A bit of undocumented GBAtemp history..,

Just wanted to post this stuff for archival purposes!

So GBAtemp decided in 2002 to become a legit community and stop hosting or linking to anything that could be deemed illegal and get the site shut down:

View attachment 172355

The GBA scene was thriving, with many save file hacks, trainers and custom tools being created all the time. We needed a way to host all of this stuff but didn't want to risk jeopardizing the newly formed community, so we actually built another site, GBAsaves.com:

View attachment 172356

GBASaves.com was born and hosted various save files, trainers and ROM tools, as well as maintaining a scene release list (no ROMs). I was around 20 years old at the time, studying advanced ICT at college and used the site as a basis for my .php course work:

View attachment 172358

The site only lasted about a year as a .com at which point we decided to change to .net and make it a kind of partner site to GBAtemp:

Unfortunately, we used to get hacked pretty often lol, and after a couple of years got closed down due to illegal content being discovered on the backend of the server. We tried to rebuild the site once more, and keep it clean, but it never took off the way it did initially, due to GBA releases drying up and the handheld coming to the end of its life:

View attachment 172360

We took what we had learned from the GBA scene, and applied it to the PSP scene, creating PSPSaves.info, a site for, well... PSP save files and info:

View attachment 172363

This site actually did really well for us and was probably the most popular of the 3 projects outside of GBAtemp:

View attachment 172364

I can't remember exactly why it died but I do remember us losing the backup at some point and then not really working on it anymore.

After this we built a site that was 100% automated for logging scene releases, scraping data from an irc prebot on efnet and automatically updating the site's homepage for us. The idea was to get all this info without us needing to post it manually. It was a partial success in that it worked, but it never really took off as it was a bit messy. I can't even remember the url now to get a screenshot but will look later today to see if I can dig it up as it was pretty advanced for the time.

EDIT (thx FAST!):
View attachment 172418


So that ends today's bit of history, I hope you enjoyed the short ride!
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No screen shot of the original landing page of gbatemp with the text list and links to the 10 latest gba roms or a list of the random hosts used after each previous one was taken down? Damn, can't remember the solid background color either.
 
I lurked for far too many years lol.

I should have become a member from the beginning.
 
Holy shit that's it FAST how on earth did you remember it lol I was way off with my searches for it last night!

It was 100% automated grabbing info from IRC and box arts from Amazon, Ebay and Google xD
 
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a (korean?) AI bot posting on forum and learning from user's answers.
it was fun to mess with it and check how it would answer. we ended banning him when we had enough.
 
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i see......

but it's looks like a chinese name, and Taewong sounds like Taiwan tho, don't you think so?
 
T-hug said:
Holy shit that's it FAST how on earth did you remember it lol I was way off with my searches for it last night!
My memory is weirdly good at that sort of thing, and I actually used it a fair bit before it got unstable, not to mention the idea was a good one.
 
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I've hung around since the beginning pretty much. I didn't create a user until "it was a requirement". I might've visited GBA Saves at some point, but not any of the others. Fun stuff! Thanks for sharing!
 
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Really liked the history lesson. I didn't know that pspsaves was part of gbatemp. I remember visiting the site quite a lot. Would love it even more if posted more history.
 
Good old times ... lost my account from back then but still remember the old design and going to the temp pretty much every day to see if there are any new releases and so on.
 
Gosh...this really takes me back !!
Was so excited to join the forums back then ^_^"
Also, never realized about the sav-site was a partner.
 
i know my comment is too laaaaaateee. but my question is........................................................................................



who is the owner of GBAtemp???:discuss::discuss::discuss::discuss::discuss::discuss::discuss:
 

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