Jump to content

VisualBoyAdvance

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
VisualBoyAdvance
Original author(s)Forgotten
Developer(s)VBA Team
Stable release
1.7.2 (Windows)
1.7.1 (Linux, BeOS)
1.7.4 (Mac) / May 25, 2004;20 years ago(2004-05-25)
Preview release
1.8.0 beta 3 / October 1, 2005;18 years ago(2005-10-01)
Repositorysourceforge.net/projects/vba/
Written inC,C++
Operating systemCross-platform
Size1.4 MB - 1.92 MB
Available inEnglish, French, German, Italian, Polish, Portuguese, Chinese, Spanish, Turkish (v.1.7 and above, for Windows only)
TypeConsole emulator
LicenseGPL-2.0-or-later
VisualBoyAdvance-M
Original author(s)Forgotten et al.
Developer(s)VBA-M Development Team
Stable release
2.1.9[1] / 3 February 2024;5 months ago(2024-02-03)
Repositorygithub/visualboyadvance-m/visualboyadvance-m
Operating systemCross-platform
TypeConsole emulator
LicenseGPL-3.0
Websitehttps:// visualboyadvance-m.org

VisualBoyAdvance(commonly abbreviated asVBA) is a freeemulatorof theGame Boy,Game Boy Color,andGame Boy Advancehandheld game consoles[2]as well as ofSuper Game BoyandSuper Game Boy 2.It is still downloadable to this day.[3]

Besides theDirectXversion for the Windows platform, there is also one that is based on the freeplatform independentgraphics librarySDL.This is available for a variety of operating systems includingLinux,[4]BSD,Mac OS X,[5]andBeOS.VisualBoyAdvance has also been ported toAmigaOS 4,AROS,GameCube,Wii,webOS,andZune HD.[6]

History

[edit]

The VisualBoyAdvance project was started by a developer under theonline alias"Forgotten".[7][better source needed]When this person left the development of the emulator, the project was handed over to a team named "VBA Team", led by Forgotten's brother. Development on the original VisualBoyAdvance stopped in 2004 with version 1.8.0 beta 3, and a number offorkedversions were made by various developers in the years since then, such as VisualBoyAdvance-M.[8]

VBA was a crucial component ofTwitch Plays Pokémon,a social experiment in which thousands of button inputs collected from the viewership of the streaming websiteTwitchwere fed into an emulated version ofPokémon Red.[9][10][11]Viewers typed commands into the chat function, which was then fed into the VBA emulator via anIRC bot.[9]They succeeded after 16 days of continuous play, with a peak concurrent viewership of 121,000 and over 1.1 million unique participants.[12]

VisualBoyAdvance-M

[edit]

VisualBoyAdvance-M,or simplyVBA-M,is an improvedforkfrom the inactive VisualBoyAdvance project,[8]adding several features as well as maintaining an up-to-date codebase. After VisualBoyAdvance became inactive in 2004, several forks began to appear such as VBALink, which allowed users to emulate the linking of two Game Boy devices. Eventually, VBA-M was created, which merged several of the forks into one codebase. Thus, theMin VBA-M stands forMerge.[13]VBA-M isbackwards compatiblewithGame BoyandGame Boy Color.[14]

VBA-M's GBA emulation core was ported intoRetroArch/Libretro,without the GB, GBC and SGB cores.[15]as well as a modified version called VBA-Next.[16]

VBA-GX is a port of VBA-M toNintendo Wii.It enablesmotion controlsfor emulated Game Boy Advance games.[17]

Reception

[edit]

The VisualBoyAdvance became the most popular GBA emulator for the Unix platform[18]and the emulator contributed "greatly" to the late years of GBA game development by providing a suite of development and visual debugging tools for developers who wanted to create games that surpassed even Nintendo's own.[19]A port from VBA's code was used as the foundation of the Visual Boy Zune, an emulator of theZune HD.[20]

Wesley Akkerman from the Dutch computer magazineComputer!Totaalnamed the VisualBoyAdvance as one of the best Game Boy emulators alongside the mGBA, owing to its variety of features and customization options.[21]In a review on the tech blogTechilife,VisualBoyAdvance has been named the oldest and most reliable Game Boy Advance emulator and has been praised for its ease of use.[22]

Features

[edit]

VisualBoyAdvance has many features that would require more work to do on the actual GBA. VisualBoyAdvance supports Fullscreen support, can take advantage of cheat codes fromGamesharkandAction Replay,and can take screenshots while playing the game.[23]Many players would also like to find the ability to customize graphics for a better performance than what was possible on the GBA.[24]

See also

[edit]

References

[edit]
  1. ^"Releases · visualboyadvance-m/Visualboyadvance-m".GitHub.
  2. ^"Visual Boy Advance".The Emulator Zone.
  3. ^"Visual Boy Advance Download - VBA Emulator".Visual Boy Advance.Retrieved2024-06-18.
  4. ^"VisualBoyAdvance-SDL".The Linux Game Tome. 15 February 2019.
  5. ^"VisualBoyAdvance 1.7.2".Softonic.
  6. ^"Visual Boy Advance GX".Google Code. 18 February 2022.
  7. ^"Visual Boy Advance".NGEmu. Archived fromthe originalon 2009-12-17.Retrieved2009-11-18.
  8. ^abBrendan Hesse (2020-11-23)."The best console emulators (NES, SNES, Genesis, and more)".Digital Trends.Retrieved2021-01-06.
  9. ^abStatt, Nick (2014-03-01)."Twitch Plays Pokemon conquers Elite Four, beating game after 390 hours".CNET.CBS Interactive.Archivedfrom the original on 2014-03-01.Retrieved2022-10-07.
  10. ^McWhertor, Michael (2014-02-14)."How Twitch is crowd-sourcing an amazing Pokémon multiplayer game".Polygon.Retrieved2022-10-07.
  11. ^St. Clair, Michael (December 2015)."Twitch Plays Pokemon, MarI/O, Dreeps".Theatre Journal.67(4): 702–706.doi:10.1353/tj.2015.0112.S2CID194408732.ProQuest1774950911– via ProQuest.
  12. ^Chase (1 March 2014)."Victory! The Thundershock Heard Around the World".Twitch.Archived fromthe originalon 5 March 2014.Retrieved1 March2014.
  13. ^"VBA-M (Archived - Now on Github)".SourceForge.10 February 2018.Retrieved2020-10-18.
  14. ^Garnett, Alex (September 1, 2011)."How to Emulate the Game Boy/Game Boy Advance on Your PC".PC World.RetrievedSeptember 26,2022.
  15. ^https://github /visualboyadvance/vbam-libretro[dead link]
  16. ^"GitHub - libretro/vba-next: Optimized port of VBA-M to Libretro".GitHub.21 December 2021.
  17. ^Custodio, Alex (2020).Who Are You? Nintendo's Game Boy Advance Platform.United States: MIT Press. pp. 164–166.ISBN9780262360463.
  18. ^Kohler, Chris (2006).Retro gaming hacks(1st ed.). O'Reilly.ISBN9781449303907.Retrieved15 September2022.
  19. ^O'Donnell, Casey (2014).Developer's dilemma: the secret world of videogame creators.Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press. p. 241.ISBN9780262028196.Retrieved15 September2022.
  20. ^Hollister, Sean (May 11, 2010)."Visual Boy Zune brings Game Boy emulation to Zune HD (video)".Engadget.RetrievedSeptember 26,2022.
  21. ^Akkerman, Wesley (March 18, 2022)."De beste GBA-emulators voor pc".Computer!Totaal(in Dutch).RetrievedSeptember 26,2022.
  22. ^Joshua, Alex (June 10, 2020)."A Complete Review On GBA Emulators For Android & Windows PC".Techilife.RetrievedSeptember 26,2022.
  23. ^"How to Load Cheats on VBA".Visual Boy Advance.Retrieved2024-06-18.
  24. ^Justinforsure (2021-09-08).Best Visual Boy Advance Settings.Retrieved2024-06-18– via YouTube.
[edit]
Wikimedia Commons has media related toVisualBoyAdvance.

VisualBoyAdvance Website

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=VisualBoyAdvance&oldid=1234789068"