Slashdot is powered by your submissions, so send in your scoop

 


Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror
×
Games Entertainment

Gameboy Advance Clone Superemulator 416

Posted by Hemos from the play-them-all-all-the-time dept.
Aluminum Tuesday writes "During a raging internal debate over whether to fork out for the new Gameboy Advance SP, I came across the Korean GP32, a handheld console that looks superior to the GBA in every way. It's capable of emulating the GBA, Super Nintendo, Commodore 64, etc. plus there's a SCUMMVM engine for Monkey Island games and a Java VM. Seems to have a huge online following. It runs its own OS, and there are programs capable of playing divx/mp3 files, though there's also a Linux port on the way. Not too expensive either. (99UKP / 149USD) That's a UK supplier; they ship worldwide, though I found this more expensive American supplier too. (179USD)" Gotta catch 'em all!
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

Gameboy Advance Clone Superemulator More

Gameboy Advance Clone Superemulator

Comments Filter:

  • One thing not mentioned in the submission... (Score:4, Informative)

    by mattrix2k ( 632351 ) on Thursday April 03, 2003 @04:47PM (#5655431)
    Is it's ability to link with up to 4 other SP32's wirelessly: http://www.gp32news.com/?page=showpage&lang=en&id= 6

  • Catch ? (Score:2, Insightful)

    by zeoslap ( 190553 )
    Come on there has to be a catch right ? Surely this violates untold numbers of patents or weighs three tonne, something! If not it's a very impressive little bit of kit.
    • Hardware emulation isn't illeagle. No honest to god it isn't.

      • Not illeagle... (Score:4, Funny)

        by somethingwicked ( 260651 ) on Thursday April 03, 2003 @04:58PM (#5655558)
        Hardware emulation isn't illeagle. No honest to god it isn't

        Honest to goodness, that's good to hear...I mean, we had a parakeet when I was a kid, and it got sick once and it was pretty bad the mess it made.

        But a sick eagle?!! THEY ARE HUGE! And with their diet, you would have mice carcasses and such everywhere, it would be a bloody disgusting mess, honest to god

        *grin*
    • The catch is that it does NOT play GBA games.

  • I give this thing 1 week... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by ArchMagus ( 32772 ) on Thursday April 03, 2003 @04:50PM (#5655478)
    before Nintendo's lawyers are beating down the distributors doors demanding they halt immediately importing this thing.

    Get 'em while you can! :)

  • specs (Score:5, Informative)

    by slyguy420 ( 193568 ) on Thursday April 03, 2003 @04:52PM (#5655494) Homepage
    cpu 32 bit risc cpu
    screen 3.5" tft
    rom 512 kbyte
    media smc(smart media card)
    sdram 8mb
    communication usb port
    sound 16bit stereo sound
    4 channel wav mixing
    resolution 320 x 240 pixel
    power supply 2 batteries aa
    display colors 65536 colors

  • BUT (Score:2, Interesting)

    by 1nfern0 ( 584316 )
    how can you run a good emulation of SNES with only 2 buttons.

  • but that's just me (Score:3, Funny)

    by Joe the Lesser ( 533425 ) on Thursday April 03, 2003 @04:53PM (#5655508) Homepage Journal
    I'm quite happy with the tetris on my cellphone...

  • Emulation and DMCA (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Daetrin ( 576516 ) on Thursday April 03, 2003 @04:54PM (#5655514)
    How well does the emulation work? If there's any emulator for PC that emulates all the SNES games (or whichever kind) in existance, i've yet to hear about it. And does it have enough processing power to run the non-native code without any slowdown or such?

    I'm also curious if Nintendo is going to try to kill this thing. Although I'm sure Nintendo is making a profit off of GameBoys, I'm also sure they make most of their profits from the games themselves, so logically they'd have a reason to look the other way if this encouraged more people to buy gameboy games. However since when has logic ever raised it's head in legal/piracy issues?

    • Re:Emulation and DMCA (Score:5, Informative)

      by afidel ( 530433 ) on Thursday April 03, 2003 @05:05PM (#5655622)
      ZSNES can run every rom file I've thrown at it. The SNES is pretty old and pretty well understood. Also I doubt they would look the other way if they had a way to stop this as it has no native interface for the GB and GBA carts so most people will play pirated roms.
      • That may, in fact, be it's saving grace. If it could physically interface with current cartridges on the market, Nintendo might actually have a legitimate case against these people. I'm not sure if such things have been tested in courts. But for sure, pure emulation has been and, more often than not, found legal.
        Right? Or is that just FUD?
      • The only rom I know of that has problems is Star Ocean, but it's been awhile since I checked it out.

        Even the ones with special chips are supported by ZSNES (Capcom has a special chip, superFX chips, others?)

    • Re:Emulation and DMCA (Score:5, Informative)

      by Com2Kid ( 142006 ) <com2kidSPAMLESS@gmail.com> on Thursday April 03, 2003 @05:20PM (#5655751) Homepage Journal
      • How well does the emulation work? If there's any emulator for PC that emulates all the SNES games (or whichever kind) in existence, i've yet to hear about it.


      Zsnes [zsnes.com]

      and of course the sourceforge [sourceforge.net] page for it.

      Ok ok granted there are like three SNES games it does not fully emulate.

      So freakin what.

      But for portability you REALLY want snes9x [snes9x.com]

      Unfortunately their provider is complaining to them about bandwidth usage, doh!

      Luckily you can still download the latest binaries and source from Zophar's Domain [zophar.net]

      So, yah, the SNES has pretty much been owned by the EMU community. :) With brief periods of mad translation going on (followed by seemingly long fallow periods. . . .) a ton of the Japanese only games have come over to the SNES as well.

      • And does it have enough processing power to run the non-native code without any slowdown or such?


      I know the minimum requirements for most simpler SNES emulation are about a Pentium II 266mhz with 64 megs of RAM, the FPU seems to be rather important as I have heard of users with far faster K6-2s and K6-3s not being able to run very many games full speed.

      Of course platform specific optimizations should take those requirements down even further, and obviously it was a fairly long time ago when I was using those system specs, so all the additional speed encasements that have made their way into both SNES9x and ZSNES may have brought the requirements down a tad bit more.

      Reading around a bit [gamefaqs.com] seems to indicate that there ARE problems getting the SNES emulation on the GP32 up to full speed, and IIRC the GP32 does not have a dedicated graphics unit, making it unlikely to be able to ever accomplish all the nifty real time effects of the GBA or even the SNES.

      Then again, it does have that rather fast main CPU. :) Nintendo tends to love their tricked out dedicated co-processors, the GP32 is more of a general purpose machine (as can be seen by the MP3 players and even video players out for it).

      One must also take media costs into account though, Memory Cards are expensive!

      Then again, at least with the GP32 you have the CHOICE of being able to play MP3s and everything, with the GBA you end up having to buy third party accessories [gbax.com] to get those same types of options.

      I am so tied to my desktop now days that (and this is a bit of a surprise given how much I used my original Game Boy and my Game Boy color 'back in the day') I do not even own a 'modern' portable gaming system. ^_^

  • Excellent game titles (Score:5, Funny)

    by dpille ( 547949 ) on Thursday April 03, 2003 @04:54PM (#5655522)
    The game titles alone make me want to own it:
    Little Wizzrd
    Dyhard Infinity
    Kimchi-Man
    Astonishia Story R
    Her Knights - "Forcing break-out"
    Hany Party Game
    Tails of windyland

    Especially "Kimchi-Man". Is he really made of pickled cabbage?
    • Kimchee isn't necessarily made from cabbage. I can't stand the cabbage kind, but I like zucchini and scallion kimchee.

      It also isn't what you probably think of when you think "pickled." It is traditionally coated with a pepper paste, sealed in masonry jars, buried, and allowed to ferment.

      It is really just this side of rotten.

      The bigger treat than eating kimchee is riding on a bus with thirty people who eat kimchee daily.

      But then, they insist that westerners smell like warm milk.

      -Peter

  • New on Slashdot! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Psykechan ( 255694 ) on Thursday April 03, 2003 @04:56PM (#5655533)
    The GP32 has been out for well over a year now. I wouldn't hold your breath for a US release though.

    The next time this makes the /. front page, you might want to include the standard legal emu disclaimer. Support legal emulation! Only emulate those games that you own.
    • "Support legal emulation! Only emulate those games that you own."

      Why bother? Most people who are into roms pirates them anyway. Oh sure there's a tiny part who only emulates games they own, but let's not insult people's intelligence. The vast majority pirate them.

      That's like talking about how great MP3's and P2P is while at the same time trying to lamely claim your one of .000001% that never downloads music you don't already own.

  • Excuse me? (Score:5, Informative)

    by Cutriss ( 262920 ) on Thursday April 03, 2003 @04:56PM (#5655539) Homepage
    Nowhere in that list [gp32x.com] does it say "Game Boy Advance" or "GBA". Considering that it lists the Game Boy separately from the Game Boy Color, I think it's a bit presumptuous to say that it supports GBA games just because you see that category there.

    So, seeing as how it does not actually support GBA games, I don't find it superior to my GBA, which *does* play GBA games.
  • Yeah, yeah, OT.
    meh

  • Always beautiful translated manual copy (Score:5, Funny)

    by Featureless ( 599963 ) on Thursday April 03, 2003 @04:57PM (#5655548) Journal
    "GP32 uses radio signals to communicate through solid barriers such as a building (unlike infrared signals that require an unobstructed line of sight to make a connection), you can play games even when your lovely puppy is standing in front of you wagging his tail, blocking your view."

    :)

  • Whoo Hoo!! (Score:4, Funny)

    by Wynns ( 235657 ) on Thursday April 03, 2003 @04:57PM (#5655550)

    Slap a cell phone into this thing and I'm ready to sign up!

  • I'll pass. It really flimsy and stinks. (Score:4, Informative)

    by Viewsonic ( 584922 ) on Thursday April 03, 2003 @04:57PM (#5655551)
    Everyone I know who has bought one thinks it was a waste of money so far. It sounds great on paper but the unit is very cheaply made, and emulation is sub par. Not to mention it's total piracy. Wonder why Slashdot posted a blatant piracy article?
    • Well, I certainly appreciate the information on the construction quality, but your piracy comment is a bit out of line. IANAL, but I believe emulators are legal. Posessing a ROM for a cartridge you own, as a backup, is legal. Posessing a ROM for a cartridge you don't own is illegal.

      A perfectly legitimate use for this unit would be consolidation. Say I own a Game Boy and a NES. I could get the ROMs for all of my carts, and put them on this thing, so I'd only have to carry around the one unit, but still play all of my games that I legally purchased.
      • Um, that arguement is flawed and constantly brought up time and time again on /.

        The company has to take some responsiblity knowing that 99.9% of the people that buy this our going to do illegal things with it. If I stand out on the corner in south-central LA and give away hunting rifles, I'm DEFINATELY contributing to murders. No way in hell "but hunting isn't illegal!" is flying with anyone.
        • Hunting isn't illegal. Gun shops in those areas are not illegal either. Anecdotal proof:

          Los Angeles Gun Club Indoor Pistol,1375 E 6th St., Los Angeles, CA 90021. Phone: (213)612-0931.

          listed on :

          http://www.webcom.com/gun_guy/rangesca.htm [webcom.com]

          Determining intent in a purchase is extremely difficult, and generally doesn't get you anywhere. The "if guns are illegal, only criminals will have guns" argument is at least plausible. Making emulators illegal will guarantee that only criminals have emulators, obvi
          • No, every CD ripper shouldn't be an illegal thing. But you've got your head in the sand on this one. You know full damn well the primary purpose of this product will be to play illegally-downloaded roms. Regardless of what the company says, or whatever the falsely altruistic people claim, EVERYONE knows this product will primarily be used illegally. Don't kid yourself on that. You're talking what could or should, I'm speaking of what is.
            • You've got no concept of the idea of "chilling effect" and "slippery slope".

              The primary purpose of CD rippers is to pirate music as well, so by your argument, these too should be illegal. There isn't any difference.

              Many products are primarily used illegally, but the cost of the chilling effect on the economy of making those things illegal is too great. That's why selling VHS filters is legal, selling copied tapes isn't.

              One could argue that a multimedia PC with a large harddrive with a DVD player and hi
            • > You know full damn well

              This is the flaw of your argument. In the court of law, you cannot say "I know what you think" unless you ACTUALLY have provable psychic abilities.

              > EVERYONE knows

              I don't think this has a leg to stand on, either.
        • You bring up a good point, Unicron, however I feel that Copyright Infringement is several degrees of severity lower than Murder.

          A similar argument could be made further up the ladder -- that the government allows you to buy guns, but doesn't let anyone have their own atom bomb. I mean, what gives? They both kill people.
        • "If I stand out on the corner in south-central LA and give away hunting rifles, I'm DEFINATELY contributing to murders."

          Doubtful.

          1.) Rifles are easier to get than handguns. For example, you can purchase one at 16 vs. 21 for handguns. Despite that, there aren't very many murders by hunting rifles.

          2.) People aren't stupid. They don't buy guns then run around shooting other people. There are lots of people with guns that aren't murdering people.

          3.) The manufacturer of a gun involved in a murder cannot
        • how was this modded up? You are insane.

          My computer is a device that can be mostly used for piracy!!! How could you possibly sell computers! You insensitive bastage!
          • Your computer wasn't invented specifically to do illegal things. This was. And the funniest shit is you actually believe them when they claim otherwise. It was used to play roms, end of story. Anything else they say is a marketing technique developed so they could legally sell them.

        • The company has to take some responsiblity knowing that 99.9% of the people that buy this our going to do illegal things with it.

          And what exactly is their responsibility? Especially if that 0.1% really appreciates the legal uses? Perhaps many emulator users are just interested in piracy, but I'm happy that I can again play old Lucasarts games [scummvm.org] that I've purchased over the years. I love my Dreamcast, but I know that it will eventually wear out and I'm glad that I'll be able to use emulators to continue e

      • Posessing a ROM for a cartridge you own, as a backup, is legal. Posessing a ROM for a cartridge you don't own is illegal.

        You are correct. I bet there is some legalesse that states it is illegal to use that ROM on anything but the intended system though. Owning a ROM then d/ling it to your computer would be legal. Playing it with an emulator on your computer would then be illegal.
      • "A perfectly legitimate use for this unit would be consolidation."

        Slightly OT, but consolidation's the reason a friend of mine has downloaded a huge collection of MP3s. He got sick of messing around with his 100-disc changer. Pity the RIAA would rather inconvenience the people that enjoy their music the most.
    • gp32 makers are endorsing piracy just as much microsoft is, or sharp is with it's zaurus, or apple is. they're selling a system that _you_ can code for.

      the thing is that gp32 is way much more (amateur) developer friendly than what gba is, thus lot's of different(emu&other) projects are underway. as i see it you don't need anything 'extra' to get into developing for it, where as you need to have a flash-cart and flasher for gba, and lots of patience(it's being done anyways.. primitive 3d and all).

      emula
    • Have you ever actually seen one? Held one? Played one?

      Mine is better built than my son's GBA. The games rock. My son prefers the GP32 to his GBA. He's nine and a hard core gamer, so his opinion matters.
  • I think you might have a little bit of trouble with the SNES emulation, with only 2 buttons.

    A portable NES emulator is still pretty cool, though. It'd be nice to be able to crank up Mike Tyson's Punch Out to alleviate a little bit of aggression when sitting in a traffic jam.
    • Good thing its got four buttons then. The other two are on the top endge where your index finger rests.
      • Good thing its got four buttons then. The other two are on the top endge where your index finger rests.

        Now, if only it had 6 buttons, which is how many the SNES controllers really have (A,B,X,Y,L,R), 8 if you include select and start, which many games make active use of too.
      • Good thing its got four buttons then. The other two are on the top endge where your index finger rests.

        So it does. I should have RTFA'd a little closer. My point still stands, though, as the SNES controller has 6 buttons. I suppose you could map the L&R buttons to the other 2 buttons on the front of the SNES controller (I think they were X&Y, but I'm not positive), but that would make for a really awkward layout for most games. Also, you still wouldn't have the L&R buttons on the SNES cont
    • Really, GP32 has 4 buttons, counting the L and R.

      Which is still too few, as the SNES controller has 6 buttons counting the L and R, 8 buttons if you count Start and Select, 9 if you include the direction pad, 12 if you list each major direction separately, and 19 if you throw in several buttons that it doesn't actually have.

  • They say that it can play divx movies, but who wants to split up a 700 meg movie onto 128meg smart media cards? I want someone to port that low quality SMR movies that are downloaded of Kazza. Maybe someone from slashdot could do that.
    • I use the "Future Tense" episode of Enterprise to show off my GP32 at work. It is pretty watchable. 42 minutes of video and sound at about 50MB, not too shabby.
  • Did anyone else notice that in the lower left hand corner of every page on the GP32 site it says "This is temporary Website". What exactly does that mean ... is this thing going away, or are they going to upgrade to a better site eventually?
  • iPAQ + Familiar Linux dist and you can run SNES games and even Quake. :)

    But, ok it's a bit more expensive.

    Ciryon

  • OK, this i actually find unethical. (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I have defended the whole idea of emulators for years now, on the basis that they don't defraud the game companies of any revenue they have a real right to. Whoo, i can download a SNES emulator, and nintendo has the lost sale on, um.. that used SNES that i was going to buy on ebay.. hmm.

    Alternately, yeah, people use, say, playstation emulators as a method of not having to buy a playstation and being able to pirate games, even though playstation is still on the market, and that seems a bit more like a moral

    • Re:OK, this i actually find unethical. (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Rubyflame ( 159891 ) on Thursday April 03, 2003 @06:44PM (#5656430) Homepage

      Emulation isn't a gray area at all, IMO, if you only emulate games you legitimately own. For example, in the case of the Playstation, if you run an emulator on your PC and use actual game discs, you are not hurting Sony at all. Consoles are typically sold at a loss, and this loss is recouped through game sales. So if you emulate, they're actually making more money.

      Of course, the companies probably don't see it quite this way. First of all there's a loss of control involved. If you only emulate legitimately, they're not harmed, but of course this isn't the reality of the situation. The other issue is that they don't want people to play their old games. They want people to go out and buy new games. Consoles tend to break eventually, but with emulation there'll always be hardware to run the old games, and if you've already got plenty of old games you're less likely to go out and buy whatever's being released now.

      • Re:OK, this i actually find unethical. (Score:4, Interesting)

        by be-fan ( 61476 ) on Thursday April 03, 2003 @07:37PM (#5656808)
        In fact, there is a very legitimate reason to emulate playstation games. Games that have significant amounts of 3D can look very good, because current emulators can run them at very high resolutions with full texture filtering and everything. For me, epsxe has given my PSX gaming library a whole new life, on my (Linux!) laptop :)

    • Try reading the article (Score:5, Insightful)

      by freeweed ( 309734 ) on Thursday April 03, 2003 @07:20PM (#5656694)
      Moderators, pass the crack pipe.

      This thing cannot, repeat CANNOT emulate the GBA. Check the site, there's no mention of this. Even trying it would be stupid - go ahead, run a working GBA emulator on this sort of hardware. Have fun with your 2 frames per second.

      This isn't hurting Nintendo's current revenue stream at all, save for the fraction of a percent of original GameBoy games still being sold.

      Yikes, several dozen other posts have already pointed this out, yet it gets both posted and modded up.

      Oh, and for the record, Playstation emulators were popular years ago (everyone had Connetix's for a while), back when Sony WAS making hordes of money off the platform. And because the emulator didn't care what media you put in it, everyone used pirated copies of the games. So don't give me this horseshit that somehow PSX emulators are 'ok', when a system that doesn't emulate any currently sold system isn't.
  • No thanks, I'll just have a slice of Cheeseulator.
  • 12 links on a story! Now I see why my submitions are never aproved ;)
  • they're just simple ports of available open source emulators. just because it runs doesnt mean it runs well, and certainly doesnt mean its playable. Paying for a GP32 for emulation is like those doofuses who keep buying DC, PS2 and XBOX emulators for the PC.

    I doubt very highly that GBA emulation works well at all on the GP32. GBA emus are just barely playable on an 800mhz P3. Eventually it'd get better, but even the best emulator is never the same as the real thing.

    All in all its a cool little toy, bu
    • like those doofuses who keep buying DC, PS2 and XBOX emulators for the PC.

      It's all a matter of coding. I had some very nice emu's for the playstation. They're still working on them in fact... and one does very much appreciate the "instant save" "instant load" features that many EMUs have. Not to mention that many of the 3d graphics look 10x better on my PC video card... though the scaled 2d sometimes isn't wonderful. If they could get all the FX, then games such as RPG's etc (FF9 played through on an emu
  • And I also believe it doesn't support the afterburner type lights for the gba. Not having decent lighting is the main reason why my game boy advance sits in a bag collecting dust instead of being used for anything useful.
    • Get the SP. I have played my Advance games so much more since I got it. Castlevania is finally playable at times other than high noon. Or as you said, get an afterburner, I've heard that they are pretty good as long as you have (or know someone) with good soldering skills.
      • Coincidentally enough, I just installed an Afterburner in my GBA last night... I even went out and bought a soldiering iron just for it.

        It doesn't take any really advanced solidering skills, but patience and a steady hand will go a long way. I did get some dust on the screen, but it's not the end of the world. I considered the "bathroom as a clean room" idea, but I didn't have anywhere to work with it in there =)

        The only difficult part I had was in laying down the AR film, as it was nearly impossible to


  • Mmmmm.... Portable M.U.L.E..... /me wonders how they emulate the keyboard? Or since it seems to have USB, you plug the keyboard into it?
  • "superior to the GBA in every way."

    One of the things that grabbed me about the GBA-SP was it's smallish design and the clamshell design, allowing you to easily put it in your pocket and keep the screen protected.

  • For the love of god... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Zenki ( 31868 ) on Thursday April 03, 2003 @06:01PM (#5656098)
    Don't buy it from upstategames.com. If you bother to check with BBB and tons of forums (eg. a lot of people who ordered the Flash Linker fot Neo Geo Pocket from upstategames), you'll probably end up with $179 out of your pocket, your pants down, and your @$$ reamed with Dimitri's fist.

    If you must order a unit, then order one through lik-sang.com. At least, that's what http://www.devrs.com says.
  • GP32Emu [gp32emu.com] is an excellent resource for Gamepark Emulation.

    That site mentions several SNES emulators as well as GB (no GBA, yet) and NES. Plus the site lists a few of the game ports for GP such as Doom, Descent, Wolfenstein 3D and some others. Worth a look for people who are interested in what these things can do.

  • one other advantage over *any* nintendo product... (Score:3, Informative)

    by BrazenChippie ( 663655 ) on Thursday April 03, 2003 @06:05PM (#5656124)
    is that they encourge unlicensed 3rd party development, where nintendo does their best to squash independent coders.

    http://www.devrs.com/gp32/
    http://devkitadv.sou rceforge.net/index.html
    http://groups.yahoo.com/g roup/gp32dev/

    i'm thinking of picking one up explicitly for this purpose. anyone have any experience coding for one of these?

  • Divx! (Score:3, Informative)

    by Cpt_Kirks ( 37296 ) on Thursday April 03, 2003 @06:47PM (#5656457)
    not much mention of the Divx player. There are two Divx players, a free one and one you have to pay for: Moviepark. Moviepark is not expensive ($5.80USD) and works much better than the free one. Well worth the money.

    Using VirtualDub, videos have good color, good sound and fair to good motion.

    The Matrix would be a blur, but most TV shows look good.

    The Simpsons look great on the GP32!

Slashdot Top Deals

"God is a comedian playing to an audience too afraid to laugh." - Voltaire

Close