Super Game Boy
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The Super Game Boy is an adaptor cartridge for Nintendo's Super Nintendo Entertainment System, as well as the Super Famicom in Japan. The Super Game Boy allows game cartridges designed for use on the Game Boy to be played on a TV display using the SNES/Super Famicom controllers. When it was released in 1994, the Super Game Boy sold for about $60 in the United States. In the United Kingdom, it retailed for £49.99[citation needed] It was the precursor to the Game Boy Player on the Nintendo Gamecube, which functioned in a similar manner.
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[edit] Information
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The Super Game Boy was compatible with the original monochrome Game Boy cartridges and black Game Boy/Game Boy Color cartridges, although it would display the latter in monochrome. The unit could map the four shades of grey to various colors on the TV. Later Game Boy games which were optimized to use the Super Game Boy had additional color information and could override your ability to change them, and the ability to display a graphical border around the screen as well as the ability to display special BG sprites on the screen as seen in the Mario's Picross title screen. Those games would contain a small "Super Game Boy Game Pak" logo on the box and cartridge. The adaptor could support up to 64 colors for the border (4 palettes of 16 colors each), and 16 colors for the screen (4 palettes of 4 colors each) although the manual said in the future, some games could even display up to 256 colors at one time, which would only be introduced with the Game Boy Color. Since the background color is shared among all 8 palettes, the number of colors is actually 61 for the border, and 13 colors for the screen. Colorization was applied to the screen itself, and did not scroll with the background. While static screens could display all 13 colors like Animaniacs did, the actual in-game graphics used fewer. Usually the colors were divided such that a large scrolling area with moving sprites was assigned one 4-color palette, and a non-moving status bar was assigned the remaining palettes.
It was also possible for Super Game Boy games to make use of the SNES hardware for extra effects. For example, Contra 3 The Alien Wars , Donkey Kong, Kirby's Dream Land 2 and Toy Story (among others) had expanded sound when used with the Super Game Boy. Sounds have been found in Super Gameboy's coding that were never used as enhancements in any Gameboy game. Wario Blast, the Game Boy version of Killer Instinct, and several other titles even allowed the second SNES controller to be read as another player, and the title screen changed to show that it had a two-player option, rather than just "connect." In the most skillful use, Space Invaders allowed players to play a full 16-bit version of the game that took over the entire screen.
No version of the Super Game Boy is capable of running games that are designed strictly for the Game Boy Color, although they will run dual mode (black cartridge, compatible with both systems) games in Game Boy mode. Some black cartridge games also have Super Game Boy enhancements, although there is no logo indicating this on the cartridge; however, a less prominent logo appears on the back of the packaging, downplaying Super Game Boy's compatibility in favor of the newer Game Boy Color.
[edit] Hardware
The Super Game Boy actually consists of the same hardware as the Game Boy (since the Super Nintendo was not powerful enough to emulate it); inside the cartridge a separate CPU processed the games while the SNES only provided means for user-input, output of graphics to the screen and the additional coloring.
The Super Game Boy plays the audio for games, and the games themselves, about 2.4% faster than the original hardware. The slight change in music pitch may be noticeable to some, but it is probably undetectable except when tested. [1]
[edit] Super Game Boy 2
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Nintendo released the Super Game Boy 2 in 1998. Though it was widely sold in Japan, in the United States it was only available through mail-order. Additions included a link port (allowing the Super Game Boy 2 to connect with other Game Boys for multiplayer purposes), a green game link LED, and a red power LED indicator and different borders.
[edit] System menu
Accessed by pressing the L and R buttons at the same time; the menu has five options to choose from:
- Color Palette: Choose from one of 32 pre-made color palettes, the Super Game Boy enhanced palette(s) (if available), or a user-created palette (if available). A few Super Game Boy games will not allow the palette to be changed.
- Border: Choose from one of 9 pre-made borders, the Super Game Boy enhanced border(s) (if available), or a user-created border (if created). A few Super Game Boy games will not allow the border to be changed.
- Button Setting: Switches between two controller mappings. A few Super Game Boy games will not allow the controller to be changed.
- Custom Color: Create a custom color palette and get a password to retrieve it later.
- Graffiti: Create a custom border by using several painting tools.
[edit] Predecessors and successors
The Super Game Boy was the successor to Intelligent Systems' Wide Boy 2 (which connected to the Famicom or NES). One difference between the Wide Boy and the Super Game Boy is that the former did not use any part of the Famicom/NES other than the video memory. Even the controller (a single Famicom controller) was hardwired directly into the Wide Boy. The Wide Boy would continue running even if the reset button were held down on the Famicom/NES. The Game Boy had twice as many tiles as could fit in the Famicom/NES's video memory, so the Wide Boy had to refresh the Famicom/NES's video memory halfway down the screen.
Camerica had the Game Boy to NES developed by Biederman Design Labs, which appeared similar to the Super Game Boy.
The Super Game Boy was followed by the Transfer Pak for the Nintendo 64, which allowed one to play the six (seven in Japan) Game Boy Color Pokémon titles in Pokémon Stadium and Pokémon Stadium 2 in a Super Game Boy-like fashion, complete with the Super Game Boy enhanced borders and palettes. The games were played via the use of a software emulator on the Nintendo 64. However, the main role of the Transfer Pak was to transfer data from Game Boy Color to Nintendo 64 games, not to play games.
A Wide-Boy64 AGB was released for the N64, which allowed Game Boy and Game Boy Color titles to be played on a television. It cost $1400, and like the original Wide Boy, it was only available to developers and the gaming press.[2]
A product made by Datel Design & Development Ltd called GameBooster was released for the Nintendo 64 in halfway through the console time in the game market. It wasn't officially licensed by Nintendo as it had a slot at the back for an N64 game to over-ride the lockout chip.
On the GameCube, the Game Boy Player was released in 2003, which allows all Game Boy, Game Boy Color, and Game Boy Advance games to be played on a television. It attaches to the bottom of the console; however, a boot disc must be in the GameCube disc drive in order to operate it. The Game Boy Player functions just like a Game Boy Advance, letterboxing the games' display on a standard television set. Some GBA games were programmed with consideration for the Player, including activating the vibration feature in GameCube controllers and special color palettes which accounted for a TV's brightness and resolution. The Game Boy Player will not activate Super Game Boy options on a Super Game Boy enhanced cartridge, however. Also, when playing a Game Boy or Game Boy Color game on the Game Boy Player, a black border will appear between the main border and the gameplay area; this is a carry-over from the Game Boy Advance.
[edit] See also
- List of Super Game Boy games - a list of Game Boy and Game Boy Color games which make use of the enhancements the Super Game Boy has to offer.
[edit] References
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