emulator: Gearboy
type: libretro
core_classification: community_fork
source: "https://github.com/libretro/Gearboy"
upstream: "https://github.com/drhelius/Gearboy"
profiled_date: "2026-03-21"
core_version: "3.4.1"
display_name: "Nintendo - Game Boy / Color (Gearboy)"
cores:
  - gearboy
systems:
  - nintendo-gb
  - nintendo-gbc

notes: |
  Gearboy is a Game Boy / Game Boy Color emulator by drhelius (Nacho Sanchez).

  The upstream standalone has bootrom support (dmg_boot.bin, cgb_boot.bin)
  via emu_load_bootrom_dmg/gbc (platforms/desktop-shared/emu.cpp:407-422).
  The libretro port does NOT load any BIOS files — retro_init() only stores
  system_dir, retro_load_game() calls LoadROMFromBuffer() with no bootrom
  loading code (platforms/libretro/libretro.cpp:94-109, 335-364).

  The .info declares firmware_count=2 (dmg_boot.bin, cgb_boot.bin) but the
  code never references these files. .info is wrong for the libretro port.

  The core HLE-skips the boot animation — games work without BIOS.

files: []

exclusion_note: "The .info declares dmg_boot.bin and cgb_boot.bin but the libretro port never loads them (no bootrom loading code in libretro.cpp). The upstream standalone supports bootroms but this was not ported to libretro."