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Dolphin-emu and GBA Link

Discussion in 'Games' started by Daerandin, Jul 24, 2021.

  1. Daerandin

    Daerandin Well-Known Member

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    Recently I've been playing The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker emulated with Dolphin-emu. It's not the first time I've done it, but this time I decided to check if it was possible to experience the full game.

    On the Nintendo GameCube, you could actually connect a GameBoy Advance into a controller port, and have some additional features in the game. The Wind Waker is a game that makes use of this, but I have never had the chance to try it out. When I had a GC many many years ago, I didn't have a GBA. It turns out that the dolphin-emulator actually lets you do this linking!

    In dolphin-emu I had to set the second controller to "GBA", and then just launch the game.

    Then I start up VBA-m (the visualboyadvance-m) emulator, which emulates GB, GBC, and GBA. Set it to launch with a GBA BIOS file, which you need to have. And then there is a link option in the emulator settings, and just have it link to localhost (127.0.0.1), and launch the bios file.

    I could suddenly access all the additional content! Not that it was much, but it still was so satisfying to be able to make full use of all the in-game features.

    I never knew that these emulators could do this before now, so for me this was a huge discovery, and a game changer!
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  2. booman

    booman Grand High Exalted Mystic Emperor of Linux Gaming Staff Member

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    Geesh these emulators have gotten really good!
    I've played a few for Playstation and Nintendo 64, but I have to admit, there isn't a lot of games I like from those systems.

    I used to have a Playstation back in college and found myself watching movies and listening to CDs more than playing games.
    Its years later when I found there are tens of thousands PC games out there and growing... I was hooked on PC
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  3. Daerandin

    Daerandin Well-Known Member

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    I've also always been a PC gamer, ever since I was a kid. But I do have a great fondness for the Legend of Zelda series, which are the only games I use the emulators for. I use emulators for N64 and GC primarily. I even played the Zelda Wii game (Skywards Sword), even got myself a Wii controller which worked perfectly with the dolphin-emu. But I did not enjoy the motion controls at all.

    Thankfully, Skywards Sword just got a Switch rerelease, which has the motion controls as optional, so I might get it for the switch just to play it normally. I might enjoy it a lot more then.

    I also had a PS1 back in 1996/97, I think. But I don't really find myself missing any of those games. I was 12/13 in those days.
  4. booman

    booman Grand High Exalted Mystic Emperor of Linux Gaming Staff Member

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    Yeah, I have never played the Zelda games... EVER! That is probably why... I've never given a cent to Nintendo or a cent to iTunes Mac. Not really against them or their services, just have been a Google, Android & PC gaming guy. I'm happy with the environment and services I currently use.

    There are a few games I've watched the cutscene movies which look pretty good.

    Like these games:
    • Uncharted
    • God of War
    • Ratchet and Clank

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