With the release of vba this emulator is now officially discontinued!

Many many thanks to everyone that helped!


I ported the gameboy advance emulator gdkGBA (originally made by gdkchan) to the nintendo switch! (Works on all versions as far as I know)

To set up I strongly recommend putting the original gba_bios.bin in sd:/switch/gba_bios.bin!
After that put the roms into sd:/switch/roms/ and start the homebrew.

As soon as retroarch gets updated for 5.0 this will instantly become obsolete!

source (you need the sdl2-libraries from the devkit-pro pacman to build this)

Known issues:
Sound is a bit weird (it seems like sometimes the wrong instruments play)
Some games seem to crash the switch after a while. (mostly fixed in v8)
Sometimes the switch likes to crash even in games that normally run pretty stable :/ (fixed in v8 I think)
Some games have graphical glitches/don't work at all
Saving doesn't work on some games. If that happens please don't hesitate to tell me and for now you can set (buggy) savestates using plus+r and load them using plus+l.

Please update to the latest version before reporting Problems!

Game compatibility list

UPDATE:
Sound now much better now! Many thanks to @renhei for the fix!
UPDATE2:
Changed rompath from sd:/switch/roms to sd:/switch/roms/gba in order to avoid confusion with the gbc emulator. Also double joycons now work in unattached mode!
UPDATE3:
Merged gdkchans changes to the ppu. Some games that had problems with artifacts on screen (I tried harvest moon) now look much better! However this is apparently causing trouble in some games so I also attached v2.
UPDATE4:
Added proper in-gaming-saving support! The old buggy savestate-feature is now read-only (so that you can move your progress to the new save-files). I recommend removing the old .savegame-file after making sure the new, better in-game-saving works correctly in order to make sure that you don't accidentally load it
Many thanks to @gdkchan for fixing some underlying issues with the in-game-saves of this emulator!
Also I added support for the original gba_bios.bin:
If you want to use it (which I strongly recommend since the open-source-one that's bundled is causing trouble with some games) put it into sd:/switch/gba_bios.bin
UPDATE5:
In game saving should now actually work in most games! Many thanks to @gdkchan for explaining to me how the gba handles saves!
UPDATE6:
Recompiled everything with latest libnx. Hopefully fewer crashes now.
UPDATE7:
Savestate feature is back. Please only use if the savegames fail as it is known to sometimes cause issues!
UPDATE8:
Updated libnx (again) and made a few small fixes. If you're experiencing fewer/more crashes please don't hesitate to tell me
UPDATE8.5 (Experimental only):
Pushed the new graphics-fixes from @gdkchan. Please only use them if you're experiencing graphical glitches since they introduce a large slowdown in some games.
UPDATE8.6 (Experimental only):
Pushed @gdkchans new fixes+optimisations. The experimental version should now run a bit faster!
UPDATE9:
Saving should now be more reliable again (makes the save-feature work as it did in v7 again).

 

[nmkd]

Still haven't taken the leap into trying to run CFW and stuff yet, don't really wanna wipe my microSD card, but it's getting more and more tempting each day

32 GB microSD cards are dirt cheap, I'd just grab one for homebrew.

 

[jakibaki]

Will the save file be different for each game as before? Or does each game get it's own save file name this time around.

I know previously the save file was overwritten no matter what game for GBC

Each game has its own save file .

I also fixed that in the gbc-emulator when I added the file picker.

 

[Leonidas87]

Each game has its own save file .

I also fixed that in the gbc-emulator when I added the file picker.

Haha what amazing work so far.

I had a recommendation which would help us all keep our roms folder CLEANER.

Basically changing the roms location to sd:/switch/roms/GBA for the GBA emulator.

And

sd:/switch/roms/GBC for the GBC emulator.

Would make looking and scrolling through games a lot easier.

Would help clean up the roms folder and allow us to keep GBC and GBA games in their own folders.

Again AMAZING WORK.

Tested save states on GBA and GBC both good to go

Thanks again and all the best.

 

[Deletedmember448668]

Haha what amazing work so far.

I had a recommendation which would help us all keep our roms folder CLEANER.

Basically changing the roms location to sd:/switch/roms/GBA for the GBA emulator.

And

sd:/switch/roms/GBC for the GBC emulator.

Would make looking and scrolling through games a lot easier.

Would help clean up the roms folder and allow us to keep GBC and GBA games in their own folders.

Again AMAZING WORK.

Tested save states on GBA and GBC both good to go

Thanks again and all the best.

Haven't installed this yet, where are roms currently stored?

 

[Leonidas87]

Haven't installed this yet, where are roms currently stored?

sd:/switch/roms/

I'd like to see it changed to sd:/switch/roms/GBA to allow us to separate our roms and to clean up the roms list in game selection

 

[Deletedmember448668]

sd:/switch/roms/

I'd like to see it changed to sd:/switch/roms/GBA to allow us to separate our roms and to clean up the roms list in game selection

Great idea

 

[Leonidas87]

Each game has its own save file .

I also fixed that in the gbc-emulator when I added the file picker.

Let me know if you can change GBA rom directory to sd:/switch/roms/GBA

And

For GBC rom directory of sd:/switch/roms/GBC

Besides Audio which is understandable and takes time I'm happy.

Much appreciate all your time and hard work we all know it is not easy.

 

[Bedel]

Question, maybe stupid: does it work in dock mode?

 

[Samus20XX]

Zero mission does this P:

And legacy of Goku 2 doesn't work past press start. Just thought I should let people know.

Pokemon leaf green should be cool though (: don't need audio for that

 

[Leonidas87]

Now that I think about it this was the GBC version but I accidentally started a Gameboy game haha and it ran, not the colour version either as I can tell.

Was an accident thought it was colour version

 

[Stercate79]

Super Mario Advance 4 gets stuck

 

[Leonidas87]

Question, maybe stupid: does it work in dock mode?

Yes it should, the GBC version did.

Only thing I did notice is tr ge switch may crash/need restarted sometimes in the emulator docked.

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------

I'm sure the developer is busy and a bit exhausted from all the hard work.

I'm sure he will see all our comments and get back with a fix or something in a bit. Think he deserves a brake for a few hours haha

 

[Miqote]

Yessss, you da best <3 GBA is love!

 

[anhminh]

Ah suck, I still waiting for Atmosphere to come so no emulator for me. Good tosee the most wanted emulator make it here though.

 

[SimonMKWii]

Have you tried porting Mupen64 to the Switch?
It ran pretty well on the Wii, so I'd assume it would run even better on the Switch.
I really want to play Banjo-Kazooie next to Yooka-Laylee!
If someone does it, and it's not named MupeNX, I'll be sad.

 

[QCLasky]

It is really happening \o/
We cant stop devs now, more things is comming every day

 

[Proto-Propski]

It is really happening \o/
We cant stop devs now, more things is comming every day

Not surprising it's a Nintendo scene after-all on a already well known architecture, it was a match made in heaven

 

[Deletedmember448668]

Thank you soo much for releasing this!! The sound isnt the greatest but I'll take what I can get! Here's a little video I recorded with my phone showing it working:

 

[ragingninja3]

Does this work on 4.1?

 

[Proto-Propski]

Thank you soo much for releasing this!! The sound isnt the greatest but I'll take what I can get! Here's a little video I recorded with my phone showing it working:

Yeah, I've been playing Pokemon Ruby, everything seems to be working besides the sound which is a shame, but It's still very much a playable experience.