It can be said that most Pokémaniacs share the dream of one day being able to play a full Pokémon adventure on a big screen, and one dedicated fan has achieved this by managing to fit a Pokémon Blue Game Boy cartridge into an empty SNES cartridge through some soldering work.
The Nintendo 64’s Pokémon Stadium 1 & 2 immediately come to mind in previously achieving this concept, with its Game Boy Tower feature in 1999/2000. Players wishing to play Pokémon Red / Blue / Yellow / Gold / Silver / Crystal were able to providing they had a Transfer Pak, which had to be inserted into the back of an N64 controller with the Game Boy cartridge inserted into the clunky device. It worked a charm, but it became uncomfortable holding a heavy controller in a steady state to avoid the Transfer Pak becoming loose during long play sessions. Frequent encounters of slow game loading times when travelling from area to area also occurred, and in the end many opted to revert back to playing their monster catching adventures on a handheld device. Prior to that, of course, there was the Super Game Boy on the Super NES; the difference here is the rather literal transformation of a SNES cartridge into a Pokémon Blue game.
With the ever-growing size and variety of content on the Nintendo eShop, the lingering thought of handheld main-series Pokémon classics becoming available on this platform have been increasingly apparent, and we’re still yet to experience this – if ever. If you’re tired of waiting and interested in playing your favourite Pokémon Game Boy game on the big screen with a bit of extra style (as well as feeling comfortable / adventurous with taking games apart), have a look at the series of photos + instructions and have a go for yourself. Let us know how you get on!
[source imgur.com, via gamnesia.com]
Comments 26
Huh! That looks awesome!
Somebody has to much free time.
Just sell me this one mysterious being!
But... does it work? I literally don't know how it would. The Super Game Boy is literally the guts of an actually Game Boy shoved into a cart. An SNES circuit board doesn't have the means of playing a Game Boy ROM.
EDIT: Oh, he's soldering a GB circuit board to a Super Game Boy circuit board then cramming both circuit boards into an SNES cart. I guess that would work. But it seems like of... pointless.
Also, I just realized something... has Nintendo never releases a mainline Pokemon game on Virtual Console?
No trading for you, should've bought a super gameboy 2
@Jim_Purcell No ports of official pokemon games (excluding spinoffs) are on the eshop, it would be cool to have pokemon with trading options on the go.
Awesome but pointless, the fact that you had to sacrifice a Super Game Boy just to do this means you literally just waste an adapter that could potentially be use for playing the hundreds and hundreds of Game Boy classic games you own. Not only that but since you put it inside a Super NES cart, there would be no way to link-trade-battle Pokemon between players now.
"Sit back and reflect on how much time and money you wasted to do something you could already do."
The guy even told you it's a waste of time doing this even though he had a lot of times to show you how to do it. Now the real question is who are the idiots that would be stupid enough to buy one of these?
From what I remember hearing they would prefer to remake the older games than to have them be VC.
I want to learn more about these pancakes.
@ModestFan93 don't be such a Negative Nancy.
I know it's been said, but I'll say it again: I can just do this on my Super Game Boy adapter!
Now that's cool.
@Nicolai
Yeah but to everyone saying the same as you; this is just so much cooler.
I wish they would release the older versions on Wii U
@komodo182
Yeah at least the GBA games since GBA is on VC already. They could at least do this if they are not going to give us a Pokémon game on Wii-U. I always thought they should remake Pokémon Yellow for console since that one had Pikachu following you around like in the anime. Then you would get tons of kids bugging parents for a Wii-U for it, in addition all of us who played and loved it originally. It worked back in 1999. I was in college and I bought it even though I already had Pokémon Red and even though I knew that Pokémon Gold & Silver were coming in the near future!
"most Pokémaniacs share the dream of one day being able to play a full Pokémon adventure on a big screen"
Just plug your PC into your TV and you can play ANY Pokemon game on TV through emulators... Or on your PC screen if you don't have TV out.
"… it became uncomfortable holding a heavy controller in a steady state to avoid the Transfer Pak becoming loose during long play sessions. Frequent encounters of slow game loading times when travelling from area to area also occurred, and in the end many opted to revert back to playing their monster catching adventures on a handheld device."
As a big Pokémon fan who played Stadium/2 extensively upon release, along with my friends, this sounded so inaccurate to me.
-Heavy controller? Even with Transfer Pak + Game, it's not heavy.
-Coming loose? Literally never happened to me or my friends.
-Slow loading times? Only if you boot it in the slow-load-time mode, which is only useful for short play sessions. There's the second mode which loads a lot of the game, thus decreasing the frequency of loading screens.
-If we were at home, we always preferred to play RBY on Stadium/2 because of the Dodrio GB Tower, allowing you to play at 3x speed.
"It can be said that most Pokémaniacs share the dream of one day being able to play a full Pokémon adventure on a big screen"
Pokémon XD and Colosseum says hi.
@PORYGON It never felt heavy to me either and I can't recall a single instance where it came loose; one could also just place it on their lap if it felt heavy. Additionally, if you play Pokemon red, blue, and yellow on Pokemon stadium, the only time where loading occurs is before the title screen appears and the game could even be played up to three times the regular speed regardless of how far you were in the game.
In Pokemon Stadium 2, however, you could not speed up while playing Pokemon gold, silver, and crystal until after the elite four were defeated. Additionally, when using the game boy tower in Pokemon Stadium 2 there are instances where the game will load while playing, but as you mentioned, the frequency in how much it occurs depends on which loading option you choose. According to bulbapedia, "There are two options: Load Max and Load Little. Load Max makes the gameplay smoother, but takes longer to initially load the Game Boy game (http://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Pokemon_Stadium_2#Game_Boy_Tower).
Lastly, in the same section from the bulbapedia article I shared, an interesting thing to note is that in Pokemon Stadium 2 you are able to play Pokemon red, blue, and yellow at four times the original speed, whereas Pokemon gold silver and crystal can only be played up to three times the original speed.
As a 12 year old the transfer pack did make the controller heavy and it did indeed shake loose, wasting lots of time. I saved my game quite often.
You can do the same thing with a super gameboy.
What I want is Nintendo to develop a handheld that I can hook up (the easy way) to a TV. I was hoping that the 3DS could do this, but alas, no dice.
Meh. All been done before. Kinda pointless IMO. GB cart + Super Game Boy guts crammed into an SNES cart. At first I thought it was an actual homebrew port. Then I saw the screenshots and knew better. Click-bait...
@TheRegginator such topics have been covered before. The headline assumed it was homebrew ported somehow.
Clever mod yes, but aesthetics aside, I can't really see the point in not simply using a stock SGB.
@OneBagTravel When something is stupid and pointless I'm gonna say it is. And this is useless take a look at the comments yourself.
@PORYGON Just because it didn't happen to you, doesn't mean it didn't happen at all. I encountered the same problem with my Transfer Pak coming loose during extended play sessions. Admittedly, it might have had something to do with setting the controller down while the pak was still in my controller, but still it did happen. A couple of my friends had the same problem too.
But I can also say that I never experienced the other problems either. A slightly heavier controller is a given.
An interesting task for someone learning about the guts of a game cartridge. Sure, the Super Game Boy exists and functions the same, but still. Not bad.
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