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?

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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.

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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.

 

[AdRoz78]

https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2024...-emulator-released-under-new-app-store-rules/.

Just use Android if you want emulators in your phone, there are several open source alternatives.

I have an android, but don’t really emulate - I use my switch for that (NOT nso, iykyk)

 

[raxadian]

I have an android, but don’t really emulate - I use my switch for that (NOT nso, iykyk)

I tend to use my hacked Vita and 3DS, really should hack my Switch.

 

[BlusterBong]

and in comes the flood of emulators tying to reach as many eyes to a new demographic, even when the last time they did this, it costed them Yuzu and it's many forks as far as it being allowed to exist outside of self-hosting as far as what the people behind the current day Internet think and the undivided attention of a company that made it clear that they hate the work open source emulator devs do.

The only reason this is even happening is because of the EU's Digital Markets Act (Read: Europe being mad that they can't regulate everything outside of thier country) and Apple is trying to save face with how they're following what the EU is forcing them to do if they want to continue pushing product there. And it then turned out the first one was very much shady with the person(s) behind it making a fake DS emulator before this new one they took down.

Emulation should go as far deep underground as possible and stay there becuase just becuase one shady application claiming to be an emulator didn't get very far doesn't mean that there's someone out there who's ready to push whatever scam they can and call it an Emulator, alongside the inevitible legal problems this will harbor when the more popular emulators make the jump and the corpos take notice.

 

[Marc_LFD]

This was a licensing thing. As the article here states they ripped off a pre-existing emulator without credit (which is required under its licensing) and the original author rightfully got Apple to take it down

This "developer" is nothing but a scammer according to reviews people have posted:

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/my-boy-gba-emulator/id6477892610

The dev Anas Zakarneh should be ashamed for adding spam and trackers to these apps which he didn't even develop or own.

 

[Scarlet]

Seems like we have our first legitimate emulator!

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/bimmy-nes-emulator/id1528825236

I think this should cement that Apple is fine with emulation, and that the issue was in the sketchy nature of the copycat code. Seems like Ignited is still going through appeals, but assuming that gets through we’ll have NES, N64, GBC, GBA, and NDS all covered. I’d really just be waiting on a decent SNES emulator and maybe Dolphin to find its way over.

 

[SylverReZ]

Seems like we have our first legitimate emulator!

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/bimmy-nes-emulator/id1528825236

I think this should cement that Apple is fine with emulation, and that the issue was in the sketchy nature of the copycat code. Seems like Ignited is still going through appeals, but assuming that gets through we’ll have NES, N64, GBC, GBA, and NDS all covered. I’d really just be waiting on a decent SNES emulator and maybe Dolphin to find its way over.

Until that starts to disappear from the App Store, either due to false DMCA claims or that they stole code from another emulator and re-badged it as their own.

 

[Scarlet]

Until that starts to disappear from the App Store, either due to false DMCA claims or that they stole code from another emulator and re-badged it as their own.

Seems like it is their emulator:
https://github.com/tsalvo/nes-emu-ios

Interesting to see that it did cost 99p earlier today but is now free though. Wonder if some part of the code didn't allow them to charge for it? Either way, no ads, no tracking, it seems solid on paper.

 

[JeepX87]

Seems like it is their emulator:
https://github.com/tsalvo/nes-emu-ios

Interesting to see that it did cost 99p earlier today but is now free though. Wonder if some part of the code didn't allow them to charge for it? Either way, no ads, no tracking, it seems solid on paper.

I noticed some people said Apple won't allow JIT (Just-in-time compilation) support in emulator apps, is it true?

 

[Scarlet]

I noticed some people said Apple won't allow JIT (Just-in-time compilation) support in emulator apps, is it true?

Not sure about App Store ones, but I know it’s an issue with sideloaded ones at least. If you want JIT on a sideloaded app you need to connect it to a PC every time you want it enabled iirc.

 

[aquova]

Well... apparently the developer pulled it from the App Store themselves "out of fear", whatever that means

https://www.theverge.com/2024/4/16/24132351/iphone-apple-app-store-nes-emulator-bimmy-removed

 

[M7L7NK7]

This is the punishment you get for having an iphone

 

[Flame]

Well... apparently the developer pulled it from the App Store themselves "out of fear", whatever that means

https://www.theverge.com/2024/4/16/24132351/iphone-apple-app-store-nes-emulator-bimmy-removed

blimmy didn't see the bimmy dev removing it so quickly. You call that an emulator, that's not an emulator this is an emulator https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.dolphinemu.dolphinemu&hl=en&gl=US


also the devs says it here why he removed it:-

https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...le-on-app-store-removed.2424326/post-33074620

 

[aquova]

Finally, we got one https://www.theverge.com/2024/4/17/24132984/delta-free-emulator-nintendo-gba-n64-iphone-app-store-us

From what I understand, Delta has been the premiere iOS emulator suite for a while now. In the EU though, they're using it to push their alternative 3rd party store.

 

[Scarlet]

Finally, we got one https://www.theverge.com/2024/4/17/24132984/delta-free-emulator-nintendo-gba-n64-iphone-app-store-us

From what I understand, Delta has been the premiere iOS emulator suite for a while now. In the EU though, they're using it to push their alternative 3rd party store.

It's great to see it, but I'm still hopeful for Ignited. iPad support is kinda a big point for me, and I know Delta does support it because I've used it on my iPad Mini before... No idea why the App Store version doesn't have it.

If nothing else Delta will hopefully give others confidence to get their apps up. Sucks for those in the EU though, pretty sure they have to pay to even get AltStore.

 

[Thejax]

It's great to see it, but I'm still hopeful for Ignited. iPad support is kinda a big point for me, and I know Delta does support it because I've used it on my iPad Mini before... No idea why the App Store version doesn't have it.

If nothing else Delta will hopefully give others confidence to get their apps up. Sucks for those in the EU though, pretty sure they have to pay to even get AltStore.

Still waiting, the Ignited dev tried pushing the app for review but it was always marked as “spam”, he put in a manual evaluation but who knows how long that will take.

Although, I wonder if multiplayer works between delta (what my friends are downloading) and ignited (what I sideloaded)

 

[Thescrewremover]

I wonder how soon we'll get RetroArch on the App Store.

 

[LoggerMan]

Delta is good, but Provenance is better. But now that Delta has mainstream appeal I bet the devs will start adding more features, for the glory of it.

 

[NitroRevolutionNX]

Everything related to Apple you should avoid tbh.