Using FPGAs to Add VGA and HDMI to the Original Game Boy

Everyone is nostalgic for their old Game Boy, and now that many of us have the engineering skills to do cool things with electronics, many projects have been popping up to outfit this cornerstone gaming console with a myriad of peripherals and functionalities.

One of the most predominate functionalities to target on the Game Boy is to get image data out of the CPU. And while there have been several proof-of-concept projects focused on logic sniffing the protocol from the CPU controlling the LCD, Fabien Marteau's projects caught my attention because it is one of the few actually developed VGA and HDMI interfaces for the original Game Boy.

The VGA interface is based on the thumb-sized Efinix Trion T8 development board, the FireAnt, and implements the passive VGA adapter 666 for Raspberry-Pi B+. The basis of the design reads the LCD data protocol coming out of the CPU on the pin headers sticking out of the plastic case of the Game Boy and converts it to VGA protocol frame by frame.

The HDMI interface project also reads the LCD data protocol coming out of the CPU on the pin headers sticking out of the plastic case of the Game Boy frame by frame, then feeds them into a Tang Nano 4K FPGA development board.

Each FPGA takes the image frames from the Game Boy and draws them out onto an external monitor even using the same four shades of green that the original Game Boy utilized. The final interesting aspect of these projects is that they aren't done yet. Fabien is planning to create a docking station for his old Game Boy similar to those made for Nintendo Switches which I think it's safe to say that all of us are looking forward to.