What retro consoles still have the most active game development? The most games still being released physically? The best and most popular time-tested consoles?
I’m excited to start learning programming and had a thought to make a game (having an objective makes it easier to learn). I wrote up an entire plan already for the mechanics and it seems incredibly viable for a fun and full experience. I would like to have it playable on real hardware and am just trying to figure out which system to make it for.


@PiraHxCx @sic_semper_tyrannis There are a lot more Game Boy releases than shown on MobyGames. I don’t know if the site is limited to just physical carts, but even if that is the case then the actual number is more like 269 instead of 42 since 2020
See:
https://mastodon.gamedev.place/@bbbbbr/115897847228422258
Wow that’s awesome and quite shocking that it’s so popular. I wonder if GB is more popular that GBC and GBA
@sic_semper_tyrannis Oh yeah, at least in terms of homebrew being made GB is likely 10x GBA (whether cart or rom)
That’s awesome!
MobyGames is a collective database active since 1999. Years ago I was looking for a “letterboxd for games” and others like backloggd and rawg were missing a lot of stuff and had poor info about releases and so (I never checked again, so they might be better now). At the time MobyGames seemed like the best one, there is a lot of very obscure releases there, but I don’t know if other databases are more complete.
@PiraHxCx Here’s a brief tour of the Game Boy relevant databases…
DMGPage has some of the most complete data (i think?) for the Game Boy. The format is easier for me to work with.
https://dmgpage.com/homebrew-releases/
There is a japanese page that tracks some GB releases:
https://geemuboi.web.fc2.com/misc/new-releases.htm
Game Brew Almanac tracking has more platforms. The format is less structured.
https://www.videogamesage.com/forums/topic/1050-vgs-homebrew-almanac/
And Homebrews Connexion that also has more platforms:
https://homebrews.retro-gc.fr/