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A while back, we reported on Joshua Barretto's efforts to replicate Super Mario 64 on the humble Game Boy Advance – and that project has now inspired a second attempt to bring the game to the handheld.
Fellow modder Brendan Tobias Friedly (AKA Game of Tobi) has published a video showcasing his porting project, which uses intensive optimisation and memory management to reproduce the N64 classic on the GBA.
"You have to understand the CPU of the GBA has 16 MHz," says the developer. "And it means that if we take 16 million cycles for a single frame, we literally have one frame per second. So the number of CPU cycles we need per frame must be drastically reduced. And even the point of reaching the 16 million cycles per frame to render a single frame to have one frame per second took so much effort, and it got ridiculously complicated afterwards."
Although the frame rate hovers between 5 and 15 frames per second, depending on the level, the modder insists it's playable. As you can see from the footage, it's still looking quite rough, but work will continue on the project, and its creator seems confident that the "entire game" will eventually be playable on the GBA.
He even hints that a "3D All-Stars" is possible on the console, referencing the collection Nintendo released on Switch a few years ago.
Game of Tobi – who also 'ported' Super Mario Maker to the GBA – cites Barretto's work as the main reason this project exists.
So there you have it – we could have not one but two decent ways to play Super Mario 64 on the GBA.