GemBoy brings the Game Boy to Samsung Gear S2 and Gear S3

One of the first portable consoles just got more portable.

GemBoy is a new Game Boy emulator now available for Samsung’s Gear S2 and Gear S3 smartwatches. While we’ve seen a Game Boy emulator for Android Wear watches, GemBoy is coded to run on Tizen, the OS powering Samsung’s latest smartwatches.

The rotating bezel of the smartwatch is used to navigate through a rudimentary menu system and select and load ROMs. Since the original Game Boy and Game Boy Color both had a square aspect ratio, GemBoy runs games in a small window in the center of the round watch display, leaving thick black space around the edges. However, these black spaces house directional arrows used to emulate the D-Pad on the physical consoles. In the photos and videos I’ve seen, I couldn’t see A or B buttons in the emulator, but the emulator may use unmarked touch input for these buttons.

Keep in mind that this version of GemBoy is in its infancy. Support for specific Game Boy or Game Boy Color games may be spotty. Also, this obviously isn’t the best way to play the games, as the display is small and the controls seem clunky. However, if you want a novel way to play some classic games, this may be one to check out if you’ve got a Tizen-based smartwatch.

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