SuperFW: a custom firmware for Supercard

[jellygoober]

Hey, just popping in to ask if anyone has gotten the Mother 3 fan translation to work properly? I have gotten the Japanese original to work without issue (besides slowdown caused by the SuperCard itself). The fan translation partially works.

Unsurprisingly the English patch breaks the built in database. The patcher has the really unfortunate issue where the game tries to save to SRAM. This causes the game to softlock when you try to save.

Is this a problem with my rom, or does the English patch actually break the patcher?

 

[Gianbisk]

Hi guys, can anyone help?
I'm playing a Pokémon ROM hack on my SuperFw.
The games saves fine and I can see the save file when I turn the gba off and then on.
The issue is that if I then try and play the game one hour or so after, the saved progress will disappear and it will only give me "New Game/options" available.
What can I do?
I can se the file .sav in the folder so it's strange!

 

[SuffahBish]

Maybe I'm misreading the instructions but how do you do this? Lol. I'm trying to update to .19 on the SuperChis and I can't seem to get the update to actually flash. I'm following the new install instructions... booting into the .19 rom, enabling flashing, and pressing a on the .fw one. But it still throws a checksum error and doesn't proceed. Am I missing something here?

Edit: Wait. I just did it a second time, no changes, and it just worked.

 

[sam2895]

Maybe I'm misreading the instructions but how do you do this? Lol. I'm trying to update to .19 on the SuperChis and I can't seem to get the update to actually flash. I'm following the new install instructions... booting into the .19 rom, enabling flashing, and pressing a on the .fw one. But it still throws a checksum error and doesn't proceed. Am I missing something here?

Edit: Wait. I just did it a second time, no changes, and it just worked.

load v0.19 as a .gba game (launch it like a regular game) and then install the 0.19 .fw firmware.
Sorry about the disruption

 

[SuffahBish]

load v0.19 as a .gba game (launch it like a regular game) and then install the 0.19 .fw firmware.
Sorry about the disruption

That's literally what I said I did. And if you kept reading you'd see it worked the second try.

 

[Peeteris]

Hey there!
For those having issues with some specific GBA models, but not with SP/NDS, I'm told it could be an issue with some PCB revision of the GBA. In that case, it would be useful if you report the motherboard revision. Of course, this only applies if your SC works well on NDS or GBA-SP. If your SC misbehaves on other devices, it's likely bad.

Anyway, here's how you figure the board version:
View attachment 551644

Post automatically merged: Jan 17, 2026

Just a heads up, v0.19 was released. This also contains support for Chis' SuperChis cart, which I think should be out there very soon (if not already). See Chis' post on the cart.

The release notes:

Bump to version 0.19

• Adding built-in NOR flash support and SuperChis cart support.
• Re-implemented RTC emulation, allows for time passage emulation.
• Some UI changes on loading/launching games, allow for hiding/un-hiding files, etc.
• Fix preference savings (they should now work).
• Updated patch database
• Adds PT-BR translation
• Many fixes: bug with 32MiB games, minor bug in IGM, etc.

Enjoy!

Hi, Davidgf!

You still have info about my GBA which doesn't work with this flashcard, right? Or should I resend that info to you?

 

[jsurico656]

Ugh. 7 hours into a game of Pokémon Unbound and the save file gets corrupted.

I've been ensuring that the file gets flushed by resetting my gba after saving every time.

I am incredibly appreciative of all of the work that has gone into this, but this makes me not want to touch any pokemon game or RPG if I'm playing Russian roulette with my save file

 

[Peeteris]

Ugh. 7 hours into a game of Pokémon Unbound and the save file gets corrupted.

I've been ensuring that the file gets flushed by resetting my gba after saving every time.

I am incredibly appreciative of all of the work that has gone into this, but this makes me not want to touch any pokemon game or RPG if I'm playing Russian roulette with my save file

In settings enable save backups. You can set how many backup copies to keep.

 

[jsurico656]

In settings enable save backups. You can set how many backup copies to keep.

Awesome. I will do this going forward! Makes me feel less frustrated about the whole thing

 

[jsurico656]

4 hours into a new Unbound save and now my cart won't load any of my 3 past save files

I think many of my past issues can be attributed to a crappy cart (even though I bought one of the highest rated and most purchased ones on Ali)

Going to try the chis flash next

 

[Peeteris]

4 hours into a new Unbound save and now my cart won't load any of my 3 past save files

I think many of my past issues can be attributed to a crappy cart (even though I bought one of the highest rated and most purchased ones on Ali)

Going to try the chis flash next

It's dead battery!
Almost all Aliexpress supercards are with dead battery on arrival as they put in cheapest and oldest batteries they have.
Buy Panasonic or other reputable cell battery CR1016 (not sure, check out correct info) battery, solder it in and it'll be golden.

 

[jsurico656]

It's dead battery!
Almost all Aliexpress supercards are with dead battery on arrival as they put in cheapest and oldest batteries they have.
Buy Panasonic or other reputable cell battery CR1016 (not sure, check out correct info) battery, solder it in and it'll be golden.

I shouldn't have to go through all of that just to get a functional product. I'm starting the return process and just purchased a SuperChis Prime for less than what I bought the SuperCart for

 

[chrisis685]

I somehow just managed to wipe the firmware of my SuperChis by interrupting the flash... no big deal, the DS flashtool (0.8) should work, right? However when I try to flash it on my DS Lite it (the latest 0.19 Chis variant) it stays at "Erasing flash chip" for ages... should it really take that long? I remember the flash in GBA mode to be really quick... am I doing something wrong?

Edit: OK, maybe I was just impatient, it now changed to Writing flash chip.... I'll let it run some more time and hope it goes through

Edit2: OK it worked, didn't expect it to take that long but now everythings working again I guess since the SuperChis does have the internal flash it needs much longer than the regular SuperCard, but everything is good again

 

[Lantern1984]

I just got a remank GBA flash cart the has SuperFW version 0.15 on it. I tried to transfer my favorite .gbc and .gba games to it, and while the GBA games run ok, the .sav files for the GBC games keep erasing themselves. I tried updating the firmware to 0.19 to see if that would fix the saving, but when I go to run the update, I get en error that says "Bad firmware checksum". What am I doing wrong? Did I just spent $25 on some thing that claims it can run GBC games, but in reality can't? Do I have to keep switching cartridges back and forth between a GBC flash cart and a GBA one just to play all my games?

 

[chrisis685]

I just got a remank GBA flash cart the has SuperFW version 0.15 on it. I tried to transfer my favorite .gbc and .gba games to it, and while the GBA games run ok, the .sav files for the GBC games keep erasing themselves. I tried updating the firmware to 0.19 to see if that would fix the saving, but when I go to run the update, I get en error that says "Bad firmware checksum". What am I doing wrong? Did I just spent $25 on some thing that claims it can run GBC games, but in reality can't? Do I have to keep switching cartridges back and forth between a GBC flash cart and a GBA one just to play all my games?

It says so in the readme of 0.19...

https://github.com/davidgfnet/superfw/releases/tag/v0.19

Release v0.19​

Bump to version 0.19

• Adding built-in NOR flash support and SuperChis cart support.
• Re-implemented RTC emulation, allows for time passage emulation.
• Some UI changes on loading/launching games, allow for hiding/un-hiding files, etc.
• Fix preference savings (they should now work).
• Updated patch database
• Adds PT-BR translation
• Many fixes: bug with 32MiB games, minor bug in IGM, etc.

NOTE: Updating from v0.18 will fail due to checksum check. Follow the instructions for first install (not upgrade).

https://superfw.davidgf.net/docs/install/flash/

Still mind, even if it plays GBC games this will emulate them and not play them natively (so compatibility will be lower), so depending on the game playing on a GBC flash cart could still be advantageous

 

[NostalgicMillennial]

in the era of having Twilight Menu ++, bless you for keeping FW on antiquated hardware such as the SuperCard alive

 

[Silterpy]

How do I get cheats to work? I have them enabled in the menu. I downloaded them from the SuperFW cheat repository and put them in .superfw/cheats, but any and all games just show that they have no cheats even though they do. I've confirmed the game codes with the file name.

 

[Lantern1984]

It says so in the readme of 0.19...

https://github.com/davidgfnet/superfw/releases/tag/v0.19

Release v0.19​

Bump to version 0.19

• Adding built-in NOR flash support and SuperChis cart support.
• Re-implemented RTC emulation, allows for time passage emulation.
• Some UI changes on loading/launching games, allow for hiding/un-hiding files, etc.
• Fix preference savings (they should now work).
• Updated patch database
• Adds PT-BR translation
• Many fixes: bug with 32MiB games, minor bug in IGM, etc.

NOTE: Updating from v0.18 will fail due to checksum check. Follow the instructions for first install (not upgrade).

https://superfw.davidgf.net/docs/install/flash/

Still mind, even if it plays GBC games this will emulate them and not play them natively (so compatibility will be lower), so depending on the game playing on a GBC flash cart could still be advantageous

I don't see anything in there about .SAVs or GBC games, or why I can't update from 0.15.

 

[Peeteris]

I don't see anything in there about .SAVs or GBC games, or why I can't update from 0.15.

With such an attitude I'm not surprised that you don't see.

In summary:
1. You can't update to 0.19 from any previous versions (0.18, 0.15, etc.) because it will give an error about failed checksum check.
2. Download superfw-sd.fw. Copy it to your flashcard. Make another copy of superfw-sd.fw and rename it to superfw-sd.gba
3. Run superfw-sd.gba as a standart ROM file. This will start v0.19 firmware.
4. Go to settings, enable updating, select superfw-sd.fw and update.
5. Voila.

 

[chrisis685]

I don't see anything in there about .SAVs or GBC games, or why I can't update from 0.15.

I mean there are three exclamation marks on both sides and it's written in bold text, but just maybe read it again... (obviously, the same applies for versions earlier than 0.18).

NOTE: Updating from v0.18 will fail due to checksum check. Follow the instructions for first install (not upgrade).