How To Install the Retron SQ Day 0 Patch & Fix GBA Performance Issues

In this episode, we show you how to update the firmware on the Hyperkin Retron SQ, and how the Community has fixed the Game Boy Advance Functionality.

Chapters:
0:00 - Introduction
2:12 - How To Update the Firmware
6:41 - Fixing GBA Performance
7:29 - Testing SMB3
11:07 - Star Wars Revenge of the Sith
13:13 - Sonic the Hedgehog
15:36 - Donkey Kong Country
21:41 - Final Thoughts

Ever since the announcement of the Hyperkin Retron SQ, people have been excited for the possibility of having a budget friendly, easy way to play not only Game Boy and Game Boy color games on their television in 720p, but also Game Boy Advance games. When the news broke that the Game Boy Advance functionality would be beta, most people accepted it and figured that it would have a few hiccups, but be largely functional. As we discovered in our early review, the Game Boy Advance functionality was pretty much broken, however the community has stepped up and provided what appears to be a pretty simple and effective fix.

Before we talk about fixing the Game Boy Advance issues, we need to make sure that we have the day one patch installed on your system. This patch fixes the aspect ratio issues, along with several other performance upgrades in the system. In the original tutorial that I posted, you are not able to rewrite content to the stock SD card thankfully Hyperkin has now updated their process and you do not need to use a separate SD card for firmware updates.

Once the day zero patch is installed, you will want to connect a keyboard to the USB port on your Retron SQ. You can plug the keyboard in and when done with it unplug it and connect your controller, or you can do like I did, and use a USB hub to leave both connected permanently. Once your game has booted up, simply hit the F1 key on the keyboard. From here, scroll down to the options menu, hit the return key, and scroll down to Frameskip. By default this is set to 4. Set this to 0, and press the F1 key again to save the options and exit the menu. From here, you can go ahead and play your game as normal, and I will tell you the performance is incredibly improved with this tweak. It is almost unbelievable that this is the same system.

I started my test by playing Super Mario Advance 4 Super Mario Bros 3, just as I had in my initial review. Where I was getting frame drop issues and other graphical glitches, there were none now that I set the frameskip to 0. Mario's running animation looked and felt correct. I wasn't feeling lag and latency. It was like this was an entirely different system, and I loved how it played.

I tested a number of additional games, unfortunately Earthworm Jim still does not work, but everything else was terrific. Now one downside to this tweak is the fact that it must be applied every time you power cycle the system. As such, I would like to see Hyperkin bake this into another firmware update for the system so that instead of being set to 4, Frameskip was set to 0 out of the box. This provides such an improved experience, they would be well served to do this. I was also surprised to learn that this just runs Retroarch, which generally does not have performance issues. I would also like to see Hyperkin update the firmware so that a combination key press on the controller launches into this hidden menu and there would no longer be a need for a keyboard.

I have to thank everybody who gave me a heads up about this development, it is a literal game changer for the Retron SQ. I am more than a little bit shocked that the fix was this simple, and I can't help but wonder why this was not found and addressed during the development process. Regardless, I hope that Hyperkin can produce another patch that will make this the default setting out of the box for the system. Major kudos to everybody who found this fix and passed it along, as now it makes the Retron SQ a viable option to play Game Boy Advance games on your television.

#RetronSQ #GameBoyAdvance #Firmware

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