If buying old games is a disease...

[A Black Falcon]

Darkness issues? How dark are we talking here ABF? I know the GBA screen was already darker than the GBC screen but is this "darker still" in a way that is truly noticable? That glitch I'll buy. Also a kid's Tarzan GBC game had horrible sound problems when played on a GBA. A few others had similar problems, but I think your's is the only one that's actually worth playing.

It's definitely a glitchy game and not just the general darker screen of the GBA -- while it may be true that in general GBC games are darker on the GBA than they were on the GBC (though why that would be I have no idea, they both have non-backlit LCD screens...), but this one is darker than the others... it doesn't make the game not playable, but it does make things look a little odd -- and it isn't all better by just putting the GBA under a light. That might help with the clarity problem, but it doesn't change darker colors into lighter ones...

Either way, that glitch as well as the glitch with Kirby Tilt and Tumble can be resolved. Your's with a simple patch to the device itself and Kirby with either rereleasing the game so that you can calibrate it to your liking (so even if in the future you load it sideways into some system it'll work fine), or just making the system recognize that that game has been put in and Game Genieing the thing so the controls are all reversed would have the same effect (the actual tilt controls not the cross pad of course, but distinguishing that with a small hex patch should be easy enough).

Supposedly some copies of Bionic Commando: Elite Forces are unbugged (the crash but I mean, not colors), some are bugged like mine, and some are bugged so badly that they even have the bug when played on GBCs... even with all the problems though, it's still my favorite GBC game that isn't Zelda. (And I'd only put it below OoA. OoS was not as good and LADX was pointless... LA is the best handheld game ever. It didn't need an update.)

Further, yeah I want my SGB support. Glad someone agrees. I too was a little disappointed that wasn't stuck into my Gameboy Player, but since all they really did was stick a GBA into an add-on with little extra besides the Gamecube related adaptations and that menu, I suppose I'm not surprised.

That's not a good excuse, the SGB was essentially a GB in a cart... it had all the chips for a GB inside except the RAM, I believe....

A system that can play GBA, GBC, and GB games, all flawlessly with bug fixes as mentioned, and can also show SGB palletes, and the configuration settings of the system even allows one to set "priority" levels for what you want enabled (so let's say you want to play that SGB or GBC game but in normal GB mode, for whatever reason (comparison? Prefer LA in black and white with the simpler sprites?), just put "SGB" or "GBC mode under "GB" priority and bam, that's what it'll load it in), and also uses the same link cables that have been used in the Gameboy Pocket and since (and not that horrific adaptation they stuck on the micro for no good reason I can think of), with a screen with a brightness level option that can blind an eagle, and you have "ultimates gameboy".

One thing I'm not sure about is if the GBA uses hardware or software emulation. I'd imagine that it's hardware emulation and there is a GBC chip inside the thing, though... hardware emulation is a lot easier. Even good software emulators (PC ones, for console emulation, I mean) aren't perfect... some games won't work right, even in the best emulators... (another example of this is the NES-on-a-chip used by most all NES clones -- it's not perfect.) Even so, it can't hurt to wish for one that was... :)

(so let's say you want to play that SGB or GBC game but in normal GB mode, for whatever reason (comparison? Prefer LA in black and white with the simpler sprites?), just put "SGB" or "GBC mode under "GB" priority and bam, that's what it'll load it in)

You can actually kind of do this with the color pallets. I believe that one of the twelve the GBC/GBA/GBASP/GB Player use is 'original B&W' colors...

One interesting thing about the SGB vs. those four (which have identical emulation, with the one exception of the GBA/GBASP/GB Player (can't call it a GBP, that's the Game Boy Pocket...) having 'L/R for widescreen') is that, as I've probably said before, the SGB colorizes GB games differently. The GBC and its successors colorize GB games by making the sprites two colors and the backgrounds two more (or is it one for sprites and three for backgrounds, plus black? I'd have to check, but close enough). The SGB simply changes each of the four colors on the Game Boy screen into new colors. Thuse with the SGB GB games look like, well, GB games -- just in color. (except games that support the SGB for additional colors, such and DK '94, Kirby 2, etc) That contrasts with the GBC's "sprites are a different color from the backgrounds" design that makes it obvious which parts of the screen are sprites and which aren't, something that can be a huge help in some games... (to make the enemies stand out more in DK Land, something that was a problem on the original GB) and something of a cheat in others (my favorite example of the easy way to know which statues in LA will come alive when you touch them). I was really interested to use a SGB and find that none of that happened... it still helps DKL, though, as only some of the problem was the colors. The rest of it was the blurring, and THAT the SGB does away with. :)

(and not that horrific adaptation they stuck on the micro for no good reason I can think of)

To make sure that people can't use their Micros as GC controllers and instead have to buy MORE Gameboys, of course!

and also uses the same link cables that have been used in the Gameboy Pocket

Well, kind of, I can't use a GBP/GBC link cable to link two GBA games, and can't use a GBA link cable to link with a GBP or GBC... (or rare model two SGB with the link port, for that matter) so while the cable is mostly the same, that added bump means that you do need separate cables anyway. Since I got a GB Player I finally got a GBA Link Cable (a third party one that's also a second GBA-GC linker), and I wouldn't have done that if I could link GBA games with my (GBP/GBC with one original GB adapter) Universal Game Link Cable.