On the last April 1st, the web was covered in April Fools' jokes. Unlike other years, bad taste seems to have lost ground in 2015, and some very interesting ideas appeared, such as playing Pac-Man on the streets in Google Maps. Another project that started as a joke was the Smart Boy, an adapter to play original Game Boy titles on an iPhone 6 Plus. Well... the joke is over, and the accessory is already in development.
The appeal of retro gaming
To tell the truth, this is no surprise. Someone builds an arcade machine from scratch, and their gallery goes viral. Another person manages to emulate an old system on a modern console, and users rush to install that mod. Put a Raspberry Pi inside an old console and access hundreds of games? A matter of a couple of dollars and some software. The retro wave is gaining more and more ground for a simple reason: the market has lost its compass. 2015 had to burn three months before a Game of the Year candidate emerged (Bloodborne), which is also tied to the PlayStation 4. What follows in popularity? Axiom Verge, a hybrid between the original Metroid and the Contra, which manages to summon several of the spirits we knew in classic 2D action platformers. On March 31, a company named Hyperkin published an April Fools' joke: Smart Boy, an accessory to play Game Boy classics on an iPhone 6 Plus. Guess what happened…?
From joke to confirmed accessory
It turns out the joke was barely a "half joke," and the other half consisted of market research. Hyperkin's plan was to use April Fools' Day as a starting point to measure real interest in the Smart Boy. Hyperkin is no stranger to bringing old systems back. Its RetroN 5 platform can read cartridges from at least five different consoles, and its reception has been relatively positive, despite the price. The next day, Hyperkin reposted the Smart Boy image with a "Confirmed" at the top, indicating the accessory was in development. We know absolutely nothing about the technical side, but it's clear we'll need original Game Boy and/or Game Boy Color cartridges, and there are plans to bring Smart Boy to other smartphones.
The road ahead
The first question on our minds is what Apple will think of it. Its rejection of emulators on iOS devices is well documented, and we figure the Smart Boy will need to come with an app. The second question is how Nintendo will react. The Japanese giant can be brutal when defending its intellectual property (for example, a programmer recreated the first level of Super Mario 64 in Unity and almost got a missile fired at him), and although the Smart Boy requires original games, the whole idea of emulation and alternative systems sits very badly with companies. Don't get me wrong: I want the Smart Boy to succeed, but it would be absurd to ignore the hard road ahead.
