Okay, I have had gb, gbc, and gba games and I've never had trouble with them. This kid i know (8-10?) asked me if I could fix his gba emeral. He said, "I've had it for like 2 years and all of a sudden, it won't play on my DS." I figured maybe he just got candy/dirt/whatever on the metal strips or his DS is being retarded. On other DS's and DS Lites, the game will not recognize (it doesn't even know it's there) and I can't figure out for the life of me what could have caused this. The kid doesn't remember what he was doing when or before it happened so I can't even guess. Has anyone ever experienced this before? Is it bricked?

Either it's a fake game, somebody used too many poorly made AR/Gameshark codes, or it just randomly broke for no reason.

Perhaps I'm just on the wrong trail of thought (I don't like having to use petty excuses such as "I'm really sick", but it's true), maybe it was just save files (or things in them) they have to potential to mess up. And that is usually caused by poorly made codes (sometimes the ones that come with the AR). Though there might be a slight possibility of a game being bricked if somebody did something really stupid.

Uh.... is that clearer? That's kind of what I really meant.

Yeah, I catch you, Wymsy.
From how I see it, the problem is most likely caused by game abuse (i.e. instead of softly blowing on the outside metal stripes if it's not reading, blowing harder, or even spitting on it, which I have heard has been done, and not because of AR/GS codes). If something doesn't even read, AR or GS would have positively nothing to do with it (it's possible that the save data could be erased, albeit unlikely, but never cause the game to be unreadable).


That's what I think also. Softly blowing on it usually works 1st time, and occasionally second time, and I've never had to do it more than 3 times. Have him try that - softly blow on the metal strips (with the emphasis on softly), and if the game still continues to not read, I'd say that the metal strips have been damaged somehow.

- DNA

Water exposure.
Magnetic interference by putting it near a TV, Magnets, Radiators.
Heat exposure.

Main things off the top of my head.

Sorry I didn't reply earlier. I'm new and it was kind of difficult to find my post.




I'm kind of leaning toward electromagnetic damage too. I've cleaned the metal strips and checked for extensive erosion (there wasn't any that would merit connection loss) and also checked for drop damage (bent/chipped/rattling parts; damaged/broken solder points). I've also studied the clock battery issue and though that may exist by now too, I don't think it affects the readability of the firmware. There just isn't anything else I can imagine that would do that. It's like the game on the cartridge was just erased! Anyway, thanks you guys for the suggestions. I can see this isn't a common instance and so I'm just going to call it a freak breakdown and see if I can't reprogram it or something. Has anybody seen schematics or visual diagrams of these cartridges?

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