# New Game Boy emulator "WideGB" allows you to play games in widescreen



## Zense (Apr 23, 2019)

A game changer. I'd love to see this in other emulators in the future. The benefits of more on-screen stuff are countless.


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## Chary (Apr 23, 2019)

Since a lot of old GB games are a pain to play due to "screen crunch", this could suddenly make a ton of games on the platform actually playable!


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## lordelan (Apr 23, 2019)

Holy ...
what great times for emulation fans to be alive!
Now my usual sentence: I want this on the Switch.


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## Deleted User (Apr 23, 2019)

i can only imagine how painful this is with platformers though, since it only records what you've seen, and according to the preview video for mario land 2, it doesn't render certain sprites, stage hazards are probably gonna be a pain unless you know everything by heart

unless there's a database available where it alrready knows about certain games

edit: mac only? eehhh, i'll pass for now


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## WiiUBricker (Apr 23, 2019)

Curious how it works with Link’s Awakening / Oracle since Link can only move around a square area before the map changes.


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## Zense (Apr 23, 2019)

LiveLatios said:


> i can only imagine how painful this is with platformers though, since it only records what you've seen, and according to the preview video for mario land 2, it doesn't render certain sprites, stage hazards are probably gonna be a pain unless you know everything by heart
> 
> unless there's a database available where it alrready knows about certain games
> 
> edit: mac only? eehhh, i'll pass for now


I just checked it out and the funny part about this is that it actually introduces pop-in for enemies and npcs for games like Zelda and Mario.


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## BlueFox gui (Apr 23, 2019)

i want wideGenesis


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## Mythical (Apr 23, 2019)

I dig it


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## Andrezin0692 (Apr 23, 2019)

Maybe it could work realy well with patched roms to fix some sprite/object related problems


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## Sonic Angel Knight (Apr 23, 2019)

Hopefully it can work with GBA games. Though I think the only games that actually benefits from this is one that don't make stuff "Magically appear" when you are within range.


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## Nerdtendo (Apr 23, 2019)

Is it gonna hit front page when the windows version releases?


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## altorn (Apr 23, 2019)

playing Pokemon Silver in my GBA was my widescreen 20yrs ago


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## Chary (Apr 23, 2019)

Nerdtendo said:


> Is it gonna hit front page when the windows version releases?


Sure. I'll keep an eye on the windows version, and if it's out relatively soon, I'll update and repromote this thread. If not, I'll make a new news thread when it happens.


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## Issac (Apr 23, 2019)

WiiUBricker said:


> Curious how it works with Link’s Awakening / Oracle since Link can only move around a square area before the map changes.


Was thinking the exact same thing, can't wait to try it out once it's available on Windows...


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## CTR640 (Apr 23, 2019)

It's not available for vita? Or does the vita has a gb(c) emulator that enables wide screen?


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## FAST6191 (Apr 23, 2019)

I was hoping it would be some kind of constant predictive branching render (every frame remove the controls from the player, press all directions enough to render the rest, merge images in appropriate manner, if you are really fancy do some kind of change detection or background scanning*in case a random battle is triggered and adjust accordingly). Simple "replay" I don't find that useful.
Amusing enough to see though.

*for the GBA the background resolution of the background layers is often greater than the screen resolution ( http://problemkaputt.de/gbatek.htm#lcdiobgcontrol ) so you can have some data there to play with. Also what you would look to as a start if you are going to hack a game for real to be widescreen.



Chary said:


> Since a lot of old GB games are a pain to play due to "screen crunch", this could suddenly make a ton of games on the platform actually playable!


I don't know
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1iNSQIyNpVGHeak6isbP6AHdHD50gs8MNXF1GCf08efg/pub?embedded=true

That covers much there in depth on the behaviours, reasons, benefits and drawbacks of given styles of 2d camera. The lack of look ahead or telegraphing of upcoming events (streets of rage 2 can be a bit subtle at times but is otherwise something of a masterclass in this) is typically what troubles things here. A simple replay of old data is not going to do much for that.
It can also go the other way and make things more visually odd if the enemies are spawned at the edge of the screen as the camera is about to hit them.


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## spotanjo3 (Apr 23, 2019)

Nice to another one on macOS behind SameBoy emulator!


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## gamesquest1 (Apr 23, 2019)

just had a play and....well its cool in some regards, the limitations are pretty strong even disregarding the sprite issue, you find yourself trying to paint in the area or it just looks like screen artifacting, and when entering/exiting areas all the screen is reset, i genuinely feel like for this to work to a enjoyable level you would need all the screens/maps to be preloaded by the emulator so its not a case of only being drawn as you reach it

EDIT: ok i guess i didn't test as much as a should, it seems there is some level of keeping track of previously seen areas and maybe a little bit of prediction for tiled areas (from what i can gather, there seemed to be a sort of "ghosty" tree tile drawn in a area i hadn't  reached with the camera, would still be nice if the maps were pre-drawn rather than created on the fly, although i can see maybe that might be a little more touchy in terms of distribution, but it would make it more enjoyable, that and predictive sprite rendering as maybe an optional feature for games like pokemon where many sprites are static


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## Justinde75 (Apr 23, 2019)

Looks great, waiting for that windows release though


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## UltraDolphinRevolution (Apr 23, 2019)

So in Zelda you can see further than you are able to move?


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## Justinde75 (Apr 23, 2019)

UltraDolphinRevolution said:


> So in Zelda you can see further than you are able to move?


Well the screen would just scroll to the next when you hit the end of the actual screen


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## gbatempfan1 (Apr 23, 2019)

As mentioned in the post this is like WideNes that was released 6 months ago. WideNes isn't as user friendly as the rest to setup but isn't terribly hard to get working either.

How to download and run.

Blog post from August with technicals on how it works,


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## Nerdtendo (Apr 23, 2019)

Chary said:


> Sure. I'll keep an eye on the windows version, and if it's out relatively soon, I'll update and repromote this thread. If not, I'll make a new news thread when it happens.


Thank you Chary. You rock!


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## slaphappygamer (Apr 23, 2019)

So now we stretch the pixels in to distortion? #fixonebreakone

I love the enthusiasm, though.


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## BORTZ (Apr 23, 2019)

Oh. OH. I was going to say, lol late to the party, pal. My friends and I were playing Game Boy and Color games in Diet/ Potato chip mode back in middle school. But now I see what you mean. That is interesting for sure.


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## the_randomizer (Apr 23, 2019)

Looks cool, waiting for Windows build


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## Clydefrosch (Apr 23, 2019)

Finally, things being done just because we can.


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## Deleted User (Apr 23, 2019)

CTR640 said:


> It's not available for vita? Or does the vita has a gb(c) emulator that enables wide screen?


Would love this for my Vita TV - awesome work!


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## CrossOut (Apr 23, 2019)

A class feature that is very welcome all these years later.


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## Robika (Apr 23, 2019)

WiiUBricker said:


> Curious how it works with Link’s Awakening / Oracle since Link can only move around a square area before the map changes.


that is limited by how the game is programmed so event triggers are not changed.


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## 0000ff (Apr 23, 2019)

slaphappygamer said:


> So now we stretch the pixels in to distortion? #fixonebreakone
> 
> I love the enthusiasm, though.



I don't believe there's any stretching involved


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## Rabbid4240 (Apr 23, 2019)

Widescreen Mega Man V HERE I CO-- aaaaaaand its mac only. just fucking great


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## noctis90210 (Apr 23, 2019)

nice to see a port of this on @Asdolo 's GBC VC injector


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## viral777 (Apr 23, 2019)

Hopefully this can get ported to the ez flash omega. The it will be perfect..


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## Rabbid4240 (Apr 23, 2019)

I can't use the emulator rn (not available on windows), can someone tell me if Mega Man V works with widescreen? or include a screenshot?


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## gnmmarechal (Apr 23, 2019)

It's a rather nice feature. I believe Goomba on the GBA had something similar, but it didn't do it like this, and it wasn't perfect.


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## Ritsuki (Apr 23, 2019)

Issac said:


> Was thinking the exact same thing, can't wait to try it out once it's available on Windows...


Yeah, was thinking the same, but aren't the squares actually larger than the screen?


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## Issac (Apr 23, 2019)

Ritsuki said:


> Yeah, was thinking the same, but aren't the squares actually larger than the screen?


Nope, they're exactly one screen big... well at least Link's Awakening, I'm not 100% sure with the Oracle games...


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## arceus (Apr 23, 2019)

Chary said:


> View attachment 164614​
> Continuing on the trend of emulators improving how you experience classic games, like last week's "HD" Mode 7, we now have a new emulator that allows you to play old Game Boy games like never before. Developer Kemenaran has taken the base of SameBoy, an existing GB emulator, and modified it to run games in a "widescreen" format called WideGB. This takes the normally boxy aspect ratio of the Game Boy, and extends what the screen is capable of showing, letting you see much more than usual without stretching the image. Titles like Super Mario Land, Pokemon Red and Gold, and The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening have all been tested on WideGB, with all of the games displaying correctly in widescreen. Currently, it's only usuable on MacOS, but a Windows version is coming soon. Additionally, the source code for WideGB is publicly available, meaning that it's technically possible to add this widescreen drawing capability to other emulators with retro games that only display in 4:3. A download link is available at the source below.
> 
> 
> ...


have to wait for a windows release now lol


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## Doran754 (Apr 23, 2019)

Is this something id be able to use with retropie


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## Ritsuki (Apr 23, 2019)

Issac said:


> Nope, they're exactly one screen big... well at least Link's Awakening, I'm not 100% sure with the Oracle games...


I really need to play those games again, they're actually my favorite Zelda games in the whole franchise


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## Deleted User (Apr 23, 2019)

Chary said:


> WideGB is very similar to WideNES. It basically records the screen as it moves, and keeps the parts of the screen previously drawn in place.


Someone should adapt WideGB and WideNES for 3DS Homebrew.


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## SonicRings (Apr 24, 2019)

Oh boy, a reason to play Pokemon Gold for the 213897th time!


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## osaka35 (Apr 24, 2019)

I love living in the future.


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## axelluu (Apr 24, 2019)

nice, that's something I'd definitely try out.


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## Wanderer0891 (Apr 24, 2019)

This seems to be the week of the Game Boy not that I mind. I look forward to trying out a windows version when its ready.


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## Jayro (Apr 24, 2019)

BlueFox gui said:


> i want wideGenesis


Imagine how much more of the map you'll see in Sonic!


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## GuyInDogSuit (Apr 24, 2019)

Next up: WideSNES and WideGenesis.


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## gameboy (Apr 24, 2019)

this is great


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## Pleng (Apr 25, 2019)

Jayro said:


> Imagine how much more of the map you'll see in Sonic!



About the same amount as you do in the WideScreen Android ports, I guess


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## Random__Dude (Apr 25, 2019)

Please tell me that there will be an android version!


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