Re:Show HN: Kirby's Dreamland 2 level viewer, in JavaScript
by mattdotc on Wednesday March 16, 2016 @04:00PM
(#11300229)
Chances are he didn't. Verified dumps are all over the internet.
However, a sufficiently motivated individual can create cartridge dumpers with hardware like Arduino and a broken Game Boy (to harvest the socket for convenience). The cartridges for most/all game systems are widely understood by this point thanks to the efforts of reverse engineers.
Of course there are also pre-built dumpers available through various sources. They are not unique to the present-day. Even when the SNES and Game Boy were still selling on shelves, there were devices created specifically for copying cartridges to alternative storage such as floppy disk or custom cartridges.
However, a sufficiently motivated individual can create cartridge dumpers with hardware like Arduino and a broken Game Boy (to harvest the socket for convenience). The cartridges for most/all game systems are widely understood by this point thanks to the efforts of reverse engineers.
Of course there are also pre-built dumpers available through various sources. They are not unique to the present-day. Even when the SNES and Game Boy were still selling on shelves, there were devices created specifically for copying cartridges to alternative storage such as floppy disk or custom cartridges.