In either case, the emulator simply generates random data until the game accepts the barcode as valid. Both, however, don't really emulate the Barcode Boy fully. Before I began this quest, only two Game Boy emulators appeared to offer support for the Barcode Boy: KiGB and GEST. Like the rest of articles in the Edge of Emulation series, I'm venturing into territory where few have ever been, if anyone has been there at all. Under these kinds of circumstances, I found myself more than eager to emulate the Barcode Boy once and for all. It's certainly not getting any younger, and the amount of available working units isn't getting any larger. The Barcode Boy itself is pretty old, with its 25th anniversary coming up at the end of the year time is of the essence in this case. I take game preservation seriously, and I think that some day in the future, stuff like the Barcode Boy should be more than just a footnote on Wikipedia that kids can read about it should be something everyone can experience. I mean, just imagine if information you cared about were simply erased due to neglect, or because it was not recorded soon enough. One of the things that keeps me up at night is the thought of losing a part of gaming history, especially if I can do something about it. It's a really cool product, however, until recently it was poorly documented and preserved, and emulation of the Barcode Boy was pretty spotty at best. If you've never heard of it, remember that the Barcode Boy was exclusive to Japan and never saw a release anywhere else. This exotic piece of hardware came from Namcot (Namco's old name) along with about four games that were specifically made to use it. As the name implies, the device reads barcodes from cards swiped across its sensor. Released in 1992, the Barcode Boy was the earliest card-scanning device for the Game Boy, and one of the first for handheld consoles (only predated by the popular Barcode Battler). In that article, I mentioned an earlier card-scanning device called the Barcode Boy. Back in May, I tackled something that hadn't been emulated before, the card scanner for Barcode Taisen Bardigun.
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