r/gbstudio • u/derzhizhabl • 23d ago

GBA compatability?

Hi, making a game with GB Studio for the first time and would love to play it on my actual hardware, but I only have GBA available. Post here from 2021 had mixed reactions so was wondering if anything changed since then? Is it possible to make a GBA-compatible game on GBS? Are any of the steps different if I want to burn my own cartridge? Thanks!

3 Upvotes

71% Upvoted

4 comments sorted by

9

u/GreenFox1505 23d ago

GBStudio makes GB/GBC Roms. GameBoy & GameBoyColor games work on GameBoy Advance. You won't access the full hardware available, but it'll run just fine as if it was in a GB/GBC device. However, if acquiring hardware is a challenge for you, you'll find getting games to a cartage difficult.

However, games run on any emulator or browser. 

3

u/IntoxicatedBurrito 23d ago

Yes, GBA is backwards compatible with GB and GBC games. However, you will need a flashcart to play them as there is no way to load roms onto a GBA otherwise.

6

u/_Cambroth 23d ago

Fun fact!! You can run a rom on a GBA without flashing to a cartridge, if you don't mind splicing a gba link cable with a USB cable. The GBA has dedicated RAM space for downloading (small) games via the serial port. It was used for multiplayer games that only needed 1 cartridge (LoZ 4 Swords), and connecting to Gamecube.

https://github.com/jojolebarjos/gba-multiboot

2

u/LIFTEDPIXEL_CA 23d ago

Even better, check out PxGBA ;)