True GameBoy Advance 3D

[iPadCary]

Since the GBA is, practically speaking, a compact SNES, I was wondering if it also shared
that 2nd greatest console of all time's property of
being able to generate 3D flatshade polygons, alá the SuperFX chipset.

Are there [i]any 3D flatshade polygonal games out there for GBA that may've escaped my notice?

Thanks, guys!

[Tanooki]

Star-X I believe woulld be what youre looking for.

[Satoshi_Matrix]

It's my understanding that the GBA doesn't actually have any ability to render 3D visuals, and that every 3D effect on the system is pseudo effects using mode 7-ish scaling and bitmap forced perspective techniques. See games like Stuntman and Asterix & Obelix XXL for prime examples.

However, this shouldn't take away from the GBA's accomplishments. In fact I feel its the other way around - some developers were able to push 3D-like visuals out of a system incapable of 3D. It's pretty impressive in my book.

[Tanooki]

Satoshi you're basically right. I think the best way I've ever put it to someone in the past was that the GBA as far as 3D games go is a handheld Sega Saturn. Neither system has actual dedicated 3D video capabilities, both have to have a software engine drive the visuals. As such, both systems also have the same failings in displaying polygons with textures on them. A fantastic comparison really is Sega Rally Saturn vs V-Rally 3 GBA. Both of them fairly well look similar, both display polygons the same way in the same style of game. Both titles also for polygons at the fringe of the screen at their largest(think road) will warp and warble the effect while in the farther background stuff just pops in and out after a range as it is all it can handle. Asterix I suppose would be comparable to something like Croc on the Saturn for the same display qualities of a third person platformer.

[BlastProcessing402]

Satoshi you're basically right. I think the best way I've ever put it to someone in the past was that the GBA as far as 3D games go is a handheld Sega Saturn. Neither system has actual dedicated 3D video capabilities, both have to have a software engine drive the visuals.

I thought Saturn's problem wasn't that it completely lacked dedicated 3D, but rather that it used quads for polygons instead of triangles like most every other 3D system.

Also that the machine had been designed for 2D and had 3D tacked on late in the process surely didn't help, but I don't believe it was completely absent.

[Tanooki]

Maybe but that's how I had it explained to me long ago which is why it was a master of the 2D titles (Capcom arcade and all) but also at the same time when it had stuff cross ported over from PS1 it took much longer having to redo basically a lot of stuff as it wasn't an easy pop'n drop like PS1 to other system ports were compared. As I understood it before the Saturn wasn't able to generate a 3D polygon on the fly like the PS1 did, but it did do them, but it had to do it by brute force muscling it over the larger mass of independent processors the system had and the higher levels of video memory to use. And due to that it was a hell of a lot harder to get equal performance in 3D off a Saturn game versus the PS1, plus it couldn't do much for special effects the PS1 could handle such as transparency (which is why a game like SOTN/NITM) had to dither effects. So while at base the Saturn could do higher resolutions than the PS1, they had to dumb it down to the minimum to via software and multi-processor muscle inch out similar effects. The Saturn had to run 8 processors to pull off kind of what the PS1 could do on the Saturns best day which was sad. Supposedly late in development when they learned how the PS1 was made and Ridge Racer was a flagship they threw a 2nd main CPU on there, same one, causing BUS issues along with more video chips causing bottleneck so some developers didn't even use the 2nd main chip. It really doesn't surprise me why Saturn emulation has been historically really slow, a hot mess, and few will touch it versus how the PS1 emulation just flowed out there due to the much more simple design, same with N64 more or less.

I really loved the Saturn, had one around 2000-2004 when I had to part with a lot of stuff in a depressing time of money woes, but I wouldn't get one again, same can be said of PS1 to be fair and I enjoyed the Saturn more. :P

[wiggyx]

I recall it being extremely difficult to program 3D games for the Saturn because of its chipset and how those chips communicated with each other. I could be wrong though.

[davidbrit2]

Super Monkey Ball Jr. was an extremely impressive arcade port. Give that one a try.

[Jorpho]

How about Iridion 2?
http://www.hardcoregaming101.net/iridion2/iridion2.htm

Perhaps Star Wars: Flight of the Falcon? Or Crazy Taxi GBA? (Neither is very good, but they're both sort of 3D.)

[Satoshi_Matrix]

^ pseudo 3D.

Every single time. There are no 3D games on GBA, only games that simulate it to varying degrees of success. Other examples are any of the FPS games like Duke Nukem Advance or as mentioned, the third person platformer Asterix & Obelix XXL.

[AbnormalMapping]

There are true 3d games on the GBA, handled through software, and fully textured to boot. Wing Commander IV and Smashing Drive are two of the better ones, because space and a straight ahead road don't really tax the processor. Mostly though, you'll want to stick to hybrids. Max Payne, for example, features a 3d character in a 2d space - honestly, I prefer the GBA version for the overhead view and old school gameplay.

The textures will distort in many 3d games, for the same reason you can see it happen in many early PSone titles. As for the Saturn, it did run on quads instead of 3 sided polygons, and properly programmed, the system could even run Virtua Fighter 2 in high definition while the PSOne and the N64 struggled to run games in standard CRT resolution at the time.

[Jorpho]

^ pseudo 3D. How, exactly, can you tell?

Compare Simpsons Road Rage GBA with Crazy Taxi GBA. Are those really both using the same kind of 3D?

[Satoshi_Matrix]

How, exactly, can you tell?

Compare Simpsons Road Rage GBA with Crazy Taxi GBA. Are those really both using the same kind of 3D?

It's simple: The GameBoy Advance does not have hardware capabilities to render true 3D visuals. Any 3D-ish games that was done on the GBA are the result of 2D forced perspective trickery and bitmap scaling.

Crazy Taxi for GBA consists of sprites populating a bitmap space with flat textured walls. What looks like 3D visuals are in fact flat vertical textured planes that are at all times perpendicular to the horizontal plane where the sprites move. This effect was used extensively on the GameBoy Advance for FPS games, as it works very similar to the Doom Engine that powered Doom on Jaguar, and subsequently, also on GameBoy Advance.

As I mentioned before, the crowning achievement of psudo-3D on the GBA is Asterix & Obelix XXL. It really shows how programming wizards could get around the limitations, and given how similar the hardware is in many respects, what could possibly be done on the SNES through homebrew.

[Jorpho]

It's simple: The GameBoy Advance does not have hardware capabilities to render true 3D visuals.Yes, but why can't it be done in software?


Crazy Taxi for GBA consists of sprites populating a bitmap space with flat textured walls. What looks like 3D visuals are in fact flat vertical textured planes that are at all times perpendicular to the horizontal plane where the sprites move.What about when the sprites aren't moving in a horizontal plane, like at 1:40 in https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HoNrBbAphMY&feature=player_detailpage#t=98 ?

[Satoshi_Matrix]

3D visuals can be done in software I suppose, if a proper engine was written that relied on incredibly basic polygons that required very little animation. But that never was the case on the GBA. The development time, costs and cartridge size limitations all kept that from happening.

As for the Crazy Taxi GBA game, I own it so I know all about the things that it does. Are you talking about when you collect the coins, how they fly up? Well surely that isn't surprising, all its doing is moving a 2D sprite upwards in the same plane as the car sprite. Not sure what you're getting at.

[Leo_A]

This isn't true 3D? Things like trackside trees are sprites, but the environment itself sure looks composed of polygons to me.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_nKES9j-g44


Since the GBA is, practically speaking, a compact SNES, I was wondering if it also shared
that 2nd greatest console of all time's [Intellivision, of course, being #1] property of
being able to generate 3D flatshade polygons, alá the SuperFX chipset.

The GBA was able to do all the special effects in the Yoshi's Island port that Nintendo had originally used the Super FX chip for back on the Super Nintendo.

[Satoshi_Matrix]

V-Rally 3 is a Velez & Dubail game, and no, it's not true 3D.

See their other GBA games:

Driv3r
Stuntman
Asterix & Obelix XXL


Their GBA engine was among the best on the GBA, bar none, but play any of their games and see what happens when sprites interact with the environment in ways not anticipated through normal gameplay, like rotating the fixed camera to any perspective other than dead on.

and its' not just on the GBA. If you go back a few years, the same team pumped out some crazy impressive racers on the GameBoy Color, like Test Drive Le Mans, V-Rally '99 and Wacky Racers. The only difference with their GBA efforts is that they hardware is more advanced. It's still not actual 3D proper visuals.

And that's the whole point - it doesn't have to be. The very fact that people think that they accomplished 3D visuals is what is so amazing, given that the GBA had no capability for that!

[Leo_A]

Looks like it fooled a lot of reviewers in the mainstream press as well. Take this excerpt from IGN's review of Stuntman.

"Stuntman is definitely another one of those showpiece Game Boy Advance titles thanks to an incredible 3D engine that mixes texture-mapped polys and sprite-based objects."

Or this from GameStop's review of V-Rally 3.

"V-Rally 3 looks amazing. All the tracks are rendered in fully textured 3D. The polygons are prelit, and while the textures aren't of the highest resolution and have a tendency to swim when viewed up close, the effect is still really beautiful to behold. The use of sprite-based elements for the cars, backgrounds, and scenery fits in well with the 3D presentation, making for some great-looking tracks. "

How does it work?

[davidbrit2]

It's simple: The GameBoy Advance does not have hardware capabilities to render true 3D visuals. Any 3D-ish games that was done on the GBA are the result of 2D forced perspective trickery and bitmap scaling.

Whether or not the rendering is hardware-accelerated doesn't have anything to do with it. I wouldn't consider the original Quake for PC to be pseudo-3D. If you're simulating proper 3D geometries and spatial relations, then that's good enough. In contrast, I would label games that use raster-based tricks to draw a road surface without attempting to model realistic spatial relationships to be pseudo-3D. See: Outrun, Pole Position, etc.

[SuperEliteGamer]

What about tat Top Gear Rally game?(or w/e it was called)

[Jorpho]

As for the Crazy Taxi GBA game, I own it so I know all about the things that it does. Are you talking about when you collect the coins, how they fly up? Well surely that isn't surprising, all its doing is moving a 2D sprite upwards in the same plane as the car sprite. Not sure what you're getting at.I mean when the car goes up and down hills.

[davidbrit2]

What about tat Top Gear Rally game?(or w/e it was called)

That one looks like it's doing some raster-trick pseudo-3D. A good test with a racing game is if you can turn around backwards. Very few pseudo-3D racing engines will be built to handle that (and a few true 3D engines won't allow it for gameplay reasons, like Outrun 2). Either way, that was a great game.

[Tanooki]

Leo he's wrong in this case, the V3D engine and then the Blue Roses engine Wing Commander Prophecy uses are software driven true 3D polygonal engines that in part due to the low level parts the GBA had would use some sprites (trees and stuff in V-Rally 3) to add more to the environment. Wing Commander was more advanced than the V3D engine and that one and it can be read up on at the developers website:
http://www.raylightgames.com/games/wing-commander%E2%84%A2-prophecy-gba/

Their current blue roses doc is gone from the GBA era but the internet wayback machine has it!
http://web.archive.org/web/20020809115431/http://www.raylight.it/bluerosesdoc.htm

Actual Features (v 0.2.0)

- Thousands of polygons in a single scene
- More than 3000 polygons per second with a 60% of screen coverage.
(Note this performance are computed in an average situation of playing,
- also considering input, AI and the needed processes for a game!)
- Motion capture animation
- Affine texture mapping
- Camera animation
- Skeletal animation
- Skinned characters
- Linear key interpolation for smooth animation
- Morphing support
- Scalable engine for either internal rooms and wide open space
- LOD
- Hierarchial hidden polygons/object remover to reduce overdraw.
- Colorkey polygons
- Glows, Lens FX, Coronas
- Particle systems
- Texture animation support
- All mapping method supported: planar, sphere, face, cylindrical, unwrap, box, tiling, mirroring…
- Multicamera with dynamic FOV
- Automatic maps arrangement in "texture memory" to optimize pipeline rendering
- Possibility to mix 2d and 3d together having 3d polygonal scene with custom 3d sprite technologies already used in our current projects

- Full PC preview using BlueRoses PC technology.
- All that you see as preview on pc you'll see on AGB


Future features:
- Fog table
- Lighting support
- Transparency

[Leo_A]

Thanks, I was pretty sure what I was seeing such as in V-Rally 3 was a texture coated polygonal environment that was populated with 2D sprites.

[j_factor]

There's a lot of weird statements being made in this thread. Any game with realtime-generated polygons defined in 3D space is "real"/"true" 3D. There is no such thing as "fake" or "pseudo" 3D unless you are talking about prerendered stuff.

Virtually any system all the way down to the Commodore 64 and probably earlier can do 3D games. Perhaps not very well, but it can be done. The hardware does not need any particular capabilities. There is no such thing as a system that "doesn't actually have any ability to render 3D visuals" except for very old or very unusual hardware. "3D hardware" is (somewhat arguably) a thing, but it's absolutely not required. There was a period of about 3 years in PC games where most 3D games supported, but did not require, a 3D accelerator card. Tomb Raider looks better with hardware rendering on, but the engine and graphics aren't fundamentally different between the two modes. Switching it to software rendering doesn't transform it into "fake" 3D. Going earlier you have plenty of games on the PC that didn't support 3D cards at all (either they didn't exist yet or they were brand new) and nonetheless are "real" 3D. Earlier than that you have games like F22 Interceptor (Genesis), Hunter (Amiga), and Geograph Seal (X68000), all of which are "true" 3D, albeit quite primitive visually. The GBA is significantly more capable than the Genesis, Amiga, or X68000 at 3D graphics, as it has a more powerful CPU.

[Jorpho]

Wikipedia has a pretty informative article on "pseudo 3D", actually.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2.5D

[Satoshi_Matrix]

right.

copypasta:

The reason for using pseudo-3D instead of "real" 3D computer graphics is that the system that has to simulate a three dimensional looking graphic is not powerful enough to handle the calculation intensive routines of 3D computer graphics, yet is capable of using tricks of modifying 2D graphics like bitmaps. One of these tricks is to stretch a bitmap more and more, therefore making it larger with each step, as to give the effect of an object coming closer and closer towards the player.

Even simple shading and size of an image could be considered pseudo-3D, as shading makes it look more realistic. If the light in a 2D game were 2D, it would only be visible on the outline, and because outlines are often dark, they would not be very clearly visible. However, any visible shading would indicate the usage of pseudo-3D lighting and that the image uses pseudo-3D graphics. Changing the size of an image can cause the image to appear to be moving closer or further away, which could be considered simulating a third dimension.

Dimensions are the variables of the data and can be mapped to specific locations in space; 2D data can be given 3D volume by adding a value to the x, y, or z plane. "Assigning height to 2D regions of a topographic map" associating every 2D location with a height/elevation value creates a 2.5D projection; this is not considered a "true 3D representation", however is used like 3D visual representation to "simplify visual processing of imagery and the resulting spatial cognition".

[iPadCary]

Thanks for the input, guys!
I always looked at the GameBoy Advance as a handheld Amiga,
so I was wondering if Amiga 3D legends, like "Starglider 2", were available for it.

As per your suggestions, I'm gonna try
"Star Wars: Flight Of The Falcon", "Wing Commander: Prophecy" & "StuntMan".

"James Bond 007: Nightfire" looks pretty interesting, too, albeit in a "Doom" kinda way.

Anyhow, thanks again!

[Tanooki]

Not a bad selection but I'd suggest really getting V-Rally unless you're not into that type of racing as it's a really fantastic game, and if you don't mind an import the Asterix title is pretty solid as well.

[Satoshi_Matrix]

As per your suggestions, I'm gonna try
"Star Wars: Flight Of The Falcon", "Wing Commander: Prophecy" & "StuntMan"


Yikes. Star Wars Flight of the Falcon and Wing Commander Prophecy are awful GBA games that beg to be seen just for their graphical feats, but not actually played. Don't waste your money on them. Emulate them if you must play those, and you'll see why I'm warning you.

On the other hand as far as 3D-ish games on GBA go look for these:

Duke Nukem Advance
James Bond 007 Nightfire
Stuntman
V-Rally 3
Driv3r
Asterix & Obelix XXL
Iridion II

[Leo_A]

I enjoyed Wind Commander Prophecy on the GBA.

[Manhattan Sports Club]

Sonic battle is another good example:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAuCO3CA9DQ

[Steve W]

I always looked at the GameBoy Advance as a handheld Amiga


That would be the Atari Lynx, considering that both machines were designed by the same guys. And it had true 3D polygonal games like Warbirds and Steel Talons. True, they didn't exactly move too fast (Steel Talons has a framerate like drying paint) but it was capable of 3D without hardware designed for it.

I still think Star-X was in flat polygonal 3D for the GBA. The footage looks like low-rez Amiga AGA stuff.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZPB4FNoUS0

[Tanooki]

Duke Nukem 3D is a DOOM like non3D FPS, and Iridion 2 is just well drawn and renderedto look 3D but it isnt.

Wind Commander Prophecy is excellent on the GBA ignore the hate on that. The only rough part really on that are the lame text based cut scenes between levels. The game flies well, shoots well, and looks and sounds great, hell even has a few audio comms chat bits in space. I will admit turning is slightly less than silky smooth but its nothing rotten like WC on the SNES was making aiming a bitch as you can fly fine. I finished it more than once, you can go back to redo stages, and if you suck at it as it isnt totally easy there are unlockable codes to be invincible and stage select. its a super cheap game and a real stand outworth having if you like wing commander type games.


Also there is another 3D game not mentioned yet, easy to miss though, and its not too bad... KillSwitch.

[Jorpho]

That would be the Atari Lynx, considering that both machines were designed by the same guys.Wasn't the Lynx made by entirely different people at Epyx?

[ccovell]

Wasn't the Lynx made by entirely different people at Epyx?

Atari 2600 -> Atari 800 -> Amiga -> Lynx -> 3D0 ->

All these had one or more hardware designers in common (Jay Miner, Dave Needle, etc.)

[iPadCary]

That would be the Atari Lynx, considering that both machines were designed by the same guys.


Right, right.
The great RJ Mical & Co.

What I mean is the GameBoy Advance sort of reminded me,
in terms of capability, of a handheld AMIGA.

[davidbrit2]

Right, right.
The great RJ Mical & Co.

What I mean is the GameBoy Advance sort of reminded me,
in terms of capability, of a handheld AMIGA.

If you mean a handheld Amiga with a shit sound chip, then I could buy that.

[j_factor]

right.

copypasta:

The reason for using pseudo-3D instead of "real" 3D computer graphics is that the system that has to simulate a three dimensional looking graphic is not powerful enough to handle the calculation intensive routines of 3D computer graphics, yet is capable of using tricks of modifying 2D graphics like bitmaps. One of these tricks is to stretch a bitmap more and more, therefore making it larger with each step, as to give the effect of an object coming closer and closer towards the player.

Even simple shading and size of an image could be considered pseudo-3D, as shading makes it look more realistic. If the light in a 2D game were 2D, it would only be visible on the outline, and because outlines are often dark, they would not be very clearly visible. However, any visible shading would indicate the usage of pseudo-3D lighting and that the image uses pseudo-3D graphics. Changing the size of an image can cause the image to appear to be moving closer or further away, which could be considered simulating a third dimension.

Dimensions are the variables of the data and can be mapped to specific locations in space; 2D data can be given 3D volume by adding a value to the x, y, or z plane. "Assigning height to 2D regions of a topographic map" associating every 2D location with a height/elevation value creates a 2.5D projection; this is not considered a "true 3D representation", however is used like 3D visual representation to "simplify visual processing of imagery and the resulting spatial cognition".

Yes, but the GBA is more than powerful enough to handle 3D computer graphics. If the original Amiga can -- and it did many times -- then certainly the GBA can. People often forget this because of all the SNES ports, but the GBA uses a 32-bit ARM CPU. It's in the same family as, and similar in power to, the 3DO's -- much more powerful than the 68000 based computers. Really, any 32-bit CPU can handle floating-point arithmetic, and therefore should be fine for at least basic 3D stuff.

Also you keep saying bitmaps, but I don't think that's the case. From what I understand, the GBA's bitmap modes are very slow, and therefore almost all games use the other (tilemap) modes.

[Neb6]

There's a lot of weird statements being made in this thread. Any game with realtime-generated polygons defined in 3D space is "real"/"true" 3D. There is no such thing as "fake" or "pseudo" 3D unless you are talking about prerendered stuff.

Virtually any system all the way down to the Commodore 64 and probably earlier can do 3D games. Perhaps not very well, but it can be done. The hardware does not need any particular capabilities. There is no such thing as a system that "doesn't actually have any ability to render 3D visuals" except for very old or very unusual hardware. "3D hardware" is (somewhat arguably) a thing, but it's absolutely not required. There was a period of about 3 years in PC games where most 3D games supported, but did not require, a 3D accelerator card. Tomb Raider looks better with hardware rendering on, but the engine and graphics aren't fundamentally different between the two modes. Switching it to software rendering doesn't transform it into "fake" 3D. Going earlier you have plenty of games on the PC that didn't support 3D cards at all (either they didn't exist yet or they were brand new) and nonetheless are "real" 3D. Earlier than that you have games like F22 Interceptor (Genesis), Hunter (Amiga), and Geograph Seal (X68000), all of which are "true" 3D, albeit quite primitive visually. The GBA is significantly more capable than the Genesis, Amiga, or X68000 at 3D graphics, as it has a more powerful CPU.

Wow! That's exactly what I was going to write.

Anyway, this is a great summary. Anyone who doubts this info can feel free to research the demo scene. :)

[Tanooki]

Shit sound chip, try no sound chip. GBA's audio came off the ARM chip inside and could toss some of it to the old z80 they included so GB/C stuff would work too. GBA actually could sound incredible when people gave enough chip time to it and bothered to use clean audio samples, but often it would take a back seat in some respect and it would be low khz and get scratchy.

[Jorpho]

Shit sound chip, try no sound chip. GBA's audio came off the ARM chip inside and could toss some of it to the old z80 they included so GB/C stuff would work too.Eh? The GBA Micro and DS/DS Lite didn't include a Z80, did they?

[Satoshi_Matrix]

He's talking about sound effects. The GBA often used Z80 8-bit sound effects, especially in RPGs like Golden Sun and Pokemon.

That's why those games don't sound right on the GB Micro, DS or Super Retro Advance.

[Tanooki]

Yup that's what I was getting at, just didn't put more into it. Final Fight and Chu Chu Rocket I think did it too, never looked into it to be sure but they have a few effects played during music that sound like they're right from a GBC game.

[davidbrit2]

I could have sworn the DS/GB Micro still had the Z80 (or something compatible), but couldn't run GB/GBC games because they don't support running the system at the higher voltages (5V?) needed for GB/GBC games. I could be wrong, though. I'll have to pop Castlevania HoD into my DS Lite and see what it sounds like, because I know that game uses Z80 music almost exclusively. In fact it got a lot of shit for it too back when it came out because the music is so weak.

Incidentally, the voltage difference is also one big reason that GB/GBC games can't link with GBA games, as I understand it.

[Satoshi_Matrix]

Huh. well I'll be.

According to wikipedia:

Even though [the GameBoy Micro] still has the required Z80 processor and graphics hardware necessary to run the old games, it is missing other circuitry necessary to be compatible with the old Game Boy cartridges.

I'd love to read a more detailed explanation. I had always thought that the GameBoy Micro did NOT have the Z80 and therefore could not render GameBoy games except by using the Goomba Color emulator.

[davidbrit2]

I know the different operating voltages (GB/GBC = 5V, GBA = 3.3V) play into it heavily, but I don't know if there was other auxiliary hardware that was removed from the DS and GB Micro.

[SuperEliteGamer]

That would be the Atari Lynx, considering that both machines were designed by the same guys. And it had true 3D polygonal games like Warbirds and Steel Talons. True, they didn't exactly move too fast (Steel Talons has a framerate like drying paint) but it was capable of 3D without hardware designed for it.

I still think Star-X was in flat polygonal 3D for the GBA. The footage looks like low-rez Amiga AGA stuff.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZPB4FNoUS0

"true 3D polygonal games"
Lolwut?

[Leo_A]

I've played many GBA games on my backlit SP, Game Boy Player, and both backwards compatible DS models.

I never noticed any audio irregularities on the DS line with GBA software.

[wiggyx]

I know the different operating voltages (GB/GBC = 5V, GBA = 3.3V) play into it heavily, but I don't know if there was other auxiliary hardware that was removed from the DS and GB Micro.

I believe Nintendo didn't feel that GB/GBC BC was relevant at that point. At some point it simply isn't worth it to retain that functionality.

[Tanooki]

I know the internal slot is slightly different for the form factor of GBA games where the backplate has that little groove on both sides. I know it can't be that simple of a thing stopping the GB/C stuff from working, but has anyone stripped one and stuffed a game into a micro jack where it isn't blocked just to test it and see what happens?

[Satoshi_Matrix]

I don't think that was the case, since the GBA SP 2.0 with the backlit screen that was released a year after the GameBoy Micro retains full GB/GBC compatibility.

I was under the impression that the GameBoy Micro was just so super small that they couldn't have fit the components in such a tight space, especially considering that those original carts would be almost the size of the whole system.

[davidbrit2]

Yeah, they probably had to strip some components to get the Micro down to that size. For the DS, it probably would have just been more trouble integrating GBC compatibility than it was worth.