In today’s episode, we’re building Pico-GB, a 3d printed GameBoy emulator handheld gaming console for Raspberry Pi Pico that ressembles to the original Nintendo Game Boy released in 1989.
This homemade Game Boy emulator is a fun and creative way to bring back old games on the beloved classic Game Boy console. With just a few basic components and a little bit of tinkering and programming you can build your own handheld gaming console capable of playing original Game Boy titles.
All you need is a Raspberry Pi Pico, an ILI9225 LCD display, an SD card and a couple of micro-push buttons to get started!! With a few hours and some basic soldering skills, you can build yourself a beautiful handheld Game Boy emulator to play all your favorite classic games. So, if you’re feeling nostalgic for some good old fashion Game Boy gaming then building a homemade emulator handheld is a great and inexpensive way to do just that!
Pico-GB is based on the $4 Raspberry Pi Pico microcontroller. The shell and buttons are 3D printed. The screen is a 2.2-inch LCD with a resolution of 220×176 pixels and 65K colors. There are 8 buttons: 4 for the DPAD + 4 action buttons (A, B, select, start). The buttons are 6x6x6mm micro push buttons.
The Game Boy emulator used by Pico-GB is Peanut-GB by Mahyar Koshkouei /deltabeard (github.com/deltabeard/Peanut-GB) with some changes done by me to support sound and accommodate SD card menu/save games on Raspberry Pi Pico (github.com/YouMakeTech/Pico-GB)
Peanut-GB has been specially optimized to run at full speed on low specs computers or microcontrollers. It runs at 60 frames per second on the Pico, at the expense of some emulation accuracy. It can play most of the 1000+ original Game Boy DMG games!
More information, materiel needed, assembly instructions, circuit diagrams, firmware, 3d printed parts etc. can be found on www.youmaketech.com/pico-gb-gameboy-emulator-handheld-for-raspberry-pi-pico/
Music: Rich in the 80s - DivKid - TH-cam Audio Library