No matter how many Game Boy games you have knocking around at home, we bet you don't have any quite like this one.
After receiving a Game Boy Color as a gift, Singapore-based developer JinGen Lim decided to make use of the system in a pretty unexpected way. You see, in addition to the Color's new processing speeds and its colour screen, the Game Boy's successor also featured an infrared port (that black rectangle on the top), and JinGen Lim thought that this could make for a unique air conditioning controller.
After a bit of research, they stumbled across a Mission Impossible game which could record and replay infrared signals. This proved that the aircon remote theory could work, and they started to piece together everything else needed to build it, including a bootleg game cartridge and a programming card.
From there, things get a little more complicated. Infrared remotes use a series of light flashes to operate the device they're being pointed at, and the patterns used can vary between devices. Thanks to this, JinGen Lim had to solder a wire to the original remote's IR emitter and hook that up to a computer to capture the signals sent out, all in a bid to understand how they might go about programming such a feature inside the Game Boy cart.
You can see exactly how all of this was achieved by checking out JinGen Lim's full blog post, but here's the final result:
What a wonderfully silly way to get creative with a Game Boy without having to so much as touch the system itself. We'd quite like Game Boy remotes for everything around the house now!
[source jg.sn.sg, via gizmodo.com]
Comments 16
I had no idea that all those years, I was using only 5% of my Gameboy's true potential.
If its anything like how I remember it, from trying to use those infrared lights to link up to play pokemon, you'd need to be really close with the gameboy to get that infrared sensor to work XD
That is really pretty incredible. Also, I think you mean "successor" rather than "predecessor."
That remote control feature was mentioned in Nintendo Power and is the only reason I even remember the game, and consideration of whether or not to get it (I eventually didn't) as a teen wonder if that feature could be put to devious use.
I never, ever managed to get the IR sensor to work on Pokemon. Until this day I thought it was a myth that it even functioned.
Incredible ideas and incredible people never cease to amaze me
Wow, just wow. This is the true future of gaming.
Neat, someone making creative use of that IR sensor on the GBC!
This isn't a first though, there have been many unofficial accessories for the Game Boy Color, I remember one that made use of that IR sensor to work as a TV remote for your television.
If you want to get crazier, there's a Game Boy accessory called World Port that featured a modem socket, and could be used to connect online to send and receive email!
Next up just need to scrub the o zone layer.
Not gonna lie... that’s pretty cool.
Badum tis!
(Yes, I’m a Dad, so it’s allowed...)
@Dr_Corndog Sure did! (I'm very, very tired 😅)
Thanks for spotting it - that's fixed now.
I'm here for this content. A+
Would have thought it would be a lot simpler to superglue a GameBoy cartridge to the thermostat dial. Bingo. Heating controlled by a GameBoy game!
@KingMike same here but I probably read about it in Action GBX or some other equivalent UK magazine. I really wanted the game just because it could be used as a TV remote, I doubt id get any mileage out of the game itself though
Quarantine giving people too much time
The only game I recall using that sensor was Pokemon - although I did really like the feature, you have to be really close for it to work. I remember my friends and I having the Game Boys no more than a couple centimeters apart.
Maybe under perfect circumstances it could work farther apart, but we never managed it.
On another note, I did like that we could do that mystery gift with friends. But that was one of Pokemon's famous "this generation only" features. Although HGSS did kinda bring it back with the Poke-walker. Which is what the Pokeball Plus should have been...
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