I can remember seeing a reel by a guy called magaccio_16bit on Instagram showing what it might look like if we had Netflix running on a Game Boy Color. It was just a cartridge with a loading screen, but it got me wondering if it would be possible to actually stream shows to such old tech and whether it could be something that caught on. The Sega Game Gear had the TV Tuner accessory, so maybe it could be done with the likes of YouTube?
If anyone was going to bring this idea to life, it was going to be Throaty Mumbo. If you've been keeping up to date with your retro news, then you'll know that he recently got Windows running on an N64 cartridge and original N64, so if anyone could pull it off, it was going to be him.
As always, Throaty has made a detailed video about the whole process, this one being an hour long with lots of information to soak up about his creative process. I love how he's summarised the whole thing on GitHub as just needing 'a microcontroller, a cartridge breakout board, and a bunch of other crap soldered together to make this nightmare a reality,' however!
So, how do you get a video of a capybara onto a GBC? The GBCTube cart allows you to pick a video by using your Game Boy, and then a host PC pulls the video and streams it onto your handheld in real time to a microcontroller that's pretending to be a ROM. Yes, if you're scratching your head now, then you're not alone. Essentially, everything you see is being automatically fetched from YouTube and pushed to your GBC.
I mean, it's not technically a self-contained YouTube solution, but it does the job. Like the Orange FM GBC radio cart, the GBCTube cartridge pushes what's possibly from a little handheld with a 160x144 screen. It's very impressive that the cart plays the video soundtrack too - a lot is happening within that little cartridge, demultiplexing the audio from the video stream and clocking it to an I2S amplifier. Don't worry if this is all a little alien to you - you can find out more from Throaty Mumbo's GitHub and follow the steps he's implemented there!
I love projects like this; it wasn't too long ago that I reviewed a copy of GBS Windows, and I recently reported on Windows NT running on a GameCube. The Retro Gaming community continues to answer niche questions and 'what ifs', and that's why I love what I do. Pushing the boundaries of retro media keeps life interesting, and I'm looking forward to seeing what crazy concoctions and ingenious inventions Throaty Mumbo and other creators come up with next!
