Gaming Hardware DS vs. 3DS: Which is better for Gameboy games?

Sono

cripple piss
Developer
Joined
Oct 16, 2015
Messages
2,851
Trophies
2
Location
home
XP
9,716
Country
Hungary
I could've sworn that I played Pokémon Yellow with GameYob natively on the 3DS. I remember making my own palettes for other monochrome games.
Although... pretty sure I used the unscaled option, meaning that the image was squished very small into the middle of the big 3DS screen, but it wasn't bothering me personally.
I would show it working, but for some reason it always crashes on my 3DS, now that I wanted to try again...

For DS, I actually play GB games by writing Goomba (GB emulator for GBA) to a cartridge, and shoving that into Slot-2. I actually prefer this, as the DS Lite is less heavy as my 3DS, and it has mushy buttons instead of clicky buttons. But with your DSi, and cartridges (and especially cartrirdge writers) being on the more expensive side, I'd say this is only viable if you prefer real hardware. But at that point you'd have better luck refurbishing a junk system with an aftermarket shell...

Opinion aside (as in, this is still my opinion, but I'll try to be objective), if you're on a budget, I'd say try 3DS, as it can also emulate other systems, if you want them in the future. Can also play DS and DSi natively.
And for GBA, open_agb_firm just got color correction to mimic the colors of a real GBA, so Golden Sun won't look like piss anymore (literally), and Harvest Moon will look more depressed, than without correction.
And the upscaling in open_agb_firm uses some tweaked linear, so it actually looks as good as we can get it, without using pixel-perfect scaling (except 2DS, as it has 1:1 pixels, not 2:1 pixels) and subpixel scaling (untested yet on real console, as hardware limitations make us scratch our head to not add unnecessary lag, and fit into CPU budget without wasting battery for nothing).
Oh, and the best part is that open_agb_firm uses the real GBA inside of the 3DS (more specifically, the same GBA that is in a DS Lite), so it will always run at full speed with maximum compatibility. The only downside is that GBA Video, and some other obscure games don't work without patches, as there is no gyroscope, light sensor, or any of that fancy stuff connected to the cartridge emulator. But every game up to 32MB works, and even EEPROM and RTC games work out of the box, as Nintendo made them supported, *in hardware*.
Some naughty homebrew may not work, as they set cartridge speed to 2;1, which the 3DS doesn't support (only down to 3;1 speed is supported), but those types of homebrew have bigger issues preventing them to work on real hardware anyways, so this limitation is usually a non-issue.

And if you're *really* on budget, I'd say make the most use of your DSi. I don't remember GameYob being *that* bad.

Or if none of these sound convincing, I've used to plug a Sony PS2 controller with multiple adapters into my Android 2.2.2 tablet, and play old games that way :P
Grips, and all that exist, not all of them are that bad. Although in my case I just had it on my lap, as I have a high discomfort tolerance for various reasons.
 

Jayro

MediCat USB Dev
Developer
Joined
Jul 23, 2012
Messages
13,404
Trophies
6
Location
WA State
Website
ko-fi.com
XP
17,922
Country
United States

SG6000

Well-Known Member
Member
Joined
Nov 2, 2015
Messages
394
Trophies
0
XP
1,452
Country
United Kingdom
If you must choose either a DS or 3DS for Game Boy emulation.. I'd suggest using an original 2DS because it's the only model that feels kinda like a Game Boy; A solid comfy slab rather than a clamshell.

Once upon a time I'd be more interested in other factors but no DS or 3DS can beat that slate 2DS for the Game Boy vibes, outside of real hardware or a FPGBC kit IMO.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Sono

devlman127

Well-Known Member
OP
Newcomer
Joined
May 1, 2022
Messages
92
Trophies
0
Age
21
Location
Midwest
XP
353
Country
United States
But if you used a emulator, you'd be using a emulator!
Emulation is dirty/inaccurate/no-way to play games you actually care about.:teach:
I got into these games because they are still great games even to this day. If you don't think they are worth playing even on the shittiest hardware you're implying the games are worth less than the hardware they're played on, then that's your problem. If people want to play on a shitty inaccurate emulators with bilinear filtering, then that's fine by me - in the end it's the games we cherish.
 

4d1xlaan

Well-Known Member
Member
Joined
Apr 21, 2024
Messages
752
Trophies
0
XP
776
Country
United States
TMNT II Back from the sewers, Pokemon Pinball, and Pokemon Yellow all have speech samples you can test with.
oh, that's what you were referring to. wasn't there a setting that specifically makes those sounds work correctly? or you mean they're still inaccurate even with that setting on?

though, that setting is on by default, and I dont think you would be dumb enough to turn it off and then complain about it, so you're probably correct and it's probably still inaccurate. so I should open a rom of pokemon yellow on bizhawk or something and compare the audio to see what it's like

at least it seems like it affects very few games, none of which I care about playing, which is good for me lol

(maybe you could run goomba roms through gbarunner3 eventually also)
 

Maeson

Well-Known Member
Member
Joined
Apr 3, 2013
Messages
1,246
Trophies
2
XP
3,615
Country
Spain
I personally would not use a GBA SP, nor a DS Lite again to play thanks to the excessive ghosting their screens have. It made playing misserable to me.

I was dumbfounded when I discovered that for the 3DS' GBA Ambassador games, they actually simulated the ghosting.
 

4d1xlaan

Well-Known Member
Member
Joined
Apr 21, 2024
Messages
752
Trophies
0
XP
776
Country
United States
Or just mod a 3ds and put the roms in it and play them through mgba
does mgba have perfect speed on o3ds these days for gb games? I could never get it to run some of the more demanding games without lag, compared to gameyob

but with new 3ds the games should all run full speed and with better accuracy, for sure
 

Site & Scene News

Popular threads in this forum

General chit-chat
Help Users
    Kirbydogs @ Kirbydogs: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rax8NvkXfyI