Random: Valve's Steam Deck Can Now Run Game Boy Advance Cartridges

I wonder if it could run an everdrive, for the ultimate in emulation? 🤔

That's neat, but also, y'know, emulation is pretty easy these days...

Sees 'Valve's Steam Deck' in the title

Oh no, here we go again ...Quick, brace yourselves!

On a more serious note, though ...That's pretty rad.

Steam Deck doing what Nintendon't

And I would very much like to see GBA games on Switch Online. Thank you for asking. Also, original Game Boy and GBC, of course. Why it hasn't happened already is truly a mystery to everyone but Nintendo in my eyes.

It is a PC, don't be surprised that you can do everything with it that a PC can

Edit:
@CharlieGirl
An Everdrive will not work, such Devices load the Rom from the Module.
Everdrives are loading a Software that gives you Accsess to the Roms.
But you just can dump your original Roms with such Devices on your PC (or Steam Deck in that Case) and have even your own 100% legal Rom Collection on your System of Choice without the Need of a Everdrive

It is also still pretty insane for me, to have 30 Year old Savegames from Consoles dumped on my PC now.

Only two Games with a dead Battery are Pokemon Silver (damn real life Clock) and strangly Terranigma.

I wouldn’t mind playing Astro Boy Omega Factor on that thing.

Paging Retro Game Corps and Bob Wulff

Nice to be able to transfer your shiny Mew, but doesn't look very convenient

Loving it! Keep it up, Valve!

NINJA APPROVED

I got my steamdeck today. been wanting to play Eldin ring and since I play more portable, I haven’t gotten far on my Xbox. But with steamdeck, I’m sure I’ll log 1000s of hours.
After that, I will probably learn how to mod it to play some botw mods.

Okay thats cool!

Oh this is cool. If my DS lite breaks and I win the lottery maybe I’ll think about getting one

Neat for that very specific type of person who owns a Steam Deck but not a GBA and wants to play their real cartridge on the Deck. Legitimately, I'm happy for them.

I'll stick to my softmodded 3DS personally.

Virtual Boy next!

Steamdeck and playdate have been my gaming surprises this year, both came out of the blue and blew me away. Still love my switch but more the merrier.

I'm still hoping Nintendo will add GBA to the NSO Expansion Pass next year.

This offers great functionality, but it looks dreadful. I'd sooner play GBA on a DS Lite than walk sound with this attached to a Steamdeck.

@Vil Unfortunately, the reason is relatively obvious. It's more than likely because the service has been doing very well for itself, so much so that they don't really see much reason to add Gameboy games to add extra incentive for the purchase, as it's currently not needed. I really can't think of any other reason.

If we're really unlucky they may even be saving these systems' games for the Switch successor.

When I used the GB Operator, I had some issues. For example, I have a few fan-translated unofficial cartridges that wouldn't run properly. Fire Emblem Binding Blade for some reason loaded the JP rom, and the thing refused to recognise Mother 3 at all.

Also the "save data transfer" functionality of the GB Operator was not useful either - for example the thing refused to recognise my Phantasy Star Collection save file, and would always load the ROM without the save - which means that if I ever saved while playing the GB Operator, it would likely overwrite my save.

Maybe by now they've updated the thing since I tried mine, but I did not have a good experience with my GB Operator

@jrt87 you'll skip them? So dramatic.

I'll never understand why a site or YouTuber that has a good working relationship with Nintendo would ever talk about emulation. Nintendo has made it crystal clear on their stance with emulation of their games of any kind

It would be cool if they had something like this for GameCube/WiiU/Switch/DS/3DS. I'm too lazy to bother with emulation, this is so much simpler.

So if we can’t talk about emulation In comments/forums, then why is it okay to post articles about it?

When they used the would 'validated, I guess they meant by nintendo. This is just a troll article anyway, it would be far cheaper to suggest to buy an old system.

@Kang81 It is emulation. However it is one of the only legal ways to emulate these games, since it requires original cartridges.

@sanderev Nah. It's just as legal or illegal as dumping the games from your cartridges. You may be playing the game OFF the actual cartridge, but since it may not use the actual GameBoy firmware, which I am 99% sure would already violate Nintendo's rules by itself, it also has to circumvent the copy protection, which is also the only thing that makes dumping your own games TECHNICALLY illegal (although it really has not a single moral issue in my opinion, since you already need to own both the game and the console to dump it).
Never forget: Emulation != Piracy. You can emulate games that aren't pirated, and you can play pirated games without using emulation. The two things are fundamentally different. (Maybe you know, but I just wanted to generally state it, because SO MANY people either don't know or willingly CHOOSE to ignore that fact)
AFAIK, the actual Gameboy Firmware is the only thing that can "legally" play GameBoy games without going around the copy protection. And said firmware is just as "illegal" to copy, as are the games themselves.

imagine what could be achieved with an external Xbox360 drive...

@NDragon1412 copying your own games is legal, no matter what Nintendo says. Also it doesn't circumvent a "difficult" copy protection, so the law wouldn't apply to that either. (for example; copying a DVD is legal since the copyprotection is one of the weakest)

@NDragon1412 the only illegal thing related to emulatiob is distributing ROMs themselves. Emulation itself and playing ROMs is fully legal. Using ROMs copied from games you own is also legal, as long as you don’t distribute them.

@CharlieGirl then it might be worth it? haha I bet it would work.
I recent got my deck but haven't had time to set it up yet. looks like a lot of the other comments here are still hung up on that old way of thinking about roms.

@Azuris ah that's too bad I thought it would probably work. but i think I would only use something like this on my deck, only to save space and if it using something like the analogue pocket. openfpga etc.

Where's all the 'emulation is illegal' people now, huh?

Man I wish I can buy gba games on switch, there's a couple of great gba games that I really want to play or replay.

Finally, a portable way to play GBA games!

That is pretty sweet, but just use a rom and emulator lmao.

@wiiware If you have a spare pre-patch system you can hack it with a paperclip or with a custom made 5$ wedge you order online.

That is what I did, now I have a spare Switch for emulation.

@Vil so true , thats so many GB, GBA multiplayer i was looking

Something happened to me recently I never thought I'd ever say but I got a new phone and decided to check out a few games like nexomon, crazy taxie, gta, rocket league ect and also xcloud and I'm having so much fun for a fraction of the price. I'll probably just buy nintendo only for switch now.

@tofuman86 discs with ring burn?

These same adapters were also made for the Super NES and Sega Genesis Classic Mini where it allow you to use your legit cartridge to dump rom file onto the mini and play those games using the emulator on the device. While cool, a majority of them used the same tactic as the Polymega and Hyperkin product in that those cartridge rom file are only temporary and will disappeared from the device if the cartridge is disconnected. While the rom file is only temporary, the save files are created permanently and could be backed and preserve for as long as you want. You could even transfer those save files back to the game cartridge even if that game cartridge was not the original source cartridge.

How much is the Steamdeck costing plus the USB GBA cart thing versus a GBA SP 101 these days?
I'm not picking a fight or anything, just seems like an expensive and perhaps convoluted way of playing something that was already handheld....

@sanderev

Well yeah, buts it's basically the Emulation for Dummies version, which I prefer. Haha

@Jokerwolf I think it will be great if nintendo make Gameboy Advance SP Mini and add eshop store to it 😃

@Old_Man_Nintendo lol yes cause Nintendo has def had great relationships with YouTubers 😂

@FourBs I think you are under the assumption this is solely used to play the cart directly, which would be convoluted.

Instead, this is an easy way of legally backing up your actual GB carts to a digital format, to then play on the Steam Deck (or elsewhere).

Why play on the Steam Deck over a GBA? Because Steam Deck is an all-in-one system, that conveniently plays almost everything on the market, from new to retro, the ergonomics are nice and the screen is large. Not rocket science, really...

@yuwarite
Yes I was under the assumption you had to play your cart rather than rip them.

Great comment, aside from ‘not rocket science really’ which made you come off somewhat condescending. Apologies if that wasn’t the case.

@FourBs Apologies, I thought you were legitimately asking why someone would play on a Deck, instead of an old GBA.

Anyway, yes, the Steam Deck is a fantastic device to enjoy retro games, via emulation; price to performance wise, it has no equal.