GoKawiilis a senior editor and founding member of The Verge who covers gadgets, games, and toys. He spent 15 years editing the likes of CNET, Gizmodo, and Engadget.
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Last week, I powered on a 26-year-old copy of Pokémon Pinball, one of the best Game Boy games ever made. My save file was no more. The Charmander I’d caught for my daughter, the high scores we’d set together… gone. Before flash memory, Nintendo cartridges used tiny watch batteries to save their games, and those batteries were never meant to last this long.
But it’s not a huge deal, because I saved my family’s save file months ago. I backed it up with an Epilogue Operator, a device that connects your real Nintendo cartridges to Windows PCs, MacBooks, even a Steam Machine.
The $50 GB Operator is a transparent trapezoidal cartridge reader that reads and writes to real Game Boy, Game Boy Color and Game Boy Advance cartridges over a USB-C cable; the company’s new $60 SN Operator does the same for Super Nintendo and Japanese Super Famicom titles. Epilogue’s also got a N64 version coming.
They’re not just for backups! As you can see in my embedded video, these gadgets can play your carts, too. My Xbox Ally now takes Super Nintendo cartridges, my Steam Deck plays Game Boy carts, and my phone is a Game Boy Camera, because I attached an Epilogue Operator to each one. (Double-sided magnet rings and Mechanism mounts helped.)
Technically, the SN Operator and GB Operator are just cartridge readers, there are no original Nintendo chips or FPGAs inside. When you play a game, your computer saves the ROM to your computer and plays it in an emulator.
But Epilogue’s Playback software makes that easy — just plug in the reader, plug in the cart, hit play — and it casts a convincing illusion that you’re playing your games on actual carts. Plug one in, and your game pops up on screen. Whenever you save in the game, Epilogue should automatically save back to your cartridge as well. Whenever you yank a cart, the game instantly winks out.
The SN Operator, with a big slot to fit an SNES or Super Famicom cartridge (and spring-loaded door covers up top). The GB Operator, about a quarter of the size of the SN Operator.
That last one’s a bit of a double-edged sword, because Epilogue’s Operators can be touchy about cartridge detection. They aren’t as forgiving as an actual Super Nintendo or Game Boy if your carts are slightly dirty or damaged. I’ve got Japanese copies of Bahamut Lagoon and Sailor Moon R that’ll quit mid-session if I nudge them wrong.
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