xFractals/pokopia-native

What it does

This project turns a user's own dump of Pokémon Pokopia (Switch 2, title 0400A3A01EE4C000, update v327680) into two native applications: a Mac app and an unsigned iPhone IPA. It is not an emulator wrapper. The game's ARM64 code is rewritten so Apple's kernel accepts it, Switch OS services are emulated, and NVN2 graphics calls are translated to Metal. Switch 2 shaders are lowered to an older instruction set and compiled by Apple's Metal toolchain at build time.

The repository claims no game content is included. Extracted and generated game data stays in a build folder created beside the dump, and the tool checks the dump version and build IDs before proceeding. Only numbers, hashes, and patch recipes live in the repository.

Quick start

Prerequisites are a Mac with Apple silicon (M1 or newer), about 20 GB free disk, Xcode 27 with command line tools and the Metal toolchain, Python 3.12, the .NET 10 runtime, xcodegen, and a legally obtained dump of the required update. The full list and expected dump layout are in the README requirements section.

A command-line build looks like this:

git clone https://github.com/xFractals/pokopia-native.git
cd pokopia-native
python3.12 nxs2.py setup
python3.12 nxs2.py build "/path/to/your/dump folder" --mac-app --ipa

setup downloads the pinned nxnative host commit, applies the Switch 2 patch, and builds the shader-lowering tool. build extracts the dump, rewrites the code modules, compiles the host, lowers and compiles shaders, then writes outputs to <dump folder>_native/out/. The first build is stated to take about an hour, mostly shader compilation; rebuilds take a few minutes. The Mac app can be opened with right-click then Open because it is not notarized. The IPA requires a paid Apple Developer Program team for the Extended Virtual Addressing entitlement, per the iPhone signing section.

A GUI wrapper, Pokopia Native Builder.app, exposes the same flow with Setup, folder selection, and Build buttons.

Constraints and caveats

• Platform lock-in: Building requires a Mac with Apple silicon. A Windows-only route exists for the IPA, but the README says it currently produces almost no rendered picture, so it is not a working path yet.
• Game version: Only update v327680 is supported. Other versions are rejected because patch recipes and shader tables target that exact build.
• iPhone signing: Without a paid developer team, the app installs but fails at launch because it cannot reserve the game's memory address space. No workaround is documented.
• Runtime shaders: About 140 shaders are generated by the game at runtime and cannot be precompiled. Missing ones cause individual effects to be skipped rather than a crash; nxs2.py refresh translates recorded shaders and rebuilds.
• Heat and memory: The README reports the phone entering iOS serious thermal state after roughly six minutes at 30 fps. Lowering DM_RENDER_SCALE is suggested. Phones below recent Pro models may struggle.
• Legal: The project states it does not decrypt or supply keys, and asks users not to share dumps, builds, IPAs, or shader recordings. Licensing is MIT except ampere-lower/, which is GPL-3.0-or-later from Eden-NS2; see the legal statement.

HotRepo's take

The project entered HotRepo's new-project list for C++ on 2026-11-03 with 102 stars and 9 forks gained in about 19 hours, an early pace that stands out for a fan porting tool with this narrow a scope. The README's own claim that the port was assembled in a couple of weeks with heavy AI assistance and that Windows rendering is still broken means the tool is best treated as an early working proof of concept rather than a polished cross-platform utility. The technical detail around shader lowering and camera control is concrete, but the practical audience is limited to users who already own the game, the required hardware, and for iPhone use a paid developer account.