Topic: Game Boy Color issues and game saves

Hey all - was thinking of putting this in the GBA thread, but ultimately I feel like this may be a bit different for the older console.

I have a couple old GameBoy consoles, one of which is mine and one of which is a Color that I just got in from the interwebs. To my semi-trained eye and initial experiences, everything on the Color seemed fairly good and for about a week of a few hours playing Wario Land here and there.

Then, today, the GameBoy Color reset itself right in the middle of a stage. I was playing as normal, and then -poof- screen goes white and the GameBoy Color splash screen comes right up, and the game reboots itself. I thought maybe it was something weird with that particular level and that portion of the cartridge or whatever (I know that can be true for discs), so I played through the same level and everything was ok this time. But then a few minutes later, total different part of the game, same thing happens.

Later in the day, I boot up the game again and now the save file is gone. I'm thinking this is related to the capacitors needing to be replaced - is that a possibility? I know those affect sound issues and the power issues, and I swear I saw somewhere that it might affect save data, but I know most people would say it's the cartridge battery. I guess I'm just hoping it's not the cartridge battery because I'm a bit more nervous of replacing one of those myself - and I'm afraid of what I may find if I open that cartridge up: It has a rattle to it that I was very suspicious about at first, but after playing it many times seemed be innocuous.

Just looking for any similar experiences or thoughts on the situation - thanks!

It sounds like it could be an issue with the power switch. It reminds me a bit of when my N64 was resetting, and it turned out it wasn't plugged in properly. This meant that the power was going out and coming back, which was resetting it. It could be another issue related to power, but I doubt it is the cartridge causing the resetting. However, your save file getting lost could be an issue with the cartridge. You could try cleaning it first, but if that doesn't help you may need to replace the battery.

@GX_64
Yea, I guess when I open up the Color I'm also gonna open up the cartridge and try to just clean it up a bit. Some other sites are suggesting that even if the cartridge battery is ok, maybe the contacts on the battery are a bit jittery or corroded or something and need to be spruced up.

Prior to the DS, Nintendo cartridge games used MaskROMs. Those can't go bad.
(other components on the cartridge, yes they can)
(Unfortunately like everyone else, when the DS came around, Nintendo went cheaper and started using ROMs on DS, 3DS and Switch that aren't write-protected.)

Yes, as said it could be a power issue. Are connections, such as the batteries, good?

As to rattling, I've opened a few cartridges to find the little plastic post in the back of the cartridge casing, which holds the circuit board in place, broke off. But it shouldn't be something much to worry about. Just closing up the cartridge tightly enough should be enough to keep it in place.

@KingMike
Sorry for the long gap here, but wanted to check back in.

Yes, the rattling was just from the board being loose due to those plastic posts being gone/chipped down, but it is secure once I close the cartridge back up.

I went ahead and changed the three capacitors in the GBC (my first little soldering job!), and everything has been good since then. I can also tell the sound is stronger and the image a bit more crisp, so I think the old ones were kind of on their way out.

But what was also interesting and may have been the actual culprit: I cleaned out the power switch slider really well after seeing a couple Youtube videos where people said that could cause power issues (duh I guess lol). I scrubbed it out gently with a Q-tip and alcohol.

So anyway, between cleaning the power switch and updating the capacitors, everything is going pretty smoothly. Just played back through my copy of Metal Gear Solid with no power issues!