ModRetro Chromatic Now Displays Nintendo Game Boy Games In Quest Headsets

Game Boy and Game Boy Color cartridges running inside a Chromatic gaming handheld from ModRetro now display in Horizon OS headsets over a simple USB-C cable and Quest HDMI Link.

You can now play Game Boy and Game Boy Color games in your Quest headset by simply plugging it into the Chromatic.

Quest HDMI Link debuted last year to show almost any device on a giant virtual screen via a specially-purchased capture card. Meanwhile, last year, Palmer Luckey-backed ModRetro released the Chromatic handheld for playing classic Game Boy and Game Boy Color cartridges, as well as a small collection of newly published Chromatic cartridges, including a new version of Tetris. At the time of the ModRetro Chromatic’s debut late last year, though, we couldn’t get its “USB-C lagless video out to PC” feature to work with Quest HDMI Link.

Now, after playing GTA 2 displayed on my ceiling while holding the Chromatic in my hands, I can see that’s changed.

Imagine a pair of Pokemon-loving friends finishing a day-long climb up a tall icy mountain. They cozy up next to one another in big thick sleeping bags warming up inside their two-person tent. One friend pulls out their Chromatic, with a copy of Pokemon Gold, and their friend does the same with Pokemon Silver. They each put on their Horizon OS headsets and run a Link cable between the sleeping bags.

Their hands are warm under the covers and not a soul alive can see the light produced from the Chromatic screens in their hands. Over a Link cable made last century, they trade Pokemon between their cartridges and fight a daily battle they’ve waged for years. In essence, the pair would share a virtual reality universe made for exactly two people, and their Pokemon, shared over that Link cable. They find a single reality inside those cartridges which they view on a pair of giant virtual screens in the air of the pitch-black tent.

In that scenario with a friend on a mountain, the wind whipping at it in this truly off grid scenario, what Game Boy or Game Boy Color game would you want to play as you warm up in VR?