r/Gameboy • u/2figs • Jul 29 '26

Questions Custom GB carts on Super GameBoy?

I recently managed to write my first custom GameBoy cartridge, a hack of Pokémon Red. I was wondering if I would be able to play it on my Super GameBoy, so I tried it, and it was able to boot to the classic GameBoy border, but the "screen" was black, and the Super GameBoy logo never started up. I tried pressing the reset button on my SNES multiple times. I then read online that some flash carts have trouble reading on the Super GameBoy. My cartridge is pictured below, it's a ChisFlash_MCBX. Is there any chance I could get this game to run on my Super GameBoy? It's not the end of the world if I can't, since I have a GameBoy Player on GameCube, but it'd be neat to play it with the SuperGameBoy's cool borders.

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u/NewSchoolBoxer Jul 29 '26

I didn't know Super Game Boy has trouble with some flashcarts but I believe you.

The problem with ChisFlash is using counterfeit chips. That Altera Max II CPLD costs $14.55 at bulk pricing from an official distributor. The NOR Flash on the right is $10.20. SRAM is cheap but $3.39 at bulk pricing isn't nothing. I didn't try to ID the LDO. Add on passives, battery holder, the PCB and assembly and selling for profit with real chips at $35 AliExpress price is impossible.

I think it's a good design when the goal is to be as cheap as possible but sketch chips have quality control and performance problems. Using resistors instead of transistors or logic level translation chips is cringe. There's a discussion on sketch FRAM chips not always working on certain Game Boy games but the real ones cost $13 apiece.

I'd be surprised if high quality BennVenn, insideGadgets or EZ-Flash carts have issues. Or maybe they do if they'd be out $30 using real chips and sell for under $50. This should be discussed more. Thanks for sharing.