GBA and DS linked games

[Galron]

So the answer to this question is probably 'no'.

But does Everdrive GBA work with the cross-linked GBA games DS?

The few games where if you stuck in a GBA cart the DS game would detect it and give you extra features in the DS game? One of the early DS Castlevania games had that feature and it would unlock some extra items in the game.

Then of course Boktai games and Lunar Knights would link up (but this was only to add 'solar support' features, so would be irrelevant to discussion of flashcarts that lack solar technology).

http://nintendo.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Nintendo_DS_games_with_GBA_connectivity

Does the GBA Everdrive let you set up a way for the DS games to detect the GBA game through the everdrive?

If not, are there any other flash drive options that might allow for the cross-linking?



On a related note if you have Everdrive GB, and load up Zelda Oracle games on a GBA will the game detect the GBA to load up the Advance Shops?

[Shadow666]

So the answer to this question is probably 'no'.

But does Everdrive GBA work with the cross-linked GBA games DS?

The few games where if you stuck in a GBA cart the DS game would detect it and give you extra features in the DS game? One of the early DS Castlevania games had that feature and it would unlock some extra items in the game.

Then of course Boktai games and Lunar Knights would link up.

Does the GBA Everdrive let you set up a way for the DS games to detect the GBA game through the everdrive?

If not, are there any other flash drive options that might allow for the cross-linking?



On a related note if you have Everdrive GB, and load up Zelda Oracle games on a GBA will the game detect the GBA to load up the Advance Shops?

"NO" and there is no flashcart that will work u will need the real things to do this

[Galron]

So not even the Ez 3in1 expansion pack, that has the option load a single game into "NOR" to mimic a single game cartridge?

Has anyone tested that out?

Or is do 'linked' games have something special with their cartridges that DS game detects (chips? Contact layouts?)? How does this "connectivity" work? I am asking this out of interest in the technology, for anyone who might know?.

Also, how did the connectivity work for the Oracle games and GBA?

[Localhorst86]

So not even the Ez 3in1 expansion pack, that has the option load a single game into "NOR" to mimic a single game cartridge?

Has anyone tested that out?

no, but i can try. I have a an ezflash 3in1, ezflash IV, supercard mini and an F2A at my disposal.

i'd assume at least the F2A to be able to do this, all the other ones probably have issues.

how can i check the connectivity works, what do i have to look out for?

EDIT:

I just tried with boktai. I whipped out lunar nights and my original bokati cartridge and checked what happend. in the options menu of lunar nights there was a new option called "solar sensor" so i knew what to look out for. I then flashed the rom (properly patched for each flashcart, just to be sure) to the NOR flash of the EZflash IV, Ezflash 3in1 and Flash2Advance. The supercard does not have a NOR so i left it at that. Here are the results (in the order i tried it):

1. Ezflash IV: option does not show up
2. Ezflash 3in1: option DOES show up
3. Supercard Mini: option does not show up
4. Flash2Advance 128M: option DOES show up

so in conclusion, the option would not show up on the two cards that have an SD Slot and a built in menu system to load different games. Whereas it would show up with both cartridges that are "storage only". So i guess the NDS identifies the GBA game via its header, the 3in1 and F2A will identify as the games flashed, whereas the EZIV and SC would boot into their menu first and therefore have a different header at boot. By this conclusion the EDGBA would not work either as the header would be different, but maybe krikzz would be able to have the header of the EDGBA to be set to whatever we want.

note that I was not able to test how the F2A would behave with a multi-ROM menu because my card is only a 128M model and therefore can only hold one of the Boktai games.

I was also not able to test how the pokemon games would behave so i do not know if you can tranfer pokemon from the F2A or 3in1 to the DS generations. This might fail since both cards use SRAM instead of FLASH or Eeprom or whatever the Pokemon games were using so i am not sure if the DS games would be able to see the savegame on the SRAM.

[Galron]

Local, excellent research and review! Thank you for the help!

This may be a reason for me to pick up a secondary card (Ezflash 3in1, or FlashAdvance 128) but assume its only going to be useful for something like Castlevania, or the 'bonus unlock' type uses (Rub Rabbits, etc) for costumes, and extra images, maybe for Advance Wars unlocks in the DS game as well.  I'd probably be better off with the EzFlash 3in1 since it also doubles as a rumble pack for DS games that handle rumble (although I doubt it would work with Drill Dozer or Warioware Twisted or any other GBA games that have rumble features?). I think there is some software to get the EzFlash 3in1 to work with the DsTwo+ flashcard.

It would be interesting to see further research, and how it reacts with the Pokémon link-ups as you mentioned. However, I'm not much into Pokémon, so probably no big deal to me.

Edit:
And Shadow666 has proven he knows absolutely nothing on this subject....

[Localhorst86]

Local, excellent research and review! Thank you for the help!

This may be a reason for me to pick up a secondary card (Ezflash 3in1, or FlashAdvance 128) but assume its only going to be useful for something like Castlevania, or the 'bonus unlock' type uses (Rub Rabbits, etc) for costumes, and extra images, maybe for Advance Wars unlocks in the DS game as well.  I'd probably be better off with the EzFlash 3in1 since it also doubles as a rumble pack for DS games that handle rumble (although I doubt it would work with Drill Dozer or Warioware Twisted or any other GBA games that have rumble features?). I think there is some software to get the EzFlash 3in1 to work with the DsTwo+ flashcard.

It would be interesting to see further research, and how it reacts with the Pokémon link-ups as you mentioned. However, I'm not much into Pokémon, so probably no big deal to me.

A FlashAdvance or Flash2Advance is rather hard to find these days and the linker software for PC will only work on XP (allthough I managed to get it working in a virtual XP machine on my Windows 10 rig). The 3in1 seems to be easier to find, plus it sits flush in a DSlite.

I did further research on the pokemon games and just as I expected the generation IV games is looking for the savegame information in the FLASH. Since none of my GBA Cards has flash storage, Pokemon Diamond refuses to see the pokemon savegame (out of the box). There is, however, a tool that allows you to patch the DS Pokemon games to look in the SRAM section of the GBA cart, which I got to work with my 3in1 and F2A as the patches are specific to the slot-2 flashcard used. I was not able to get it to work properly with the EZFlash IV even though the pokepatcher tool said it would be compatible, I got the option to show up but it would tell me the save data was corrupted.

Depending on how the EDGBA works with its savegame storage the DS games *might* be able to work ootb or *might* be patchable with pokepatcher

So the final results seem to be this:

if a DS Game is simply checking for the game in the slot it most likely simply checks the Header of the GBA Games. Flashcards that do not use a menu will work for this, flashcards with a menu will not work. Maybe patching the DS Roms to check for the EDGBA Header instead might be feasible.

if a DS Game accesses the savedata of the GBA Game it will check in the storage option that the GBA Game would originally use. If this is not available on the card (i.e. flashcard and presumably bootleg games) it won't work either. Patching the DS Games to look in SRAM instead is possible, might be incompatible with the EDGBA, though.

[Galron]

Thanks Local.

Another question, concerning the 3in1...

How is the rumble on it compared to official rumble pack? I have the original "phat" GBA cart-style Rumble Pak which works really well, although its a bit loud at times.

Then I have an off brand DSlite version, but it's extremely weak, you can barely feel it (so its pretty much a waste).

It looks a bit like this one:
http://i.ebayimg.com/00/s/ODAwWDgwMA==/z/AmgAAOSwLVZVitAH/$_1.JPG

I understand the official Nintendo short DS lite version never made it western world (other than imports, so its pretty rare)? So I don't know where that compares to the off brand version of the DSlite rumble.

As for 3in1 I think there is both phat and a dslite version. You have the DSlite version? In your opinion how is the rumble?

[Localhorst86]

i cant really say anything about the rumble because i cant get to to work on my R4i SDHC at all. You need to patch the DS roms to be able to use the 3in1 as rumble and for some reason that never worked for me.

[Galron]

Ahh Local I was reading you need to use something called a GBA Exploder?

I wonder what the steps would be for my DSTWO Plus.

[Localhorst86]

gba exploader is a nds software that allows you to flash a gba game onto the NOR of the 3in1. simply place your gba roms on the micro sd of the dstwo, run exploader.nds and select which rom to flash.

the 3in1 apparently was initially designed to go along with the EZflash V, you wouldn't need a special tool or patches to use the GBA function and rumble support. but that card is hard to find. i found one two years ago, ordered it and it arrived in a non working state. when i reclaimed at the shop they said "sorry, were sold out" and sent me an Ezflash IV for the GBA instead.

[Galron]

I've read many of the ez flash  cards can arrive DOA but apparently it's not hard to change the battery. I've found plenty of sites that have the lite model.

Anpparently another flash card that has NOR was m3 perfect but that is near impossible to find.

Adding NOR might be a handy feature to have in X7 model if Krikzz ever starts thinking of new feature to add. I could only dream for support for rumble, solar feature and game link abilities for DS including Pokémon games..

[brianvgplayer]

Everdrive GB uses flash memory. Shantae boots in GBA mode and games with SGB features work on SGB. I heard GBA features for the Zelda Oracle games work too.

[Galron]

Thank! Good to know.

[Galron]

Local, excellent research and review! Thank you for the help!

This may be a reason for me to pick up a secondary card (Ezflash 3in1, or FlashAdvance 128) but assume its only going to be useful for something like Castlevania, or the 'bonus unlock' type uses (Rub Rabbits, etc) for costumes, and extra images, maybe for Advance Wars unlocks in the DS game as well.  I'd probably be better off with the EzFlash 3in1 since it also doubles as a rumble pack for DS games that handle rumble (although I doubt it would work with Drill Dozer or Warioware Twisted or any other GBA games that have rumble features?). I think there is some software to get the EzFlash 3in1 to work with the DsTwo+ flashcard.

It would be interesting to see further research, and how it reacts with the Pokémon link-ups as you mentioned. However, I'm not much into Pokémon, so probably no big deal to me.

A FlashAdvance or Flash2Advance is rather hard to find these days and the linker software for PC will only work on XP (allthough I managed to get it working in a virtual XP machine on my Windows 10 rig). The 3in1 seems to be easier to find, plus it sits flush in a DSlite.

I did further research on the pokemon games and just as I expected the generation IV games is looking for the savegame information in the FLASH. Since none of my GBA Cards has flash storage, Pokemon Diamond refuses to see the pokemon savegame (out of the box). There is, however, a tool that allows you to patch the DS Pokemon games to look in the SRAM section of the GBA cart, which I got to work with my 3in1 and F2A as the patches are specific to the slot-2 flashcard used. I was not able to get it to work properly with the EZFlash IV even though the pokepatcher tool said it would be compatible, I got the option to show up but it would tell me the save data was corrupted.

Depending on how the EDGBA works with its savegame storage the DS games *might* be able to work ootb or *might* be patchable with pokepatcher

So the final results seem to be this:

if a DS Game is simply checking for the game in the slot it most likely simply checks the Header of the GBA Games. Flashcards that do not use a menu will work for this, flashcards with a menu will not work. Maybe patching the DS Roms to check for the EDGBA Header instead might be feasible.

if a DS Game accesses the savedata of the GBA Game it will check in the storage option that the GBA Game would originally use. If this is not available on the card (i.e. flashcard and presumably bootleg games) it won't work either. Patching the DS Games to look in SRAM instead is possible, might be incompatible with the EDGBA, though.

Well, after several years I think I finally found a Ezflash 3-in-1 on ebay. The DS Lite version. Reasonable price, I ordered it and hopes it functions with most of the DS/GBA link games. At least the ones that uses 'headers' and NOR.


BTW is this the Flash2Advance?


https://www.ebay.com/itm/Flash-Card-128-M-for-GameBoy-Advance-ONLY-Advance-Wars-2-plus/292467821743?hash=item441870ccaf:g:hOEAAOSwX6RcK~21:sc:USPSFirstClass!73045!US!-1

[Marteicos]

Not a single Mention of the M3 Perfect. It could do some things but for Pokemon you need the real card and cart.

For games that only need to detect the gba game to unlock things on DS game, the M3 could boot in nds mode from slot 2, load the gba game into ram then launch the DS game from sd card dma.