Author Topic: Reprogramming gameboy colour cartridges.  (Read 6346 times)

Offline Max_Kreeger

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Reprogramming gameboy colour cartridges.
« on: March 20, 2013, 02:45:57 AM »
Hey guys,

I was wondering...IS there a way to reprogram a gameboy colour cartridge with another game?

Thank you in advance.


EDIT:
Never mind, some hard research paid off. For future reference though if anyone else comes across the same problem.

To build the programmer:
Manual: http://www.reinerziegler.de/GB-Flasher/gbcflsh_manual.pdf
Schematics: http://www.reinerziegler.de/GB-Flasher/schem+pcb/GB%20Cart%20Flasher%20%28USB%29.pdf

Components needed:

R1:   27R
R2:   27R
R3:   1k5
R4:   470R
R5:   330R
R6:   330R


C1:   100u
C2:   100n
C3:   100n
C4:   100n
C5:   100n
C6:   33n
C7:   27p
C8:   27p
   
L1:   ~10uH
   
X1:   6Mhz

   
D1:   Green
D2:   Red
   
IC1:   FTDI FT232BM
IC2:   ATMEGA 8515

Now because all commercial cartridges are ROM, you will have to replace the chip with a flashable one (29F032B)
Guide: http://www.reinerziegler.de/download/MBC5_Cart.pdf

Software: http://www.reinerziegler.de/readplus.htm#GB_Flasher

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« Last Edit: March 21, 2013, 11:54:53 AM by Rodent »

Offline Epic Lavalamp

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Re: Reprogramming gameboy colour cartridges.
« Reply #1 on: March 21, 2013, 12:14:12 PM »
Nice post, I've always liked gbc mods/custom roms the best. I was wondering though, after your researching for the flasher, did you find out how big a game could possibly be?

I've always wanted to make a massive pokemon game that spanned through much more than just 2 regions like gsc did, but I've never been sure whether it was even possible or not. I've messed around with making ruby rom hacks before, but If a gbc could run a cartridge with huge amounts of data then I would probably start learning how to make gbc pokemon rom hacks.

Any light on the subject would be appreciated, thanks.

Offline FOOKz™

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Re: Reprogramming gameboy colour cartridges.
« Reply #2 on: March 21, 2013, 09:54:45 PM »
Dude thats pretty sick. I thought that game cartridges are not re-programmable? Read only memory?

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Offline Max_Kreeger

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Re: Reprogramming gameboy colour cartridges.
« Reply #3 on: March 22, 2013, 03:02:05 AM »
Dude thats pretty sick. I thought that game cartridges are not re-programmable? Read only memory?

Correct, thats why if you look up, there will be a guide on how to replace the ROM chip with a flashable one.

Nice post, I've always liked gbc mods/custom roms the best. I was wondering though, after your researching for the flasher, did you find out how big a game could possibly be?



I've always wanted to make a massive pokemon game that spanned through much more than just 2 regions like gsc did, but I've never been sure whether it was even possible or not. I've messed around with making ruby rom hacks before, but If a gbc could run a cartridge with huge amounts of data then I would probably start learning how to make gbc pokemon rom hacks.

Any light on the subject would be appreciated, thanks.

If you read the guide on how to make a programmable cartridge you will see he used a previous Zelda game which has 32K of RAM. The author states with that much RAM you can pretty much program any game onto it. Heres a list on which cartridges contain what RAM and Chips:

http://www.reinerziegler.de/gbcmbc.txt


As you can see, its a complete :censored: to do especially if you want to tinker with custom ROM's on a larger scale. This is where I'd like the R&D team to step in and make clean flashable cartridges instead of having to play lottery every time you buy one from a garage sale hoping it has the right RAM size etc inside.
« Last Edit: March 22, 2013, 08:08:03 AM by Max_Kreeger »

Offline Epic Lavalamp

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Re: Reprogramming gameboy colour cartridges.
« Reply #4 on: March 22, 2013, 11:24:28 AM »
If you read the guide on how to make a programmable cartridge you will see he used a previous Zelda game which has 32K of RAM. The author states with that much RAM you can pretty much program any game onto it. Heres a list on which cartridges contain what RAM and Chips:

http://www.reinerziegler.de/gbcmbc.txt


As you can see, its a complete :censored: to do especially if you want to tinker with custom ROM's on a larger scale. This is where I'd like the R&D team to step in and make clean flashable cartridges instead of having to play lottery every time you buy one from a garage sale hoping it has the right RAM size etc inside.

Oh wow, alright. That's awesome, thanks for the info man

 

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