The VG Resource

Hi everyone!

I'm really excited about contributing to the site and I have a question about color discrepancies across GB emulation.
I've mostly been working with VBA for extracting assets but I usually use Gambatte when I'm playing the game casually and I realized that I don't know what the preferred color palette is for uploading. Obviously everyone doesn't go into their sprite sheets and color-correct but is it frowned upon to use for instance the Gambatte's slightly more washed out palette to better replicate the GBC screen?

I know personally I actually prefer the washed out look of Gambatte and feel it better represents the intention of the art but also, should I care that much?

I've attached some parts of the sheets I'm working on right now: Left = VBA, Right = Gambatte

Ultimately I will probably just stay with VBA as I'm finding it easier to work with, but I'm curious what other people's thoughts are or if this conversation comes up much. Again, very new to this but I'm really looking forward to making progress on this.

Hmm... Looking at those portraits, the second palette does fit better with the art and is more eye popping. As you say, it is the closest colours when actually looking at a GBC screen but it doesn't say that the console itself uses that palette.

The thing is that the colour differences in GBC emulation don't pop up as much as say NES or Mega Drive rips, with the former having no consistent palette due to the nature of the console and the latter depends on emulator with more modern rips using the correct one. Another console is the Atari 7800 but there are a few rips of that console so the subject doesn't pop up on sprite ripping (but does on emulation though). Other consoles have their palette differences but they are extremely minor, like a value or two in difference and don't get talked about. e.g. mGBA and bsnes in terms of Super Game Boy emulation.

Most rips on the site would use the former palette as it is assumed that they are ripped via VBA (a couple have been ripped via mGBA). There are some such as Game & Watch Gallery 3 that have a darker palette. Why I mentioned that example is one due to the comments that people made about being too dark and two re-ripping the title screen as it is very incomplete.

As a note, mGBA and SameBoy (both accurate emulators for GBA and GB emulation) use the first palette too. SameBoy though does have a "Preserve Hardware" palette option where it is darker but nothing like Gambatte and still bright by comparison. If 3 different emulators have the same/similar palette (VBA, mGBA, SameBoy) then it is the case of majority wins. If it does turn out that Gambatte's palette is correct then virtually most rips on the site would have be re-ripped or corrected by the ripper.