1998 · Nintendo · Japan · handheld
Nintendo Game Boy Color
The Game Boy in colour, still able to play a decade of monochrome classics.
Mixed Trivial to run ▶ Watch on YouTube ↗
Nintendo's 1998 colour Game Boy — the same beloved handheld with a colour screen and a faster processor, and, crucially, able to play the entire monochrome back catalogue. It bridged the gap to the Advance and sold enormously.
Its best games rivalled home consoles: Capcom's linked Zelda Oracle pair, Pokémon Gold and Silver, and Wario Land 3.
Under the hood
- CPU
- Sharp LR35902 (Z80/8080 hybrid) @ 8.38 MHz in colour mode
- Sound chip
- 4-channel PSG — 2 pulse, 1 4-bit wavetable, 1 noise
- Graphics
- 160 × 144 reflective colour LCD — up to 56 colours on screen from 32,768
What it cost
a rounding error against a month’s pay in 1998 · about $154 today
| US launch list price ($79.99) |
$79.99 (1998)
Featured full backward compatibility and colorization of original Game Boy carts. |
|---|---|
| Typical street price | — No verified mass-market street price recorded yet. |
| Units sold | 118,690,000 Included in 118.69M combined Game Boy family total. |
Why it mattered
The Color extended the Game Boy's decade-long reign and, by staying backward-compatible, kept one of history's largest libraries alive while bridging to the Advance.
Emulating it today
| Emulators | SameBoy, Gambatte, mGBA |
|---|---|
| Setup effort | Trivial to run (0.5 on this site's scale) |
| Controls | A standard modern controller covers the ordinary controls, though unusual accessories may need custom mapping. |
| Runs on a handheld | Yes |
The emulator names above are starting points, not a promise that every title or accessory behaves identically. Computer platforms usually add model selection, disk handling and keyboard setup even when CPU emulation itself is mature.
Game Boy Color Boot ROM (gbc_bios.bin)
SameBoy and Gambatte contain built-in high-level emulation that boots all GBC games automatically. Supplying the official 2,048-byte gbc_bios.bin enables the original rainbow Nintendo logo boot sequence and authentic palette assignment for monochrome Game Boy games.
How many files you need: 1. One optional 2 KB file: gbc_bios.bin.
Where it stands legally: Open-source emulators include clean-room boot code. The original Nintendo GBC boot ROM is copyrighted.
Firmware details checked 2026-08. Emulator requirements change — see Libretro — SameBoy core documentation for the current list.
Where the software is
Preservation catalogues describe verified dumps; they do not grant permission to download commercial software. A curated, correctly matched set is easier to use than an undifferentiated archive.
Copyright: Commercial software remains copyrighted unless its owner explicitly released or relicensed it. Homebrew, public-domain programs and current reissues should be treated separately from abandoned commercial titles.
This site names preservation projects and explains what they are. It does not link to ROM downloads.
Where to start
- The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons / Oracle of Ages 2001 action adventure
Two linked games built by Capcom under Nintendo's eye.
- Pokémon Crystal 2000 RPG
The polished third version of Gold and Silver, colour throughout.
- Wario Land 3 2000 platformer
- Metal Gear: Ghost Babel 2000 stealth
- Dragon Warrior III 2001 RPG
- Shantae 2002 platformer
A late, gorgeous release that now sells for a small fortune on cartridge.
The verdict
Essential. Colour classics like the Zelda Oracle games and Pokémon Gold and Silver, and it plays the mono library too.
Only a handful of its games demand the Color specifically — otherwise it and the original Game Boy overlap heavily.
- Worth it if
- Players curious about nintendo handhelds and willing to learn how the original machine worked.
- Not for
- Anyone who wants a large, instantly accessible library and no model, firmware or control decisions.
Scored 3/5 for fun today and 3/5 for historical importance. Those two scores decide the label at the top — a machine can matter enormously and still be no fun.
Read more & watch
This page is 50% complete against the facts we try to record for every system. Gaps are shown as gaps.