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The first retro emulator hits Apple's App Store, but you should probably avoid it
With Apple having recently updated their guidelines for the App Store, iOS users have been left to speculate on specific wording and whether retro emulators as we know them would truly have a place in the great walled garden. Today it seems our questions have been answered with the arrival of what appears to be the first traditional emulator on the App Store: iGBA. Having downloaded it myself I can confirm it is a functional GBA and GBC emulator, so what’s the catch?
Well to be blunt, this really just looks like the classic iOS emulator GBA4iOS, with unavoidable advertisements thrown in for good measure. This comes from a developer with an extensive library of apps ranging from barcode scanners to money trackers, all oddly four years old. It comes across as a quick cash in while there are no other accessible alternatives and it isn’t something that should be supported, especially as more feature-rich and actively developed emulators like Ignited have been rejected as spam.
If you are interested in emulation on iOS I’d encourage you to look into sideloading, with apps like AltStore making the process surprisingly painless nowadays, and allowing you to install up to two other apps alongside AltStore itself. This comes with a caveat that you need to check in with a PC every seven days to keep your apps playable, but it’s a price worth paying when you consider you’re getting ad-free emulation. And ad-free emulation that supports both DS and N64 games with no issues.
Emulation on iOS can actually be pretty great!
iGBA could yet be a positive sign of things to come, with this potentially demystifying Apple’s latest guidelines. It’s a space worth watching for any iOS users out there, even if the first to make it through isn’t quite what we’d hope to have seen.
Update: Other Emulators on the App Store
Note that outside of iGBA, other "emulators" have been appearing on the App Store. The ones I'm aware of are "My Boy! - GBA Emulator", "John GBA", and "DraStic DS Emulator 3D", all by Anas Zakarneh. These each cost £6.99 and and are not emulators. Scrolling through their screenshots reveal that they are cheap games trying to cash in on the emulation hype before the real apps hit the scene. Be cautious, do research, and don't get caught out.
Note that outside of iGBA, other "emulators" have been appearing on the App Store. The ones I'm aware of are "My Boy! - GBA Emulator", "John GBA", and "DraStic DS Emulator 3D", all by Anas Zakarneh. These each cost £6.99 and and are not emulators. Scrolling through their screenshots reveal that they are cheap games trying to cash in on the emulation hype before the real apps hit the scene. Be cautious, do research, and don't get caught out.
Last edited by Scarlet,
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