I Turned the Lego Game Boy Into a Working Game Boy

Posted3 months agoActive3 months ago

Timothee

273 points

22 comments

blog.nataliethenerd.comTechstory

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LegoGame BoyModdingMaker Culture

Key topics

Lego

Game Boy

Modding

Maker Culture

A maker has successfully turned a Lego Game Boy into a working Game Boy, sparking excitement and admiration from the community for the creativity and technical skill involved.

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01Story posted
Oct 3, 2025 at 10:18 AM EDT
3 months ago
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Oct 3, 2025 at 12:17 PM EDT
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Oct 7, 2025 at 12:43 PM EDT
3 months ago
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Discussion (22 comments)

Showing 22 comments

jjkaczor

3 months ago

1 reply

This is... very very nice, and why I love the internet, LEGO and maker/hacker type nerds...

danielkay

3 months ago

1 reply

I think tons of HN tech people are into LEGO. After they gathered 10,000 votes and still declined to do a JWST telescope TWICE, I personally decided to have some fun with it on my own.

https://ibb.co/bgFFKhLn

Plan to Kickstart it early next year...

jjkaczor

3 months ago

Yeah - technical people in general - it was a great introduction to following instructions and creativity all-in-one. (I would build every kit first with the instructions, then tear them apart and put the bricks in the "big" (actually very tiny) box, and from then on, build my own creations - no models sitting on shelves for me - this still happens to-this-day, but now I build with my grandkids)

ginko

3 months ago

3 replies

The Game Boy modding scene is fascinating. You can literally replace every single part of it other than the `DMG-CPU` main SoC.

Well even that can be replaced, sorta: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EccVHo-pDGI

jsheard

3 months ago

There's a replacement motherboard which uses an FPGA in lieu of an original GB/GBC/SGB SoC, so you can in fact build a Gameboy of Theseus with zero Nintendo parts.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cesh5OAL4uk

giancarlostoro

3 months ago

You can also get an FPGBC which is FPGA of a GBC. They even sell them prebuilt for $99. So all parts are 100% brand new.

https://funnyplaying.com/products/fpgbc-kit

edoceo

3 months ago

The Game Boy of Theseus

icu

3 months ago

1 reply

This looks cool but that D-Pad is going to hurt after a few minutes of play.

jama211

3 months ago

The kind of person who does this has many gameboys to play on, this is for art and concept only I imagine

dom96

3 months ago

3 replies

I pre-ordered this set to do exactly this. Nice to see others have the same idea.

Weirdly I only received mine today, I wonder why the difference in pre-order shipment times is so large.

B-Con

3 months ago

1 reply

People in the USA have been picking them up for weeks from Costco. I got mine ~2 weeks ago.

alias_neo

3 months ago

I saw this set on the shelf in a big toy shop (Smyths) here in the UK a few days ago, didn't realise it was hot off the press.

One can definitely go pick one up off the shelf here in the UK as of at least Wednesday (the day I saw them).

jerrysievert

3 months ago

1 reply

beyond the other explanations that some have given, lego direct order releases ship from more than one warehouse, even in the US - my bricklink western train set shipped from Vegas, and others I had chatted with either got them 3-4 days earlier than me or 3-4 days later, depending on how close they were to the warehouse and the order of the orders going out.

just logistics, or luck as some of us call it?

dom96

3 months ago

Seems pretty lame to literally pre-order something and get it significantly later than others who haven't pre-ordered

10729287

3 months ago

Because some sellers don’t respect sales embargo and/or some clients have some privileges.

janci

3 months ago

Did Nintendo lawyers already get in touch?

lowbloodsugar

3 months ago

Was so disappointed when I realized it wasn’t a real gameboy, but then I realized someone even more of a nerd than me would take care of that and I’d just have to be patient. Only took a few days!

robotnikman

3 months ago

I just built this set yesterday and was thinking to myself 'I wonder how hard it would be to turn this into a functioning gameboy?' Looks like I have my answer!

Liftyee

3 months ago

I love projects like this where you have to work around constraints like the Lego form factor and the support electronics for the CPU. In terms of modern hardware, the PCB is surprisingly sparse - using modern surface-mount components really helps.

The super detailed silkscreen on the Nintendo PCB does make me wish for the time when all products came with schematics and component specifications...

ranza

3 months ago

Thats my wife!

layer8

3 months ago

The startup video doesn’t feature the Game Boy startup sound (nor any other sound), so no sound?

ericzawo

3 months ago

I was wondering how long it would take someone to do this.

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ID: 45463319Type: storyLast synced: 11/20/2025, 9:01:20 PM

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