If you want to play GBA/GBC ROM hacks on your iOS device, but don't know how to patch and add them to your device, you need to do the following steps:
Unlike Android devices, the iOS App Store doesn't unfortunately have any patching apps, so you'll need your PC/notebook and iTunes of course.
Unlike Android devices, the iOS App Store doesn't unfortunately have any patching apps, so you'll need your PC/notebook and iTunes of course.
- Find a clean Pokemon Fire Red v1.0/Pokemon Emerald v1.0 ROM by typing either "1636 pokemon fire red (u)(squirrels) download" or "1986 pokemon emerald (u)(trashman) download" into your browser's search bar.
- Get NUPS or Lunar IPS and open whichever you need for your file to patch. Below, you'll find the steps for patching .ups files first.
- On NUPS, select "Apply an UPS patch to a file"
- You will now see a window, where you have to select your in Step 1 downloaded Pokemon ROM. Afterwards, another window pops up. This time, select your .ups file.
- Before patching, check the "Ignore" option, if the file is invalid. If you don't check this option, the patching might fail, and you'll have to do it all over again.
- Click "Patch". The patching should be done within less than a minute. You will get a notification that the patching was successful.
- Now to Lunar IPS: on Lunar IPS, click "Apply IPS Patch".
- As with NUPS, even on Lunar IPS, you will be asked to select your downloaded .ips file to use, browse to it. Then you will be asked to select the GBA/GBC ROM to apply the .ips file to. Browse to your unmodified GBA/GBC ROM.
- Once you have applied the patch to your ROM, a small window with the message "The file was successfully patched!" will pop up. Congratulations, you have successfully patched two ROMs!
- Connect your iOS device to your PC/notebook, and wait for iTunes to open by itself.
- Before that, create a folder with the name "GBA4iOS 2.1" on your desktop.
- Click your device in iTunes and in the left sidebar, click "File Sharing".
- Click "GBA4iOS 2.1" and click the Add-button to add your .gba or .gbc ROMs to your iOS device.
- Select your ROMs and move them into the newly created folder on your desktop.
- Once you have started your games, make sure to select everything on your list in the GBA4iOS 2.1 section, and click "Save to..." to save ALL in the GBA4iOS 2.1 folder.
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