Song Of Morus – Gala Of Battle is a new homebrew title for the Game Boy that incorporates Game Boy Printer functionality.
The Retro Room published title is described as a “Hong Kong themed boss-rush shooting game” featuring nine bosses with their own attack patterns, artwork and music.
The solo developer behind Song Of Morus, SunnyChowTheGuy, shared a video on Twitter of the Game Boy Printer in action as it printed one of the twelve available bookmarks from the game. The video gives a sneak peek of the printing process which includes artwork from the anime-inspired title.
I spoke with SunnyChowTheGuy about the printer functionality for Song Of Morus – Gala Of Battle. “The idea came to me after finalizing an agreement with my publisher the Retro Room Games. Since there will be a physical cartridge, I felt the need for a gimmick that would engage players with the real device. One of the ideas was to allow players print something as a certificate”.
SunnyChowTheGuy explained to me how the Game Boy’s technical limitation required them to get creative with how Gala Of Battle managed printing. “Game Boy itself has a technical limitation as it can only handle 256 unique tiles for a print command. I discovered that as long as the player doesn’t press the printer’s feed button, the device can seamlessly print the next image. So, I divided the bookmark into several sections and tricked my Game Boy into only printing one section at a time”.
The Game Boy Printer functionality for Song Of Morus is limited to the physical edition of the game. Players can choose between a Complete Box edition which features a Game Boy style box, cartridge, and instruction manual; or opt for the cheaper cartridge-only edition.
Song Of Morus – Gala Of Battle is available to pre-order now via the Retro Room Games website and is compatible with NTSC, PAL, and Japanese Game Boys.
The Pocket Printer
Nintendo launched the Game Boy Printer in 1998 as an accessory that worked with every version of the legendary Game Boy apart from the Game Boy Micro.
Originally intended to partner with the Game Boy Camera, it allowed gamers to print out their favourite snaps using the Game Boy Printer’s inbuilt thermal printing technology to print images on the proprietary 38mm wide paper.
The add-on, also known as the ‘Pocket Printer’ in Japan, also supported printing images from certain Game Boy and Game Boy Colour games with titles such as Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2, Pokémon Dark, and Donkey Kong Country all supporting the device.
Nintendo ultimately ceased production of the Game Boy Printer in 2003, although the company continued to sell rolls of printer paper from the official e-Shop until 2007.
