How to play Gameboy games on your computer

 First of all i should point out that playing gameboy games on your computer is not strictly legal. It involves downloading pirated games off the Internet, therefore it is breaking the law. However, If you can push the legality of this aside, playing Gameboy advance or Gameboy games on your computer is fairly easy, although it does involve downloading a few bits of software, which are, by the way, completely virus free. This guide will show you how to download and play games, the easiest way possible.

An emulator is basically computer talk for a games console. Any type of emulator can be downloaded off the internet, but to play Gameboy advance or Gamboy games you will need a piece of software called the Visual Boy Advance. This is your console, the equivalent of a Gameboy advance. You can download this, completely virus free off http://www.emulator-zone.com/doc.php/gba/vboyadvance.html. I would recommend you make a new file called emulator, or gameboy or something to save it into so it is easier to access in the future. There are other emulators for the Gameboy Advance but this is the most popular choice.

A Gameboy isn't a Gameboy without games, right? Well to play games, you will need to download roms, which is just a fancy word for games. Roms are downloaded individually, and you can get pretty much any game you want off http://www.doperoms.com/ . Then just type in a game that you want in the search bar at the top of page, for example, Pokemon Emerald, and download it. When downloading it, save it to the same file I told you to save your emulator to, so you don't lose your games. Also note that Gameboy and Gameboy advance games can both be played on Visual Boy Advance. DopeRoms is completely virus free, but remember, it's not legal, so if you're all anti-piracy, don't download anything.

 So you've got your gameboy, and you've got your games, but how do you play them? Well first of all you will need to load up your Visual Boy Advance from that file I told you to make earlier. Then go to File>open games and open your game from the same file. Your Gameboy/Gameboy advance game should load up automatically.

And there you go! Now you can play any gameboy game on your computer, whenever you want, for free! I hope this helped, if you have any queries, please comment below, and ask, you don't even have to be a member of HubPages to do so.

1.  To save your game, press ctrl+s, or File>save game
2. To alter controls, go to Edit>Joypad>1...
3. To record gameplay, press 'start AVI recording'. Recordings can be loaded into almost any video editing software, or directly to youtube.
4. Remember: Gameboy colour games can also be played on Visual Boy advance.