GBA:Flash Cart Compatibility
Premise
Unlike the wild variety of NES cartridges or the more modest selection of (licensed) GB releases, the vast majority of GBA games has no expansion hardware beyond a save chip; the ROM chip is nonstandard but its peculiarities are the same for all of these standard GBA titles. Even where there are some additional gimmicks, they usually don't affect the common hardware.
These characteristics imply that, once a sufficiently accurate imitation of one is made, most others will also be adaptable: this is one among the many reasons for the fast boom of the GBA emulation scene, as well of the generally wide compatibility of flashcards. This page will now focus on the exceptions.
Whenever a patch is mentioned, Advanscene.com is often a good place to search for one (as is the following link:)
Originally wrote by Tom White (FAST6191 of GBATemp.net).
ROM size
All but the earliest cards, as well as emulators on low-memory platforms, support 16 MB (128 megabit) titles, which covers a large percentage of the library.
Support for 32 MB titles is relatively less common, though still widespread especially on modern hardware. 32 MB titles include a lot of fluff and re-releases but also a few famous releases:
2 Disney Games - Disney Sports Skateboarding + Football (Europe) 2 Games in 1 - Sonic Battle + ChuChu Rocket! (Europe) 2 Games in 1 - Sonic Battle + Sonic Advance (Europe) 2 Games in 1 - Sonic Pinball Party + Sonic Battle (Europe) 2 Games in 1 - Spider-Man + Spider-Man 2 (Europe) 2 in 1 - Pferd & Pony - Mein Pferdehof + Lass Uns Reiten 2 (Germany) 2 in 1 GamePack - Spider-Man + Spider-Man 2 (USA) 4 Games on One Game Pak - GT Advance - GT Advance 2 - GT Advance 3 - Moto GP (USA) 4 Games on One Game Pak - Nickelodeon (USA) Arthur and the Minimoys (Europe) Bleach Advance (Japan) Cinnamon - Yume no Daibouken (Japan) Cinnamon Fuwafuwa Daisakusen (Japan) Crash & Spyro - Super Pack Volume 3 (Europe) Crash & Spyro Superpack - Ripto's Rampage + The Cortex Conspiracy (USA) Crash Superpack - N-Tranced + Nitro Kart (USA) Crayon Shin chan - Densetsu wo Yobu Omake no Miyako Shockgaan (Japan) Double Game - Cartoon Network Block Party + Speedway (Europe) Double Pack - Sonic Battle + Sonic Advance Plus (Japan) Double Pack - Sonic Pinball Party + Sonic Battle (Japan) Fire Emblem - The Sacred Stones (Europe) GBA Video - All Grown Up - Volume 1 (USA) GBA Video - Cartoon Network Collection - Edition Platinum (France) GBA Video - Cartoon Network Collection - Edition Premium (France) GBA Video - Cartoon Network Collection - Edition Speciale (France) GBA Video - Cartoon Network Collection - Limited Edition (USA) GBA Video - Cartoon Network Collection - Platinum Edition (USA) GBA Video - Cartoon Network Collection - Premium Edition (USA) GBA Video - Cartoon Network Collection - Special Edition (USA) GBA Video - Cartoon Network Collection - Volume 1 (USA) GBA Video - Cartoon Network Collection - Volume 2 (USA) GBA Video - Codename Kids Next Door - Volume 1 (USA) GBA Video - Disney Channel Collection - Volume 1 (USA) GBA Video - Dora the Explorer - Volume 1 (USA) GBA Video - Dragon Ball GT - Volume 1 (USA) GBA Video - Nicktoon's Collection - Volume 1 (USA) GBA Video - Nicktoons Collection - Volume 2 (USA) GBA Video - Nicktoons Volume 3 (USA) GBA Video - Pokemon - Volume 1 (USA) GBA Video - Pokemon - Volume 2 (USA) GBA Video - Pokemon - Volume 3 (USA) GBA Video - Pokemon - Volume 4 (USA) GBA Video - Sonic X - Volume 1 (USA) GBA Video - SpongeBob SquarePants - Volume 1 (USA) GBA Video - SpongeBob SquarePants - Volume 1 (USA) GBA Video - SpongeBob SquarePants - Volume 2 (USA) GBA Video - SpongeBob SquarePants - Volume 3 (USA) GBA Video - Strawberry Shortcake - Volume 1 (USA) GBA Video - Super Robot Monkey Team - Volume 1 (USA) GBA Video - Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - Volume 1 (USA) GBA Video - The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron Boy Genius - Volume 1 (USA) GBA Video - The Fairly Odd Parents - Volume 1 (USA) GBA Video - The Fairly Odd Parents - Volume 2 (USA) GBA Video - The Proud Family - Volume 1 (USA) GBA Video - Turtles le Demenagement (France) GBA Video - Yu-Gi-Oh! - Yugi vs. Joey - Volume 1 (USA) GBA Video - Yu-Gi-Oh! Yugi vs. Joey (France) Happy Feet (Europe) Happy Feet (USA) Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (USA) Harry Potter Collection (Europe) Horse & Pony - Let`s Ride 2 (Europe) Kingdom Hearts - Chain of Memories (Europe) Kingdom Hearts - Chain of Memories (Japan) Kingdom Hearts - Chain of Memories (USA) Kouchu Ouja - Mushi King (Japan) Lizzie McGuire 2 - Lizzie Diaries - Special Edition (USA) Maya The Bee - Sweet Gold (Europe) Mermaid Melody - Pichi Pichi Picchi Pichi Pichitto Live Start (Japan) Minna no Ouji-sama (Japan) Mother 3 (Japan) My Animal Centre in Africa (Europe) Ochainuken Kururin (Japan) Pferd & Pony - Mein Pferdehof (Europe) Pokemon Fushigi no Dungeon - Aka no Kyuujotai (Japan) Pokemon Mystery Dungeon - Red Rescue Team (Europe) Pokemon Mystery Dungeon - Red Rescue Team (USA) Riviera - The Promised Land (USA) Robots (Japan) Shamu's Deep Sea Adventures (Europe) Shamu's Deep Sea Adventures (USA) Steel Empire (Europe) Strawberry Shortcake - Summertime Adventure - Special Edition (USA) Summon Night Craft Sword Monogatari - Hajimari no Ishi (Japan) Tennis no Ouji-sama 2004 - Glorious Gold (Japan) Tennis no Ouji-sama 2004 - Stylish Silver (Japan) The Legend of Spyro - The Eternal Night (Europe) The Legend of Spyro - The Eternal Night (USA) The Sims 2 (USA) The Sims 2 - Pets (Europe) The Sims 2 - Pets (USA) The Urbz - Sims in the City (Japan) The Urbz - Sims in the City (USA) Vecinos Invasores (Spain) Wagamama - Fairy Milmo de Pon! DokiDoki Memorial (Japan) Yggdra Union (Japan) Yggdra Union - We'll Never Fight Alone (Europe) Yggdra Union - We'll Never Fight Alone (USA) Yu-Gi-Oh! Double Pack (Europe) Yu-Gi-Oh! Double Pack (USA)+ Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters Expert 2006 (Japan) Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters Gx - Mezase Duel King! (Japan) Yu-Gi-Oh! GX - Duel Academy (Europe) Yu-Gi-Oh! GX - Duel Academy (USA) Yu-Gi-Oh! Ultimate Masters 2006 (Europe) Yu-Gi-Oh! Ultimate Masters 2006 (USA)
A handful of feature-length GBA Video titles actually exceed 32 MB, the maximum ROM size in the GBA architecture. They use a dedicated mapper which is currently only supported by the EZ-Flash Omega Definitive Edition.
Antipiracy
The GBA may have no effective copy protection but individual titles might.
For no particular reason, this includes the NES Classics series, Top Gun Combat Zones, and many Dragon Ball titles. Most of these have patches (cracks) available.
Gimmicks
Accessories not emulated on some/all flashcards, in which case a patch may or may not be required.
Real time clock
- Pokemon Ruby/Sapphire - use No-Intro GBATA
- Pokemon Emerald - [1]
- Megaman Battle Network 4.5 Real Operation - included in the fan translation, with or without a translation
- Boktai - Already has in-game time setting
- Polarium Advance and Tony Hawk - no RTC features contrary to rumors
Tilt/Gyro
- Yoshi's Universal Gravitation / Topsy-Turvy - Advanscene
- Koro Koro Puzzle Happy Panechu! - Advanscene
- WarioWare Twisted - Advanscene
Smart toys
- Cyber Drive Zoids - already functional without removable accessory
- Bouken Yuuki Pluster [aka PlaStar] World series - Advanscene
- Legendz series - nonexistent
Solar sensor
- Boktai - [2]
Rumble
- Drill Dozer - Supported out of the box by the two flashcards with vibration on the market.
- All other games with rumble only support the fundamentally incompatible GB Player vibration system, but these (and others) tend to have appropriate patches on romhacking.net.
Blood glucose meter
- Glucoboy - nonexistent
Save types
Most traditional flashcards only support SRAM, and came with dedicated automated patching software, else No-Intro GBATA may work for the purpose.
Newer flashcards do the patching on their own (or require no patching at any stage) and should be fed clean ROMs.
Some modern bootlegs use a single flash chip for both ROM and save ("Card2" in 3DS terms). Conversion to this format is a matter of tedious manual labor.
For historical reasons, the English version of Pokemon Emerald received a patch to allow its proper (limited) operation on 64 kB (1 Mb) flash memory: [3] Otherwise, it is a bad idea to run a Flash 128k title on Flash 64k storage (and will in fact be obstructed by many games) due to address wraparound - just like those fake USB drives with inflated capacity.