Difference between revisions of "Application:VBA"
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Revision as of 08:12, 18 January 2010
VisualBoyAdvance
VisualBoyAdvance (commonly abbreviated as VBA) is an emulator of the Game Boy, Game Boy Color, and Game Boy Advance handheld game consoles sold by Nintendo.
Credit
Ported by Will Dietz Jan 2010.
Thanks to #webos-internals for their feedback throughout testing!
License
All source is under the GPLv2 license.
The original source code is available here
And the latest VBA for webOS source is available on git here
Donate
Lots of work has gone into making this a great game for you to enjoy! If you like it please consider donating. See official thread for the paypal link if you're interested.
Installing VBA
Install Preware, and then launch it. Click on "Available Packages" then "Applications, or "Available Applications" then "All" depending on the Preware preferences you have chosen. Now type in "visual" (no quotes). VisualBoyAdvance should show up. If not, make sure your feeds are up to date. Click on VBA and then click install. You will probably have to install other services as well (it will tell you if you do).
Now you are ready to add ROMs(games)!
Adding ROMS
We aren't going to discuss how to get ROMs here but we will tell you how to transfer them to your Pre. If you want to try some free Homebrew games for the GBA look at the end of the wiki page.
Compatible ROM Files:
.gba (Game Boy Advance)
.gbc (Game Boy Color)
.gb (Game Boy)
If the downloaded game has a ".bin" extension just rename it to the proper extension(for example, rename a gameboy advance game to end with ".gba" without quotes)
Once you have installed VBA on your Pre via Preware, click on it from the launcher to open it for the first time. This should create the necessary folders for the ROMs.
Now connect your Pre to your computer via USB mode. Once the Pre shows up on your computer, open it. You now should be at the "root" of your Pre's storage. If you look at the folders in the root, there should be a few including the "wallpapers", "ringtones", and most importantly, "vba" folders. Click on that and then the "roms" folder. Copy the ROMs from your computer and move them here. DO NOT put the ROMs (.gb, .gbc, .gba) in folders or zips within the "roms" folder.
If you don't see a "vba" folder, but you do see a "wallpapers" and a "ringtones" folder AND you know you installed VBA properly, go ahead and create the necessary folders. Create one at the root called "vba" (no quotes or caps). Then make another one inside that called "roms" (again, no quotes or caps).
NOTE The game talks about "/media/internal/vba/roms" because that's what the folder is called from the game's perspective. When mounted on USB it will just be "/vba/roms". Sorry for the confusion!
As of 1.0.3, the "roms" folder is also where the saves (.sav) and screen captures go.
Controls
To select a rom, just tap on it in the rom selector.
Note that if you have more roms than fit on the screen, simply scroll to them.
New in 1.0.4 Hit a letter key to jump to that letter in the rom list (useful when you have lots of roms)
These are the current controls (while playing):
| Pre Button | Emulator Function | Notes |
| WASD | Up/left/down/right | |
| k | B | |
| l | A | |
| q | L (trigger) | |
| p | R (trigger) | |
| Enter | Start | |
| Spacebar | Select | |
| @ | Turbo | |
| . (period) | Screenshot | |
| t | Start/Select/a/b All at Once | Useful for Resets (or saving in zelda) |
| orange+s (minus) | Toggle Displaying Emulation Speed | |
| orange+l (apostrophe) | Change Scaling Filter | |
| orange+z (or y for qwertz pre) | Toggle Sound | Boosts (GBA) Performance |
| 1,2,3 | Save state number 1,2,3 | orange + "corresponding letter" |
| 4,5,6 | Load state number 1,2,3 | orange + "corresponding letter" |
Screenshots/Videos
No Screenshots Yet!(fbcat doesn't grab opengles apps apparently?)
YouTube Videos of VBA(1.0.1):
Mario Kart Advance: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HdCZs3SU_Nc
Metroid Fusion: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6nZKduqLcC8
Zelda DX: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UE8SbBLbqHI
Pokemon Crystal: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-312zgBPpyI
Super Mario Land 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WQ9s_57jGTM
Feature Requests/TODO
Here's a list of feature requests I'm aware of and/or things I plan to do.
- ALSA instead of pulseaudio
- Add ability to customize controls (it is possible allready but you have to create a new Config)
- Add on-screen controls
- Portrait: controls can go off the screen (below, move image up)
- Landscape: if you can resolve the alpha blending performance issues, make that happen!
- Zip rom support
- "Go back to rom chooser" menu
- Option to move/hide the "Wrote battery" message.
- Create /save folder for .sav files (battery-backed RAM save info), instead of placing .sav in the /roms folder
- More Scaling options, particularly 1:1 (no scaling)
- Better performance on GBA!!
- See iphone/GP2X ports and their ARM optimizations! (dynarec?)
- Frameskip options! (auto-frameskip?)
- Don't list 'hidden' files (ones starting with period)
- Toggle for globally enabling/disabling status messages, including "wrote battery".
- Include a homebrew rom to demo the app?
- change splash screen to tell them about the wiki for roms
Known issues
- Poor performance in GBA. Try disabling sound (press '*'/orange+z)
- Audio doesn't seem to be fully disabled (you won't hear anything, but Pulseaudio is still doing a little work)
- Notifications always appear as if in landscape
Changelog
- 1.0.4
- Remove dependence on upstart, should fix problem with VBA not launching.
- backported sound fixes for (slight) speed, also added code to hopefully fix freezing on pause
- save/load state support
- jump-to-letter functionality in rom selector for better management of large libraries
- sort roms case insensitively
- Remove dependence on upstart, should fix problem with VBA not launching.
- 1.0.3 Added toggle for displaying emulation speed to help compatability reports
- 1.0.2 Small metadata fix.
- 1.0.1 Small performance boost, public release!
- 1.0.0 Initial release (testing feed). Reimplemented rendering engine, rom selector.
Compatibility List
This is a list of games and how well they run.
PLEASE include a version number (on rom selector) when adding entries!
To see the emulation speed percentage, hit orange+s while playing (as of 1.0.3).
Gameboy/Gameboy Color
All GB/GBC Games should be compatible (99.9%) at 100% Speed, please just report those NOT working.
| Title | Works | Version | Notes |
| Legend of Zelda Oracle of Ages | YES | 1.0.0 | |
| Legend of Zelda Oracle of Seasons | YES | 1.0.0 | |
| Zelda DX | YES | 1.0.0 | |
| Bugs Bunny and Lolla Bunny: Operation Carrots | YES | 1.0.3 | |
| The Lion King: SImba's Mighty Adventure | YES | 1.0.3 |
Gameboy Advance
Orange: Not Playable/Very Slow
Yellow: Semi-Playable
Green: Playable
| Title | Speed | VBA Version | Notes | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sound | No Sound | |||
| Advance Wars | 48% | 68% | 1.0.3 | Very Playable without Sound! |
| Astro Boy - Omega Factor | 50% | 75% | 1.0.4 | |
| Backyard Football | 35% | 55% | 1.0.3 | Menus work near 100% but gameplay is slow. |
| Breath of Fire II | 60-67% | 80-100% | 1.0.3 | Runs at 100% walking around. Battles haven't been tested. |
| Castlevania - Aria of Sorrow | 56% | 80% | 1.0.4 | Very Playable without Sound! |
| Chu Chu Rocket! | 97% | 100% | 1.0.4 | Plays perfekt with or without sound :) |
| Duke Nukem 3D Advanced | 86% | 100% | 1.0.4 | |
| Drill Dozer | 47% | 60% | 1.0.4 | |
| Final Fantasy Tactics Advance | 40% | 60% | 1.0.3 | Semi-Playable without Sound |
| Fire Emblem | 60% | 90-100% | 1.0.3 | Takes a bit to load. Extremely Playable without Sound! |
| Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones | 60-70% | 90-100% | 1.0.3 | Extremely Playable without Sound! |
| F-Zero - GP Legend | 43% | 55% | 1.0.3 | |
| Golden Sun: The Lost Age | 35% | 50% | 1.0.3 | Semi-Playable without sound if you have a lot patience. |
| Gunstar Super Heroes | 44% | 65% | 1.0.4 | playable without sound |
| Harvest Moon - Friends of Mineral Town | 60% | 95% | 1.0.3 | |
| Iridion II | 43% | 57% | 1.0.3 | |
| Kuru Kuru Kururin | 40% | 65% | 1.0.3 | |
| Lord of the Rings, Return of the King | 45% | 63% | 1.0.3 | Playable, but a little slow. |
| Mario & Luigi - Superstar Saga | 65-70% | 80-100% | 1.0.3 | Menu 100% with Sound ;), ingame mostly fullspeed without. |
| Mario Kart - Super Circuit | 44% | 64% | 1.0.3 | Time Trial without Sound is almost Fullspeed (95%)! |
| Metal Slug Advance | 48% | 68% | 1.0.3 | |
| Metroid Fusion | 68% | 92% | 1.0.3 | |
| Mortal Kombat Advance | 50% | 70% | 1.0.3 | Playable without sound |
| Ninja Five-0 | 57% | 90% | 1.0.3 | Runs very good without Sound |
| PocketNES - NES Emulator | 60% | 80% | 1.0.3 | |
| Pokemon - Ruby | 60% | 80-90% | 1.0.3 | Playable without sound |
| Pokemon - Fire Red | 47% | 64% | 1.0.3 | A little slow to actually play, but bearable I guess |
| Pokemon - Leaf Green | 46% | 63% | 1.0.3 | Error Loading Savegame, but still works. |
| Rayman Advance | 53% | 75% | 1.0.3 | Without sound very playable! |
| R-Type 3 | 70% | 90-100% | 1.0.3 | |
| SMA2 - Super Mario World | 45% | 62% | 1.0.3 | |
| SMA3 - Yoshi's Island | 43% | 58% | 1.0.3 | |
| SMA4 - Mario Bros. 3 | 51% | 72% | 1.0.3 | Takes a bit time to Load. |
| Sonic Advance 1 | 60% | 85% | 1.0.3 | |
| Sonic Advance 2 | 55% | 80% | 1.0.3 | |
| Sonic Advance 3 | 49% | 72% | 1.0.3 | too slow for sonic |
| Super Ghouls'n Ghosts | 48% | 69% | 1.0.3 | |
| V-Rally 3 | 37% | 48% | 1.0.3 | |
| Wario Land 4 | 60% | 85% | 1.0.3 | |
| Wario Ware Inc. | 60% | 70-80% | 1.0.3 | |
| Zelda - A Link to the Past | 45% | 62% | 1.0.3 | Slow but Playable! |
| Zelda - The Minish Cap | 50% | 85% | 1.0.3 | |
| Zooo | 55% | 90% | 1.0.3 | |
Free Roms
There are several places where you can get free homebrew games for the GB and GBA that are 100% legal to download and try on the emulator.
The best source for homebrew games for any console is http://www.pdroms.org but there are several other homebrew sites around that offer something similar such as this site specifically for gameboy advance: http://www.gameboy-advance-roms.info/
Here is a small list of free games that are worth trying, if you have more add them to the list!
GBA
If the downloaded game has a ".bin" extension just rename it to ".gba"| Title | Speed | VBA Version | Link | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sound | No Sound | |||
| Anguna | 80% | 100% | 1.0.3 | http://www.pdroms.de/files/1724/ |
| Another World | 60% | 85% | 1.0.3 | http://www.foxysofts.com/index.php?l=content/gba/anworld.inc |
| Arkanoid Clone | 70% | 100% | 1.0.3 | http://www.playeradvance.org/forum/showthread.php?t=4039 |
| BulletGBA | 80% | 100% | 1.0.4 | http://pqrs.org/gba/bulletgba/ |
| Bust-A-Move Clone | 100% | 100% | 1.0.3 | http://www.russprince.com/gba/ |
| Dangerous XMAS | 95% | 100% | 1.0.3 | http://www.rickdangerous.co.uk/rickxmas.htm |
| Hergs Solitaire | 100% | 100% | 1.0.3 | http://www.pdroms.de/files/1317/ |
| The Last Seal | % | % | 1.0.3 | http://www.pdroms.de/files/895/ |
| Motocross Challange | 58% | 80% | 1.0.3 | http://www.pdroms.de/files/495/ |