Official Game Boy and Game Boy Advance emulators for the Nintendo Switch appear to have leaked online

Last year there were rumours that Nintendo was planning to bring Game Boy games to its Nintendo Switch Online subscription service to join the existing libraries of NES and SNES titles, plus the Nintendo 64 and Sega Genesis catalogues available as part of the Expansion pack subscription tier.

Now, a leak seems to provide evidence that Game Boy, Game Boy Colour, and Game Boy Advance games might be coming to the service soon.

According to Twitter user: @trashbandatcoot files have been leaked onto 4chan which include a Nintendo-developed GBA emulator codenamed “Sloop” and a Game Boy emulator called “Hiyoko”. This lines up with what was previously rumoured. In early 2019, dataminer OatmealDome discovered that the NES Switch Online app contained references to four emulators – Kachikachi, Canoe, Hiyoko and Count, suggesting that two or three new consoles could be coming to Nintendo Switch Online

So Nintendo's official Game Boy Advance emulator for the Nintendo Switch just leaked. Now it's just a matter of waiting for NSO to add GBA. pic.twitter.com/mEJcKrRtzL

— Trash_Bandatcoot (@trashbandatcoot) April 18, 2022

Developed by NERD

Both of the new leaked emulators appear to be created by Nintendo of Europe’s NERD (Nintendo European Research & Development) team. The Paris-based subsidiary has been responsible for much of the company’s emulation efforts in recent years. The team led the development for the Gamecube emulation technology, which was used in the creation of Super Mario 3D All-Stars. The team has also found success in developing other technologies and features for Nintendo products. This includes a heart rate detection system that uses the Joy-Con’s IR Motion Camera, made for Ring Fit Adventure. Additionally, they have been working on deep learning technologies for Dr Kawashima’s Brain Training.

Games and Features

The leak lists 40 Game Boy Advance games included in the app, including: Fire Emblem the Sacred Stones, Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories, Kirby and the Amazing Mirror, Mario Kart: Super Circuit, Pokemon Pinball, and many more. As for the Game Boy Color though, @Mondo_Mega has also shared that they’ve only discovered a few titles so far including Super Mario Land, Link’s Awakening DX, Tetris, and Qix.

However, this doesn’t confirm that these games will be released on Switch Online. They could likely be titles that NERD are using to test the emulator’s capabilities, and not every tested title will end up on the service for certain. Ultimately which ones will make the cut will be determined by Nintendo.

According to known dataminer OatmealDome, the emulator also appears to include netplay support for link cables. If true each Switch could emulate two Game Boys at the same time and simulate a Link Cable between them.

Earlier, there was video proof of the said Game Boy (Advance) emulator supposedly running on the console. However, the account that posted it was quickly deleted.

The library of GBA games they've tested for this thing is massive. Tested is the key word; doesn't mean they'll all actually launch on the service. Yellow = in the rom folder at some point but not in the leaked build.

There's one other game with evidence of being tested though- https://t.co/QQDBDcdAZp pic.twitter.com/lGSB4Mg7Gt

— MondoMega (@Mondo_Mega) April 18, 2022

Whatever the case, It seems likely that we could be hearing official word on the addition of Game Boy and GBA games to the Nintendo Online Subscription Expansion Pack, in the near future.

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The post The Nintendo Switch’s Game Boy emulator may have been leaked first appeared on Get2Gaming.

What the hell is a Gex?

Gex. We all remember Gex right? No. no you dont. No-one remembers gex. It was a series of 3D platformers on the 3DO, PSX and the Sega Saturn, and given no-one remembers Gex, I highly doubt anyone remembers the Sega Saturn or, more so, the 3DO.

Gex was about a lizard called Gex, who was obsessed with TV and one day gets sucked into TV land… I think. Look I have never actually played Gex, I have 2 and 3 Ripped and ready to emulate in Duckstation, and the original is available on PC through GOG but I just haven’t gotten around to them yet. They are notoriously dated, relying on pop culture references for their humor and so haven’t aged as cleanly as other 3d platformers of the Era.

Gex Jr, AKA the Son of Gex

In any case, the reason we bring up Gex today is that people have discovered a demo for a previously unannounced and unknown Gex game, Gex Jr. The demo is available on archive.org and can be run in any PSX emulator (although how well it will run is questionable, this is an unreleased demo that we where never meant to have). A playthrough has also been posted to youtube by Justz00t.

According to the user who originally posted the demo, it was found on a CD-R dated to around January 2001. This probably never came out because… 2001 the PS2 was kicking off an interest in the PSX was dying off. Plus, the Gex franchise was never too successful anyway.

And it sure is more Gex. More dated pop culture references, including “I am your father, Luke”, and many more across the short 31 seconds of gameplay.

As of last year, the rights to the Gex series in European territories where re-acquired by Square-Enix, although what will come of this, if anything, is yet to be seen. And being real, do we really want more Gex? The games are pretty good but even if there is a new game that uses more up-to-date pop culture references… in 10 years time those will just be as dated as the ones in the original.

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Guys, Nintendo Just updated the switch online app. More Poorly emulated games from 2 decades ago to play that really should have been a part of the service at launch, and if you want to play N64 games you still have to pay extra!

I do not care for switch online. I dont expect nintendo to really fully match PC emulators but the emulation is so bare bones it isnt even vaguely competitive. The offerings are slow and right now the service still isnt even half way to matching the amount of games offered by the Wii Virtual console (a massive collection of retro games not only from Nintendo that, may I remind you, is now completely gone with the close of the wii shop channel. Nice preservation you got there nintendo).

Now, 3 new Sega Genisis/Megadrive games have been added to the switch online expansion pack. Yep, the expansion pack. Not the base service, the upgraded version where you pay more for badly Emulated N64 games. You can now grab the games light Crusader, Super Fantasy Zone, and Alien Soldier as part of the service.

Thats it. 3 new Genesis games, available to play on your nintendo switch, if you pay for switch online *and* the expansion pack. Yeah, uh, so heres the thing with that. You can play these games on PC. now obviously you can download the roms if you are willing to break the law to get them, however what you can do with light crusader and alien soldier instead is buy the games on steam. They are only about 80p at full price, meaning you can pick them up for a fraction of the cost of having them on switch for as long as you maintain the subscription, and you Own the games, rather than just having them for as long as the switch online service is maintained by nintendo. Hell, even though the official Sega emulator for the steam Releases of these games is kinda naff, you can take the files right out of your game directories and run them in any community made Sega Genesis/Megadrive emulator, like KEGA Fusion or Pico Drive.

So unless your a *huge* Super Fantasy Zone fan, I dont really see this as being a huge reason to Buy into the app.

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As time goes on game preservation becomes a more and more pressing issue, with older games being shut down by their developers to free up server space and some High profile fan revivals being shut down by companies who then proceed to do nothing with the IP.

In a conversation with Axios, Xbox Exec Phil Spence advocated for emulation as the solution.

What is an emulator?

An emulator is a piece of software that makes games for a certain system, such as the PS2, thinking they are running on said system. Most virtual consoles are emulators. These games do not run natively on the hardware, so software is used to Emulate the original hardware.

The Most common emulators you are likely to come across are Made by fans to allow games to run of pc. Dolphin Emulator and PCSX2 are maybe the best known, but many more exist, and most Consoles have their own inbuilt emulators to allow the play of retro games on their service.

Xbox Series X/S is able to run older Xbox titles by using its own built-in form of emulaton. However, because there is no industry standard for emulation, Xbox still has to secure the rights from the games publisher or developer.

And just this week Xbox has claimed that the 76 most recent games added to the backwards compatibility list would be the last due to those legal and technical constraints. Presumably, and industry standard emulator would solve such issues.

Spencer said “I think we can learn from the history of how we got here through the creative. I love it in music. I love it in movies and TV, and there’s positive reasons for gaming to want to follow. My hope (and I think I have to present it that way as of now) is as an industry we’d work on legal emulation that allowed modern hardware to run any (within reason) older executable allowing someone to play any game.”

He added “I think in the end, if we said, ‘Hey, anybody should be able to buy any game, or own any game and continue to play,’ that seems like a great North Star for us as an industry.”

Compared to its Rivals of Sony and Nintendo, Xbox has reliably championed the importance of game preservation.

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