YES ANOTHER GAMEBOY....

So again it's been a while since I posted anything up on my Blog. The past few months have flown by and I've just bit-d and bob-d about with projects but haven't really got any finished during the time. It's a shame but I'm still super excited about retro gaming projects and still have several lined up. One major one I need to get to is changing the battery on my CPS2 all-in-one Marvel Vs Capcom board. The battery is pretty old on it and I need to grow the nerve up to change it. Apparently they work differently to normal CPS2 boards and you have to change it while the game is on and playing!! If theres no power and the battery gets taken out it dumps the encryption keys and thats it, you need to get it phoenixed! And I don't want that at all!

Anyway, what's the story with me getting another Gameboy!??! Well it was a bit random really, I'd been into my companies (where I work, I don't own it haha) RnD department on the scrounge for some AA's to run my DMG Gameboy and told them why I wanted them. They very kindly gave me some retro fuel cells for the Gameboy and then a few days later one of the guys from there came over to my desk and gave me his old Gameboy Color! For Free!!! Woo! It's been sitting in his loft and when he saw I was interested in playing them he thought someone should play it and just bought it in. Man I was stoked! And green is my favourite colour so its even better! It came with Star Wars pod racing in it which I haven't tried and Brain Training for Nintendo DS (Which I have been using to get my maths skills better than the crappy Graphic Designer stage they are at now haha).

The Gameboy isn't in mint condition or anything, it's been played and Im more than happy with that. The screen is scratched slightly but you don't see them when the game is on. Oh and the battery cover was missing. I don't understand how so many Gameboys have no battery covers?! Do the clips break on them or do kids just not put them back on when changing the batteries and they disappear? Anyway, I dropped £3.99 on amazon and got a repro cover and its now complete. :-)

And I've started working my way through Zelda : Links Awakening. It's really good so far and I've just entered the second dungeon ; Bottle Grotto. I've got a lot of game to play but It's very much a game I can pick away at I think. Also Im very impressed with the screen on the Gameboy Color. I didn't think the viewing angles etc would be improved over the DMG but it really is a step up! It's a lot easier to see in normal daylight. When it gets dark etc the game gets switched into the backlight DMG ;-)

Oh also, I got this game with some of my birthday money and I've started the trek into Dark Souls 2 on PS3. I've heard that it is a solid game and I've not really been interested in it for years, but I watched a Giant Bomb quick look on Dark Souls 3 and they completely hooked me. It actually looked really fun and the style, graphics and gameplay looked really good! So I dropped £6 and picked it up. Well, It IS FOOKING SOLID!! haha. I've played a few hours of it and Im totally stuck already. Its not a hand holder at all which is really interesting and Im determined to get further, it has definatly hooked me!

I've looked up a tutorial and I was heading into an area I'm no way near strong enough to go through yet which has been why I've died, and died and died etc etc etc over and over again :-P

Oh and I also have Metal Gear Solid V : The Phantom Pain to play through. Im super into MGS and Im really looking forward to getting some play time in on it, I think Dark Souls 2 needs to be done first though...we'll see.

So I thought I would drop an update and I need to get more projects finished.

Hopefully I'll have some actual finished stuff to show soon.

*fingers crossed*

Porl''

PLAY IT LOUD!! BACKLIGHT + BI-VERT MOD

Hey, how’s it going? Hopefully well. :-)

A few posts ago I showed the Play it Loud! Gameboy I got locally for a real deal. Well I got round to backlighting and bi-verting my Gameboy so that I can play it in any light :-D

As an example, this is the original screen. You can see the title screen for Zelda : Links Awakening okay in this photo but you really struggle when your holding the Gameboy and its moving around in the light.

I was a little worried I must admit because I watched a few tutorials on doing the backlight mod and one of the main things everyone says is how easy it is to ruin the screen by prying the screen out too far and snapping / breaking the connections between it and the main board. I really wanted to do this mod though so I had to be brave, take my time and go for it.

I went to a really cool UK Gameboy mods site to order my backlight kit. Check them out here : http://www.gameboymods.co.uk/ Shaun who runs the site was really helpful with my questions and the backlight arrived super quick. I highly recommend getting your backlight from him!

When the backlight arrived I got started that night on the mod. I couldn’t wait haha. Here you can see front main board out and the really tricky back reflective sticker removed. I didn’t want to take any in progress photos as I did this, I just wanted to concentrate on getting it all out in one piece and not wrecking the screen. Its this process that can damage the screen. There are solder points under the glass that can easily be pried away from the solder pads if your not careful.

I didn’t end up photographing the light in place, I’m not sure know why but I connected the power and grounds up to the capacitor you see in the above photo. Its directly below the screen. Its a nice short location and keeps everything clean.

Here you can see the Gameboy back together and the light working!! Whoop whoop!! What you might notice is that the image is now inverted compared to the first non-backlit image. Once of the cool things you get with the back-light is a contrast sheet and if you turn it one way the image is normal and you rotate it and the image is inverted. Its important if your going to do the Bi-vert mod to have the sheet set to invert. When I add in the invert chip to the gameboy its going to re-invert the screen which will result in a really nicely contrasting screen image.

That was all I managed to do in the one night, and I must admit I was really happy I’d gotten that far with it as I really did take my time removing the reflective sticker.

I played the machine for about a week inverted until I got another chance to open it up and install the small 7404 Hex Inverter chip to switch the image back over.

This really was a simple mod to do and I followed the excellent guide on mmmonkey’s site : http://www.mmmonkey.co.uk/gameboy-dmg-01-screen-invert/ He always does great write ups and has really informative photos so you shouldn’t have any problems following them.

Here you can see my inverted back-lit Gameboy sitting on the tutorial I printed out. This is a reference of how it looks before for a late photo ;-)

There isn’t much to write about the process really, the guide is so good I just followed it and kept my wiring as neat as possible. The chip just wedges in the top of the case and it all closes up absolutely fine! Here you can see my wiring and the chip in place. Looks pretty neat I think!

And here it is all Bi-verted for comparison! Look at that backlit bi-verted contrasty goodness!! :D

And heres another one of the first level of MegaMan as it shows more depth in the screen image.

These two mods really have made my Gameboy way more useable in everyday life. I can see the screen in any situation now and I have it in my rucksack at all times for whenever Im having to wait for anything and I want a hit of retro gaming.

I really recommend trying this mod out if you feel brave enough or get someone to do it for you. It really does add loads of extra usable life to you Gameboy and looks top banana! I went for the green backlight just to keep the feel of the machine original. But I saw several Gameboys backlit with other colours and they all looked great! I was really Impressed with the light blue and the pink ones.

So yeah, go for it and have fun with your Gameboys!

Porl’’

PLAY IT LOUD!!!!!

Hey everyone,

Wow another post in the same week! This is fairly uncommon for me haha. Well I wasn't planning on putting up another post so soon but I managed to spot a bit of a deal, well I think it is anyway, on gumtree this week.

I've been playing some Legend of Zelda Link to the past advance on my DS when I've had a spare half an hour in the last few weeks. But I went to play it at the start of the week and I found out my game save had corrupted or the battery had burped on the cartridge and all of my game had gone! I was so far through the game too! I was a little distraught haha.

So It got me thinking that I wanted to start playing my Gameboy Legend of Zelda Links awakening now that my DS game has now reset.

Well if you've seen my older post about getting Links Awakening with Metroid 2 you'll have seen that I've been using a Gameboy Advance SP to play my Gameboy games. Well this is actually my sisters Gameboy that she's been lending to me so I could scratch that oldschool Gameboy itch. Its been playing on my mind to give her the SP back at some point and to actively look up a cheap original Gameboy. I never had a DMG, pocket or color when I was a kid. I had a Game Gear :-P But I've always wanted to have a Gameboy so I don't feel like I've missed out haha.

I did a random search on gumtree for a Gameboy in my local area on tuesday and one showed up! £20 for a Yellow Gameboy DMG Play it Loud! in a carry case with 6 games! And it was less than 3 miles from my work. After work that day I enquired about the quality of the Gameboy and if it was still available and next night I went round and picked it up.

I think this is a deal because the DMG's are generally £15-£20 on ebay on there own and I got 6 games and a Nintendo carry case that fits the gameboy perfectly for the £20.

And here it is! :D The games that came with it are : BC Kid (bonk), Super Mario Land, Super Mario Land 2 : 6 Golden coins (which I already had but with a damaged label),  Alleyway, Ms Pacman, and Foreman for Real.

They all fit in the carry case as well as the Gameboy so I can have my games really on the go now. Its pretty much going to live in my rucksac.

The Gameboy itself is in perfect condition as well! It's a pretty common yellow Play it Loud! version which I quite like the look of to be honest. I wasn't sure when I first saw the gumtree advert but in real life its pretty cool!

There are little to no scratches on the screen which is insane for its age! The sound is spot on, with no speaker crackle and it has its battery cover which I've seen is a little unusual. Everyone seem's to either lose or break the covers so they are missing.

There is a little wear on the start button text but that's it.

The screen display itself seems really good but I must admit Im a little disappointed with how hard it is to see the screen in most lights. You really have to angle it just right so you can see the game in a way that you can make out whats going on. Its quite similar to the Neo Geo Pocket Color except the NGPC is easier to see as its newer I guess.

Im really considering getting a backlight kit from a UK gameboy mods website and having a go at making it a lot easier to play. I'll have to watch some tutorials to see if its as hard / scary as I've heard.

Seen's I've finally gotten an original Gameboy I don't want to break it, especially seen's its such a good example of one.

I love a show on Youtube called The Game Chasers and I must admit I generally get a bit jealous with how many good deals they get in their shows. And finally I feel that I've managed to get one myself. :-)

The lesson of the day, check gumtree in your local area and if your lucky you may stumble across some really nice retro items. It never normally happens to me so it shows they are out there.

And with Revival Winter Warmer coming up in 2 weeks I think I'll be looking at the stalls to see if there are any classic Gameboy games I can snag for a good price.

Happy hunting!

Porl''

TICKING OFF SOME CHILDHOOD GAMES FROM THE LIST

Howdy,

When I was a young lad doing my paper round I would get Mean Machines, C&VG and Games Master magazines and would spend hours pouring over all the pages dreaming of playing all the awesome looking, now retro, games in there. Being a boy with a paper round I wouldn't make enough money to buy any of the new systems let alone get new games as they were so expensive. So in the back of my mind I've got a nostalgia games list that's constantly niggling away.

Well a little trip to one of Derby's retro game shops last month managed to satiate one of the little itches back there. I managed to spot a copy of Super Mario Land 2 : 6 Golden Coins with a damaged label for £3. I thought that was a really good price to finally get to play a portable mario game from back in the day. I would have loved it to be the first game but for that price I paid without a second thought :-P

A little trip to my sisters house on the way home to borrow her Game Boy Advance and I've been happily trying to get anywhere significant in this hard as rocks game!

I've been on and off playing The legend of Zelda : A link to the Past GBA on my DS Lite for a while now. Getting stuck, leaving it then coming back to it etc and with my Game Boy stint going I decided to look up some of the older Zelda games to add to the list to play once I beat it. If I ever beat it haha.

Well I heard that Link's Awakening on the Game Boy is a brilliant game in the brilliant line-up of Zelda games, so I looked up a copy cheap on ebay. I managed to snag this cart with a damaged label on the cheap which im really happy about. Now I know they aren't the nicest looking cartridges in the world but for the price I've paid im getting so much game and that's what Im after. The playing of the game, especially seen's my shelf space is getting woefully small at the moment.

And yes I know the DS Lite is an awful pink colour!! :-P It is the cheapest price DS Lite you can generally get and I don't go playing it in public haha. It does the job and works an absolute treat :-P

And the last game, I've heard so many good things about the Metroid games and how brilliant they are so I looked up some on the Game Boy and managed to get Metroid 2 : The Return of Samus nice and cheap too from ebay, cart only. This one has a nice intact label though ;-) Again I hear that the Metroid games are hard as nails and I've never ever played any of them, oh other than Metroid Prime! I loved that on the Game Cube but that is a world away from the original side scrollers.

So yeah, I wanted to update the blog, sorry its not a WWF Superstars update. Im still working through DIY jobs at home (Slabbing and building steps) at the moment but when I get the next bit of Retro DIY time Im going to get back onto the sound issue.

But for now I'll be living the Game Boy dream and heading back to the 90's :-)

Porl''