghost files in the background every time the player enters those parts of the game (as those files have been removed from the demo due to Time Trial mode not being accessible).

During gameplay, the Mii audience / billboards found on some courses will always have random Miis, instead of also displaying Miis from the console.

Demo End#

Trial End Screen
The trial version ends here. Please enjoy the rest in the full version.

The demo runs on a timer. After 10 minutes (or 2 minutes if nothing is pressed on the controller, and the player is not watching a race replay), the game shows this screen, and after 7 seconds, goes back to the Kiosk Menu / Home Menu.

Technical details#

Filesystem#

File differences#

Several files, which are in the release version, are missing from the demo version due to being unused there. For example, assets for all the unlockable courses, their music and unlockable characters are missing, as the demo doesn't allow the player to unlock new content.

The following files from the disc are either exclusively found in the demo (NEW), or are present in both the retail Japanese version and the demo, but their contents differ across builds (MODIFIED):

/Boot/Strap/jp/wait.szs                        (NEW)
/Scene/UI/Font.szs                             (MODIFIED)
/Scene/UI/MenuSingle_J.szs                     (MODIFIED)
/Scene/UI/Trial_J.szs                          (NEW)
/Scene/UI/Trial.szs                            (NEW)
/rel/StaticR.rel                               (MODIFIED)

The files present in both versions of the game but not mentioned above are identical between both versions. Much like with the Starlight build of the game, this version has different firmware WAD files inside the UPDATE partition, needed for it to work on kiosk units.
The demo version is also lacking the channel partition, meaning the channel's WAD is not present. Because of this, it's not possible to deduce a possible build date for this version, unlike with the other builds of the game.

Code differences#

Overview#

The following table shows the RAM address start-end ranges where the code is mostly identical between the retail Japanese version (left) and the demo version (right) in main.dol
The end of these ranges is where code differences can be found:

80004000 800063cc => 80004000 800063cc
80008d68 8000a610 => 80008c0c 8000a4b4
8000c098 80021acc => 8000b488 80020ebc
80021acc 801a80d8 => 8002197c 801a7f88
801a866c 801ab8c0 => 801a82c4 801ab518
801ab8f8 801ad720 => 801ab4d8 801ad300
801ad920 801c08b0 => 801ad300 801c0290
801c08b0 8020f54c => 801c02c4 8020ef60
8020f54c 80244cfc => 8020f1b0 80244960

Likewise for the StaticR.rel file:

8050fd34 8051aec0 => 8050fa54 8051abe0
8051af14 8051c7a0 => 8051ac34 8051c4c0
805243a0 8052e768 => 8052423c 8052e604
8052eee4 80532e18 => 8052ed80 80532cb4
80534284 8053650c => 80534120 805363a8
80536658 8054243c => 805364f4 805422d8
805443b4 80553ce0 => 80544068 80553994
80554c64 805a2264 => 8055490c 805a1f0c
805a2268 805a5fc8 => 805a1f10 805a5c70
805a5fcc 805b8cc4 => 805a5c74 805b896c
805ba478 805bbf20 => 805b955c 805bb004
805bc9fc 805c00f4 => 805bb98c 805bf084
805c1140 805c5618 => 805c00d0 805c45a8
805c65cc 805c79b4 => 805c555c 805c6944
805c9050 805cba28 => 805c7ff8 805ca9d0
805cbb34 805cea68 => 805caa38 805cd96c
805cfb48 805d0bcc => 805cec3c 805cfcc0
805d0be0 805d3328 => 805cfce8 805d2430
805d84bc 805d9a90 => 805d75c4 805d8b98
805da400 805dc2ec => 805d9508 805db3f4
805dc944 805e0314 => 805dba4c 805df41c
805e0438 805e3a38 => 805df540 805e2b40
805e50e0 805e7d24 => 805e41f8 805e6e3c
805e9a00 805f19c8 => 805e8b18 805f0ae0
805f1f90 805f4ca0 => 805f10a8 805f3db8
805f578c 805f9cbc => 805f48c8 805f8df8
805fb51c 805fde78 => 805fa658 805fcfb4
8060094c 80604444 => 805ff920 80603418
8060458c 8060a4d0 => 80603560 806094a4
8060b8a0 8060e620 => 8060a874 8060d5f4
8060f2b0 80612ebc => 8060e284 80611e90
806147cc 806172a8 => 806137a0 8061627c
80617480 806190d0 => 80616454 806180a4
806190d4 8061a974 => 806180a8 80619948
8061e4d4 806205dc => 8061d4a8 8061f5b0
80623fe8 80625484 => 80622f18 806243b4
8062bd44 8062fa00 => 8062ac74 8062e930
8062fa34 80630ef4 => 8062f54c 80630a0c
80631d38 80634404 => 80631bb0 8063427c
80635764 806373a4 => 806355c8 80637208
80637400 8063b018 => 80637204 8063ae1c
8063d364 806463f4 => 8063df18 80646fa8
8064956c 8064ae6c => 8064a120 8064ba20
8064ae98 8064ca50 => 8064ba4c 8064d604
8064d76c 8064f194 => 8064e320 8064fd48
8064f330 80650f84 => 8064fee4 80651b38
80651a00 806f6548 => 806525c4 806f710c
806f6888 8070707c => 806f7454 80707c48
807070a8 80710650 => 80707c7c 80711224
80711d84 807131a0 => 80712970 80713d8c
807131a8 807159fc => 80713d9c 807165f0
80715c80 80717178 => 80716884 80717d7c
8071718c 8074c8b0 => 80717da0 8074d4c4
8074c8b4 80783260 => 8074d4c8 80783e74
807838b4 807e0a80 => 807844c8 807e1694
807e0a84 807e4b08 => 807e1698 807e571c
807e4b0c 807e5c04 => 807e5720 807e6818
807e5c08 807eacb0 => 807e681c 807eb8c4
807eacb4 807ebd3c => 807eb8c8 807ec950
807ebdb8 807ee7b0 => 807ec9cc 807ef3c4
807ee7b4 807f00d0 => 807ef3c8 807f0ce4
807f00d4 807f115c => 807f0ce8 807f1d70
807f1c88 807f2df0 => 807f289c 807f3a04
807f46e0 807f58b0 => 807f52f4 807f64c4
807f58e8 807f7c00 => 807f6514 807f882c
807f7c04 80832530 => 807f8830 8083315c
80832534 80838218 => 80833160 80838e44
80838230 8083d414 => 80838e5c 8083e040
8083d43c 8083fc98 => 8083e070 808408cc
8084198c 80844ed8 => 808425c0 80845b0c
80844ee8 80846e2c => 80845b24 80847a68
80846e34 8084ebf4 => 80847a78 8084f838
8084f4c8 80850908 => 8085018c 808515cc
80851034 80854b98 => 80851df4 80855958
808573f4 80858790 => 808581d8 80859574
808589f8 80859b24 => 808597fc 8085a928
8085c5e4 8085f498 => 8085d598 8086044c
8085fe2c 8088ed80 => 80860f38 8088fe8c

Demo-only menus⁵#

The RAM addresses below are for the demo version of the game, unless stated otherwise.

Pages (screens)

Trial Usage

This is the controls screen seen after boot.

• Constructor: 0x8063b9b0
• Real name: TrialUsagePage
• Page ID: 0xD3

Trial Title

This is the demo's specific title screen. Unlike its retail counterpart, this one loads the 体験版 icon and directly accesses the restricted main menu.

• Constructor: 0x8063be80
• Real name: TrialTitlePage
• Page ID: 0xD4

Trial End

This is the demo's end screen.

• Constructor: 0x8063c428
• Page ID: 0xD5

Trial Time Check

This page is in charge of checking the demo time, in order to boot the player out of the demo when the time is over.

• Constructor: 0x8063c604
• Time check function: 0x8063c710
• Page ID: 0xD6

Sections (menus)

The following section IDs were added in the demo. Since these section IDs are located after the disc section IDs and before the channel section IDs, this causes the aforementioned section IDs to be shifted.

• 0x95: Trial Usage
• 0x96: Trial End
• 0x97: Trial Title (from Trial Usage)
• 0x98: Trial Title (from Single Player menu or after ending a Grand Prix)
• 0x99: Trial Single Player menu
• 0x9A: Trial Grand Prix course introduction cutscene
• 0x9B: Trial Grand Prix gameplay
• 0x9C: Trial Grand Prix replay
• 0x9D: Trial Grand Prix award ceremony
• 0x9E: Unused test section exclusively found in the demo.

Section 0x9E

Section 0x9E is a test section introduced in this demo build of the game. Like the unused test sections 0x06 to 0x0C in the retail builds, this section is supposed to load its resources from "Scene/UI/Test.szs", which is not present on this or any other build of the game.

Curiously, unlike the other test sections (which only load a single test page), section 0x9E loads every single page (screen) in the entire game, except for the four newly added trial pages. It's unknown what the purpose of this section is. Loading it crashes the game.

Save code#

• Some save-related initialization code (such as 0x8054484c) has been partially stubbed, as this demo is not supposed to save its data.

Menu code#

• The "Section" class (constructor at 0x80621d0c) has larger size in the demo due to the newly-added pages, which increased an array within said class.
• The code associated to some menus was changed so that the player can only traverse the demo menus, and not any other part that would belong to the full game.
• A function associated to the Title screen (0x8063ae1c) was changed to make it so that only the Mario and Luigi title screen image appears, and not the unlockable ones.
• A function associated to the Main menu (0x808513f4) and the Single Player menu (0x8084f6d4) respectively was changed to disable most of the buttons, as well as changing the button message IDs to point to the trial-exclusive messages.
• At 0x8051d8c4, a check was changed in the demo version so that only the second Wii remote can bring up the Home Menu interface (instead of all Wii remotes), which is not normally possible to do in the demo.

Other#

• Functions __OSReboot, __OSShutdownToSBY and __OSRelaunchTitle are missing in the demo, since it's not meant to be restarted itself nor to shutdown the console at any time.
• Function WPADSetAutoSleepTime was added in the demo at 0x801c0290. This is used to avoid automatically disconnecting the Wii remotes if idling for too long.
• A singleton known as "Nwc24Manager" (instance at 0x809c2144 in the PAL version) is not initialized in the demo build, since the demo doesn't use any online nor WiiConnect24 features.
• A function that usually parses string arguments passed to the executable (0x805b896c) was simplified. In the demo, it only parses the option "-p", which forces a specific controller on boot.
• Extra code was added at 0x80520c4c to increase the idle time in the controller, used to boot the player out of the demo after not pressing anything in the controller for 2 minutes.
• Code was added at 0x8000a588 to obtain the demo's start time. This is used to determine if 10 minutes have passed ever since the demo was booted.
• The context identifier for this demo is 3.

DVD Error checking code#

The demo changed parts of the code related to checking for any DVD errors. If a DVD error occurs, the game won't bring up the "An error has occurred" screen anymore. Instead, it will return to the Kiosk menu / Home menu the moment it detects a DVD error. This is handled by the functions at 0x8020f0c8 and 0x8020ef60, unique to this build.

In the background, the moment the game detects a DVD error, it will print the following to a debug console:

Disk Error %d Trial Error %d => OSReturnToMenu

The disc error correspond to the error code returned by function DVDGetDriveStatus⁶ (at 0x80162920). The trial error codes are explained below.

After this happens, the demo will attempt to write an error message to the file named error_file__, located at /title/00010000/52414241/data/ in the Wii's NAND filesystem. Said error message would contain the game's ID (DABJ) alongside the disc error from above:

   game id    : %s\n
   error code : %d

Finally, a trial error code would be returned depending on how the error message write attempt went:

• 0 = The error message was written successfully.
• 3 = The error message couldn't be written to the NAND.
• 4 = The error message memory buffer couldn't be allocated properly.

While it's unknown what title corresponds to the aforementioned title ID, it's likely to be the Kiosk menu's title. The slack data from the hard drive the demo was found on also contained a build of a title with the title ID of RABAZZ (usually a default title ID for Wii titles), which when booted, creates the aforementioned NAND directory (without the error_file__ file).

Asset differences#

The following assets differ from the retail Japanese version:

Trial.szs#

The file Trial.szs was added in the demo, essentially replacing the Title.szs file from retail. It contains the assets found in the demo-exclusive screens.

Trial_J.szs / MenuSingle_J.szs#

The file Trial_J.szs was added in the demo, essentially replacing the Title_J.szs file from retail. It contains the text messages in the demo-exclusive screens. Said messages are the same as the ones found in the MenuSingle_J.szs file, which contains the text messages for the single player menu.

Inside both files, the only difference present is the addition of the following strings in the demo, inside the message/Menu.bmg file:

Font.szs#

This file contains the different fonts used by the game. The following fonts were changed between the retail Japanese and demo versions:

kart_kanji_font.brfnt

This font is used for most of the game's text.

Demo	Retail

In the demo, the kanji characters 版 and 験 were added, which are needed to display a few of the demo-exclusive text strings.

tt_kart_font_rodan_ntlg_pro_b.brfnt

This font is used for the in-race countdown, finish, and new record messages.

Demo	Retail

In the demo, some lowercase characters were added, though it's unknown if these are used anywhere in the demo.

Useful codes#

The following Gecko codes can be used to deal with some of the quirks of this version.

Disable time limit#

0463c710 4e800020

This code disables the demo's time limit.

No second Wii remote needed to play#

040079D4 48000010

This code allows the player to go past the first screen of the demo even if they don't have a second Wii remote connected.

Re-enable disabled buttons#

04851728 60000000
04851734 60000000
04851740 60000000
0485174c 60000000
04851758 60000000
04851764 60000000
04851770 60000000
0484f844 60000000
0484f854 60000000
0484f864 60000000

This code allows the player to select the normally-disabled buttons, for the sake of exploration. Most of the disabled menus won't work though, since their assets are not present in this build.

Access Home Menu interface#

04634f40 38800001

This code allows the player to access the Home Menu interface by pressing the Home button in the controller. The restart button will take the player back to the Kiosk Menu / Home Menu, due to the fact that the developers replaced all the restart and shutdown functionality with going back to that menu.
Note that, as stated above, only the second Wii remote can be used to bring up the Home Menu interface.

Trial End takes the player back to the controls screen#

0063c5d7 00000095
C263C5E0 00000006
3C80801A 6084A8D4
7C8903A6 4E800421
3CA08038 60A55680
80A50000 90651100
90851104 807F26B8
60000000 00000000

This code makes it so that, after the trial ends and the ending screen appears, the game will take the player back to the controls screen instead of returning to the Kiosk Menu / Home Menu.

Force DVD error#

2834539A 00001000
04008af0 3860XXXX
E0000000 80008000

When this code is enabled, press the - (minus) button only in the second Wii remote to forcefully trigger a DVD error code, for testing purposes (see above for more information). The XXXX values correspond to the error code in question (for example, 0004 is the error code for "No Disk").

Access any menu from the Main menu#

008518f7 000000XX

This code allows the player to traverse to a specific menu when clicking on the "1 Player" option in the main menu, for the sake of exploration. Most of the menus won't work though, since their assets are not present in this build.

XX corresponds to the ID of the section (menu) to go to (see the links below for a list of all possible sections).

Sources and references#

Sources#

Information and metadata per build

References#