In Which Situations is it Useful to Buy a GB Memory Card?

[ItsProbablyNOTMe]

Also, in which situations is it necessary to buy a GB memory card?

Is the GB memory card to save GB games?

Are these for and do these work for GBC also?

I also see that some cartridges have a memory card attached to them

 

[Nikokaro]

I've honestly never heard of it. Maybe you meant gb flascart? The latter allows you to play on DMG, GBP, GBC, GBA all GB/GBC roms in one cartridge, via micro SD, as is now well known. Perhaps others will be able to tell you more.

 

[Tsukiru]

Going to have to specify what a GB memory card even is. One of the silliest Google searches I did. Do you mean like one of these?

 

[ItsProbablyNOTMe]

Going to have to specify what a GB memory card even is. One of the silliest Google searches I did. Do you mean like one of these?

View attachment 354390

That is one of them that I've seen online and there's maybe 1 or 2 other brands but also some cartridges have a huge memory card like that connected to them

Post automatically merged: Feb 20, 2023

I've honestly never heard of it. Maybe you meant gb flascart? The latter allows you to play on DMG, GBP, GBC, GBA all GB/GBC roms in one cartridge, via micro SD, as is now well known. Perhaps others will be able to tell you more.

I meant the thing that tsukiri posted and other alike large memory card cartridges

Some games have a memory card like those connected to them

 

[Titney]

I have the one @Tsukiru posted since back in the day. It's basically a cheat cart with internal memory that lets you backup and restore saves from gameboy carts. It's not something you'd normally need unless you want to cheat or something.
I mostly used it for the gameboy camera. If I recall correctly one memory card could hold about five "rolls" worth of pictures, which was pretty handy when out and about.

 

[FAST6191]

Devices to rip saves to PC (and the reverse) were not very common back when, however some companies did make devices to rip them from the games themselves and store them internally to either flash to your cartridge again or to a friend's copy.

Mostly then used to increase save slots if the game did not provide them or external memory support (one game for several kids, or be able to lend a game to someone, and I guess the camera thing noted above), do save restoration type cheat approaches (assuming the device itself did not outright support cheats, some later consoles even seeing such devices edit saves), for some reviewers if old scenes could not be replayed but pictures or something needed after the playthrough.

Today if not just emulating outright you would generally be advised to seek out a PC ripping tool (various vendors that sell flash carts, repair kits, screen replacements, adapters and such will tend to have them for given consoles), or maybe one of the cartridge playing devices (everything from the retron5 to analogue pocket) as they may have some manner of doing this as well (if you are running your own code, have an SD slot and can speak to a cartridge to get the save for normal play it is easy enough to fire to SD or possibly even network). If it was the GBA or DS you might be able to find a flash cart to do what you want, GBC linkers are far more rare though (and adapting a GBA one just as fraught with difficulty, not to mention if you can solder https://hackaday.com/2011/05/09/avr-gameboy-dumper/ and possibly also multiboot cables if your machine still has a parallel port).

 

[mrgone]

that looks nice
as if it was made for a gba sp and the camera
more memory and turning the camera right side up again

 

[ItsProbablyNOTMe]

I have the one @Tsukiru posted since back in the day. It's basically a cheat cart with internal memory that lets you backup and restore saves from gameboy carts. It's not something you'd normally need unless you want to cheat or something.
I mostly used it for the gameboy camera. If I recall correctly one memory card could hold about five "rolls" worth of pictures, which was pretty handy when out and about.

Can I save files to it by connecting it to any GBA cartridge?

 

[master801]

Can I save files to it by connecting it to any GBA cartridge?

No. It takes Game Boy (Color) cartridges only. Although you can shove a GBA cartridge in, it won't work at all.

 

[MG4M3R]

Going to have to specify what a GB memory card even is. One of the silliest Google searches I did. Do you mean like one of these?

View attachment 354390

I had one of these, it also worked as a cheat device and could take screenshots of your games

 

[FAST6191]

I had one of these, it also worked as a cheat device and could take screenshots of your games

Screenshots at that point in time? I am curious about that one -- saw a video recently (on another computer sadly so will have to go looking again) that was selling a kit to do video out for a gameboy without modding it, it worked by being a quasi emulator that monitored cart reads and managed to infer everything else give or take a few issues with random numbers. I am not sure how a screenshot program would work for this, much less with a consumer grade programmable chip... maybe it just dumped VRAM and BG+OAM or something.

 

[Lumstar]

Going to have to specify what a GB memory card even is. One of the silliest Google searches I did. Do you mean like one of these?

View attachment 354390

Yeah. It was yellow in the USA, black elsewhere. There's also a Japanese translated version.
https://ameblo.jp/retro-game/entry-10704190891.html

 

[master801]

I had one of these, it also worked as a cheat device and could take screenshots of your games

I OWN one of these and have never heard of it having a cheat or screenshot function.

 

[zxr750j]

I OWN one of these and have never heard of it having a cheat or screenshot function.

Thanks for the screenpics! I was really curious, now satisfied.

 

[MG4M3R]

I OWN one of these and have never heard of it having a cheat or screenshot function.

The plastic case and the placement of the button on top is identical to mine so I tought that it was what I had, but mine was an actual Gameshark, sorry.

 

[master801]

The plastic case and the placement of the button on top is identical to mine so I tought that it was what I had, but mine was an actual Gameshark, sorry.

View attachment 357811

Not surprised to see the same case is used. Datel and InterAct were partners back then.

EDIT:

Game Shark Pro manual - https://web.archive.org/web/20030508223302/http://media.gameshark.com/info/document/gb_gameshark.pdf

Mega Memory Card manual - https://web.archive.org/web/2003122...ameshark.com/info/document/gb_mega_memory.pdf

Still don't see this "screenshot" feature, other than a save state system exclusively for Game Shark Online.

EDIT EDIT: If anyone is curious as to what is inside, here is a picture of the board. I broke the middle plastic peg holding the case together while disassembling.

https://www.digikey.com/en/products/detail/microchip-technology/PIC12C508A-04-SM/273437
https://www.digikey.com/en/products/detail/rochester-electronics-llc/PALCE20V8H-25JC-4/12117936
https://www.digikey.com/en/products/detail/rochester-electronics-llc/NM27C010VE120/11527695
https://www.mouser.com/ProductDetai...8SF040A-120-4C-NH?qs=HXayfqKFfDWOdNsyAAgSOA==

 

[N7Kopper]

Devices to rip saves to PC (and the reverse) were not very common back when, however some companies did make devices to rip them from the games themselves and store them internally to either flash to your cartridge again or to a friend's copy.

Mostly then used to increase save slots if the game did not provide them or external memory support (one game for several kids, or be able to lend a game to someone, and I guess the camera thing noted above), do save restoration type cheat approaches (assuming the device itself did not outright support cheats, some later consoles even seeing such devices edit saves), for some reviewers if old scenes could not be replayed but pictures or something needed after the playthrough.

Today if not just emulating outright you would generally be advised to seek out a PC ripping tool (various vendors that sell flash carts, repair kits, screen replacements, adapters and such will tend to have them for given consoles), or maybe one of the cartridge playing devices (everything from the retron5 to analogue pocket) as they may have some manner of doing this as well (if you are running your own code, have an SD slot and can speak to a cartridge to get the save for normal play it is easy enough to fire to SD or possibly even network). If it was the GBA or DS you might be able to find a flash cart to do what you want, GBC linkers are far more rare though (and adapting a GBA one just as fraught with difficulty, not to mention if you can solder https://hackaday.com/2011/05/09/avr-gameboy-dumper/ and possibly also multiboot cables if your machine still has a parallel port).

With the GBA and DS, there are homebrew solutions that work with official hardware only. (SD card support is official for the GameCube - and by extension the Game Boy Player - and Wii) Even the GBC has a software solution that works through the headphone port of all things (albeit you need a flashcard to run it - not official hardware). It reminds me of the first ever multiplayer FPS: MIDI Maze. As the name implies, it uses MIDI hardware for netcode.

 

[AmandaRose]

It reminds me of the first ever multiplayer FPS: MIDI Maze. As the name implies, it uses MIDI hardware for netcode.

I have over many years heard people say MIDI Maze was the first ever multiplayer FPS when in fact its not even close to the first. The first was actually Maze/Maze Wars which came out way back in 1973.

 

[The Real Jdbye]

I've honestly never heard of it. Maybe you meant gb flascart? The latter allows you to play on DMG, GBP, GBC, GBA all GB/GBC roms in one cartridge, via micro SD, as is now well known. Perhaps others will be able to tell you more.

Correction, you'd need a separate GBA flashcart to play GBA games. A GB flashcart can only play GB(C) games.

 

[Nikokaro]

Correction, you'd need a separate GBA flashcart to play GBA games. A GB flashcart can only play GB(C) games.

You read it wrong, buddy. I never mentioned GBA roms, but GB/GBC roms via GB flashcards, playable even on GBA consoles. You know, you bumped this thread unnecessarily, but anyway I will give you a little freebie for your trouble, which I'm sure will cheer you up :