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Gameboy Advance Linkers

Posted May 28, 2003

Originally developed for Gameboy Advance developers, commercial "linker" devices (like these) allow anyone to copy downloaded game ROMs from your PC to high-capacity blank cartridges, which can then be played on an actual Gameboy Advance.

Most Gameboy Advance ROMs are 32MB or 64MB, which means you can store and play multiple games on a single 256MB cartridge by formatting the cartridge in multiboot mode and using a boot menu provided by one of several software packages.

And since the Gameboy Advance is powerful enough to emulate older systems, you can now play NES, Sega Master System, arcade, and original Gameboy games on your GBA. The thriving Gameboy Advance emulation scene is close to releasing a functional Atari 2600 emulator (another attempt). Hand-held Pitfall or Contra, anyone?

13 Comments (Add Yours)

May 28, 2003
12:27 PM  
shmegegge wrote:

I don't know about this one. Each of these cartridges costs between 100 and 160 bucks, which is the cost of approximately 3-5 games. Now, this is worth it IF you can transfer your roms AND they're save games back to your computer so that you can play another game if you want. Yes, the cartridges can hold multiple games at a time, but most people who get handheld systems have dozens of games for them that they switch between depending on what type of game they want to play. If you can store your save games that you made while using the cartridge back on your computer for safe keeping while you put different games onto the cartridge, then I'd say it's worth it. Anyone know if this is possible?


May 28, 2003
12:33 PM  
sleey wrote:

yes saves can happen on the carts. yes saves can be exported back to your pc. you can even bring your saves into some emulators on the pc (virtual boy advance). i love mine.


May 28, 2003
5:02 PM  
stig wrote:

Best news site for emulators on the gba is http://www.gbaemu.com/ Quite a few emulators available including Spectrum and PC Engine. Also have a great FAQ and forums for newbies, I found it invaluable when I bought a 256M cartridge earlier this year.


May 30, 2003
4:27 PM  
Zak wrote:

Sweet!


May 30, 2003
9:47 PM  
koz wrote:

I'd had a F2A cart for my GBA for almost a year now, I don't know what I'd do without it. I've probably saved more than the cost of the cart by avoiding games that were total dogs.

I bought mine from http://www.dcslinks.com. Great prices, great service, and your package comes with these cool Hong Kong stamps all over it.


May 31, 2003
2:49 PM  
Anonymous wrote:

GP32 is a better handheld for emulation... and indie games. (but it's korean and difficult to find anywhere but asia)


Jun 22, 2003
5:12 AM  
Real Radix wrote:

Nintendo have just successfully sued the large importer Lik-Sang for selling the Flash Adapters.

Such a shame, as it's fantastic seeing your own code running on the GBA.


Sep 3, 2003
5:38 AM  
FreeMan wrote:

There are tons of freeware roms that can be run on the GBA Flash Advance Cards. HERE is a site http://www.gameboy-advance-roms.com with downloads and links to other rom sites. And YES www.gameboy-advance.net is the best source for info on GBA Backup devices!!!


Oct 27, 2003
6:45 AM  
kevin wrote:

k u pls help me to check is the website advance-power.de is it still available or is it the website change name

if the website change name
k u pls let me know
my email address chng_kevin@hotmail.com

thx u


Jan 20, 2004
4:42 AM  
X-ROM wrote:

If you are still looking for GBA Flash Card - EasyBuy has finaly released their own much anticipated flash linker & card called X-rom. You can find a review at Gameboy-Advance.net/flash_card/gba_X-ROM.htm . This looks like one of the most advanced and at the same time cheapest cards you can buy. I have ordered one and waiting for it to arrive. and its 512M big!


Feb 26, 2004
1:11 AM  
pocketsnes wrote:

You haven't written about the SNES emu for GBA. For a long time it was believed to be imposible untill one day I found this - snes.pocketheaven.com - SNES emulator for GBA. Download free Super Nintendo emulator for Gameboy Advance. With PocketSNES emulator gamers can play SNES roms on Gameboy Advance flash cards as if they were GBA games.

And the best part is even with this early beta release you can already play ~50 games!


Feb 26, 2004
6:39 AM  
Andy Baio wrote:

Actually, I did write about it in my Links sidebar. I took the liberty of changing all your spammy URLs to the official homepage URL. It's not cool to basically take credit for Loopy's work, you know?


Jun 23, 2004
3:59 PM  
andy wrote:

hi, so if i have a flash card n i want to play snes games, i download the emulator from snes.pocketheaven.com and put this and the game rom onto the card, can u put snes and gba roms on at the card at the same time?? email me at andy@emmett.ch or andyemmett88@hotmail.com. thanx


 

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