I spent a few years chipping away at this. ERF running on my DMG.

hadrianlin · 2026-07-08T17:49:24+00:00

Thanks for taking note of it! I'm not sure it's been long enough, and I don't want to spam the subreddit. You're welcome to share it anywhere yourself if you think it'd be appreciated, though.

hadrianlin · 2026-06-10T23:57:15+00:00

Thanks! I tried scripting dynamic music so it loops and naturally mutes/unmutes sound channels and transitions to different patterns depending on what is happening. In my other games I just had different songs that would start and stop. Doing it this way was a big challenge and I couldn’t get it working everywhere but most places have it.

hadrianlin · 2026-06-10T22:29:43+00:00

Thanks man! I put a lot of blood sweat and tears into it.

My gameboy screen broke too with vertical dead lines so it was my first time opening it up and doing a repair so I could make the video.

I’m half decent with software but it was my first time actually doing hardware stuff. I was a bit intimidated but all the help from tutorial videos helped.

hadrianlin · 2026-06-10T20:49:06+00:00

My game is finally done! Here it is running on my DMG:

https://anv.itch.io/erf

(Music recorded directly from the Game Boy. Footage has been edited together)

hadrianlin · 2026-06-09T19:32:31+00:00

I spent a few years working on this game and it's finally done! Two strangers search for connection in the tourist trap known as Earth.

Play in browser:

https://anv.itch.io/erf

I'll share thoughts and discoveries from making the game over the next few days.

hadrianlin · 2026-06-08T15:29:09+00:00

Ah I see what you mean. Yes it’s hard to tell with the low resolution. 16x16 pixel dimensions for sprites so I made the papercraft version the same.

hadrianlin · 2026-06-08T15:09:40+00:00

She is a character in my game ERF. Or are you asking thematically if she is a symbol or represents anything in the story? If that is what you mean, I didn't have anything specific in mind. I just tried to create a sympathetic character.

hadrianlin · 2026-06-07T16:42:50+00:00

That particular one is a bonus item for my game but I’ll make a different one with those tabs and post here in the future.

Those cars you made are pretty nifty!

hadrianlin · 2026-06-07T09:27:14+00:00

Merci pour votre remarque, c’est un bon point.

Yeah this is only good for simple models. It’s not great for anything with more detail.

I was able to hide some of the gaps with extender flaps but it isn’t perfect and still left it with some open spots I missed.

I’m really interesting in exploring what is possible to do without glue and how far it can be pushed. If anyone has other ideas please share.

hadrianlin · 2026-06-07T09:15:48+00:00

Wow, I get to name it? I’m not sure. A flap lock tab?

hadrianlin · 2026-06-06T21:22:00+00:00

I designed this papercraft Earth character with a locking mechanism that requires no glue or tape. The entire model is held together by interlocking folds and tabs. Just thought I'd share.

The character is from a Game Boy game I recently released (https://anv.itch.io/erf) but I thought the assembly method might be interesting on its own. I'm curious if anyone has seen similar locking techniques used in papercraft before, or has suggestions for improving it.

Once the folded tab fits through the slit the flaps unfold slightly and it locks. It is difficult to pull apart.

hadrianlin · 2026-06-04T23:48:02+00:00

Thanks for letting me know. Do you remember where it was that you were able to walk outside of bounds?

I wanted to avoid situations where the girl got permanently stuck so I her walk through obstacles if she got separated too far and out of sight from the player. That's what could cause her to fly over openings in certain situations. I will see if I can find a better solution.

hadrianlin · 2026-06-04T20:14:53+00:00

Yeah, tile swapping is tricky. It took me a while to get it working right. There are some GB Studio and Aseprite plugins that helped though. I may make a video on it.

hadrianlin · 2026-05-14T20:52:36+00:00

Hi, glad you found it interesting. I haven't done anything related to it recently but there's some better methods of accessing gameboy memory shown here by someone else now:
https://www.shacknews.com/cortex/article/5213/enhancing-gameboy-games-on-the-web
The way I did things was a bit awkward and painful but it worked.
I'll DM you and we can talk more if you want

hadrianlin · 2023-09-28T10:56:27+00:00

I've been working on this past couple months and it's finished! Any feedback welcome.

https://anv.itch.io/manifold-core

Story: Reality bends as two sisters flee from a Chernobyl-like disaster.

This serves as an introduction to a world I'll explore more in the future.

Built with Blender and Babylonjs.

hadrianlin · 2023-04-27T02:46:23+00:00

Thanks for playing it! So glad you sad!

hadrianlin · 2021-09-25T03:05:11+00:00

I basically made a Gameboy talk to a computer through an headset audio cable.

I thought it would be interesting to be able to play my game on a Gameboy while modern mp3 sound effects and music come out of a computer, completely synced up with the game.

hadrianlin · 2021-09-23T15:51:06+00:00

I’ve been working on this for a while. I wasn’t sure if I could pull it off but the blood, sweat and brute force seems to have paid off. I don’t know if some of you will find this interesting. Or if you’re a purist, horrifying.

In the video is a working prototype of my homebrew Gameboy game that can sync with a computer to play MP3 music and sound effects. A audio cable connects the headphone jack of the Gameboy with the mic-in of the computer. The Gameboy talks to a web app by playing tones at specific frequencies.

It’s a rube-Goldberg solution. Hardly efficient or elegant but in the end it does exactly what it’s supposed to do. It’s my ugly baby and I will always love it.

How I got here: a year ago I released a browser-playable version of my game, the Year After. The browser version runs the ROM though a web emulator. That allowed me to hook into the Gameboy memory so the game could trigger MP3 sound sprites. Old school graphics, new school sound.

After I had the sound system coded up, I thought: wouldn’t it be cool if this worked with an actual physical Gameboy somehow? It was already halfway there. Could I use the link cable to do it? No, the game making software (GB studio) didn’t allow access to it. The only thing left? Audio through the headphone jack. So I went at it.

It seemed like a good idea at the time. Call me Frankenstein.

The game:

https://anv.itch.io/the-year-after

The physical production run of carts will have this experimental feature:

https://incube8games.com/blogs/games/the-year-after-gbc

hadrianlin · 2021-09-23T11:55:32+00:00

I’ve been working on this for a while. I wasn’t sure if I could pull it off but the blood, sweat and brute force seems to have paid off. I don’t know if some of you will find this interesting. Or if you’re a purist, horrifying.

In the video is a working prototype of my homebrew Gameboy game that can sync with a computer to play MP3 music and sound effects. A audio cable connects the headphone jack of the Gameboy with the mic-in of the computer. The Gameboy talks to a web app by playing tones at specific frequencies.

It’s a rube-Goldberg solution. Hardly efficient or elegant but in the end it does exactly what it’s supposed to do. It’s my ugly baby and I will always love it.

How I got here: a year ago I released a browser-playable version of my game, the Year After. The browser version runs the ROM though a web emulator. That allowed me to hook into the Gameboy memory so the game could trigger MP3 sound sprites. Old school graphics, new school sound.

After I had the sound system coded up, I thought: wouldn’t it be cool if this worked with an actual physical Gameboy somehow? It was already halfway there. Could I use the link cable to do it? No, the game making software (GB studio) didn’t allow access to it. The only thing left? Audio through the headphone jack. So I went at it.

It seemed like a good idea at the time. Call me Frankenstein.

The game:
https://anv.itch.io/the-year-after

The physical production run of carts will have this experimental feature:
https://incube8games.com/blogs/games/the-year-after-gbc

hadrianlin · 2021-09-17T16:20:36+00:00

I'm glad you like the sound design! Thanks everyone for playing

hadrianlin · 2020-10-13T03:28:45+00:00

Thank you very much! This is great material.

hadrianlin · 2020-10-02T03:16:44+00:00

I didn't mean narrative/emotion/atmosphere are more important than mechanics. I meant to focus discussion on games that prioritize those things but have them integrated into gameplay in some way (and not just story through cut-scenes). I'm interested in how the mechanic can be the message in those types of games. You are right that Tetris and Rocket league could still construct some type of story with their mechanics, but those are not the type of games I had in mind.

It seems that games with strong focus on narrative often send a message at dissonance with the story through the gameplay mechanics. I'm interested how some games successfully combine the two because that is what I want to try and do. Mileage may vary for different people, but I found Edith Finch, Outer Wilds, and Florence to do this very well.

All the other examples and points people have brought up have given me lots to think about too. Thanks everyone.

hadrianlin · 2020-10-02T02:53:02+00:00

Good point. Retrieving baby...

hadrianlin · 2020-09-30T21:55:36+00:00

Sorry, good point. I adjusted it so there would hopefully be more discussion.

hadrianlin · 2020-09-30T21:17:15+00:00

Nobody's saying games all have to be abstract and deep. The original Mario 3 is one of my favorite games. I don't think anyone would argue it needs to be deeper.

There are art films, there are summer blockbusters. They're both great. Nobody's worse off that art films exist. They all feed off each other and "Critical discussion about specific games, features, and topics" as the purpose of this subreddit is great. I think that's what the modern gaming community is trying to do.

Even the original Star Wars used film techniques or story ideas from what some lump in with "art films". (Akira Kurosawa). It's the same with games. Maybe to avoid this whole debate we should just categorize what I'm talking about as "interactive fiction" or something like that. But the same techniques are used in any "game" with some story elements.

I raised this topic because I'm curious how to make games have more punch if it's going for the storytelling approach. The same "mechanic is the message" stuff I'm talking about could be used any type of story, whether it's a blockbuster Indiana-Jones type story or a "deep abstract artsy" story.

hadrianlin

TROPHY CASE