One of the best-unmarketed features of the Analogue Pocket is that it can back up save files from cartridges. You don’t need any additional hardware, nor do you have to do anything all too involved, it’s simply a feature of the Pocket that is unmarketed, unadvertised, and barely known.
Introduction
Typically, game cartridge batteries last about 20 or so years. The original Pokemon series on the Game Boy was released in 1996. 20 years from then puts any launch versions of the game at over 7 years past its expected expiration date.
If your games work currently, and you can load up your game from your childhood, then it may be a good idea to look into backing it up to preserve the memory.
This guide works for any cartridge-based game you can plop into your Analogue Pocket, not just Pokemon. The process is quick, simple, and easy.
What You’ll Need
- Analogue Pocket
- A game cartridge
- A computer, phone, or other device to move files on the SD card
Backup Cartridge Saves on an Analogue Pocket
Now that you’ve got everything you need, let’s get to it.
1. Boot up the game
In your game, be sure to load the save. In Pokemon, this would be hitting Continue from the main starting menu and seeing your player in the overworld.
All games have different ways of loading up past saves. Some say Load Game, some say Continue, some just start right up. Your goal here is to simply verify that you’ve started the save game that you want to back up.
Load Game in Lunar Legends
2. Make a Memory
Analogue introduced Memory support in the 1.1 beta, so you’ll need to make sure your firmware is a version higher than that. Right now, the most recent update is version 2.3, and the 1.1 beta was originally released back in July of 2022. If you’ve been using your Pocket since then, chances are you’re on a firmware higher than 1.1.
To make a Memory, you’ll need to press the Analogue button in the middle of the device, on its chin, and the up button on the d-pad at the same time. If done correctly, you should see “State Saved” in the lower-left corner of the screen. If you see “Save Failed” make sure you have an SD card in your device.
How to make a save state (make a Memory) on the Analogue Pocket
Memories are save states, which are different from save games. Save states are saved at the exact moment, not when using the game’s included save mechanism. As in, if you’re mid-battle, and make a save state, your game will resume at that exact point mid-battle.
However, on an Analogue Pocket, a save file is created alongside every save state. That save file is your full save backup, not a save state.
2.1 Update Your Pocket
If your device is on a firmware under 1.1, you can update your console relatively easily. Visit the firmware page for Analogue OS and choose the firmware you want to download. The file that is downloaded will have the extension .bin. A lot of archive managing software will either attempt to open it, but you need the .bin file itself, not anything else. Plop the bin right onto the root of your Pocket’s SD card, then turn on your Pocket. It will immediately start updating.
The root of a storage device is the top level, not in any folder. When you click the storage device on your computer and see those files right there, they are in the root. Check the image below for reference.
The Pocket firmware file on the root of the SD card
Also, the Pocket supports upgrading and downgrading the firmware. if you are on a higher firmware and want to go back, simply put the old firmware file on the SD card the same way.
3. Retrieve the save
Now that the Memory is made, it’s time to retrieve the save.
Turn off your Analogue Pocket and put the system’s microSD card into your computer. You will want to navigate to the Memory directory as shown below. I use a Mac, but the directory is the same on any type of computer – i just think it looks better in macOS, but that’s a topic for another day.
Save game location on the Analogue Pocket SD card
Your save may have an odd-sounding name, but sorting by Date Added should result in it being at the very top of the list. Be careful here as well, the file ending in .sav is your save game. The file ending in sta is your save state. We want the save game.
Copy the file to your computer, or an external hard drive, email it to yourself, save it to the cloud, anything. Just be sure you can find it, and if your computer spontaneously combusts, you can still find the save somewhere.
4. Import the save
You’ve backed up the save and you can finally rest knowing that your team from 20 years ago is not lost to the vicious cycle of digital death.
You have options now on how to use it.
If you’re using openFPGA, saves are typically stored in the /Saves/[console]/common directory. IMPORTANT: If you organize your ROMs by having nested folders, you should see those same nested folders here. You need to place the the save in the same “mirrored” location as the rom itself. To better explain, let’s look at the picture below.
My personal Lunar Legend save location for openFPGA
Following the paths, I have the save located at /Saves/gba/common/@Game Boy Advance/1 USA I – O/Lunar Legend (USA).sav. My self-backed up rom can be found at /Assets/gba/common/@Game Boy Advance/1 USA I – O/Lunar Legend (USA).gba
These files need to have the same name as the rom. If your game is called PacketmanStars.gba, the save should be named PacketmanStars.sav.
Once you boot up the rom via its associated openFPGA cores, you should be presented with the same continue, load game screen as mentioned in step 1.
The sav can be used across different emulators as well. If you use one of the many retro handhelds, you simply have to find the name of the save, rename your backed-up save the same way, and replace the one on the retro handheld. For example, using the mGBA core through RetroArch on my Miyoo Mini Plus with Onion OS installed, the save is located in the /Saves/CurrentProfile/saves/mGBA directory. The same logic applies to other consoles, cores, and saves. Replace mGBA with the name of the core you’re using for the game you’re playing, and you should find the saves there.
Save location on Onion OS
4.1 Save types
Some systems and emulators use different save types. For example, mGBA through RetroArch uses a different save type than the Analogue Pocket or standalone version of mGBA on your computer. One uses .srm and the other uses .sav., respectively Luckily, this is a simple fix for GBA games — just change the extension. If it says PacketmanStars.srm, change it to PacketmanStars.sav.
Other consoles may not have it this easy, however. The best option, in my opinion, is to do a quick Google for an online converter. Let’s say the save type for a console in one emulator is .type and another is .kind. Do a quick Google for “.save to .kind online converter” and I can guarantee there is a website dedicated exclusively to doing just that.
5. Backup your save
This step is the most important one.
The goal of all of this is to make sure that your game is not lost to the sands of time. If you don’t back up your save or only back it up in one place, it’s gone forever should something happen. You can try backing it up again, but what if the battery dies before then? Tears will flow.
I would recommend backing the save up to your computer, an external hard drive, or a cloud service, and emailing it to yourself. Not one of those options, but all of them. By using a cloud service and emailing it to yourself, you can rest assured that there’s a copy of the save somewhere that you can always reach. Go ballistic and download the save on every computer you come across if you’re insane enough.
Lunar Legends save backed up to Google Drive
For me, I have an oddly designed, separate 64GB thumb drive that I only put save games on. 64GB is beyond what’s needed – a GBA save is only 128KB max — but it’s too large to be future-proof, essentially. As the years go on, games are getting larger, and by nature, so are the saves.
Right now, I can’t mod or hack my PS5, but in the future, I probably will be able to. From there, I’ll be plopping all my saves onto this thumb drive.
The chances of me losing the save following normal means is low. Sony’s cloud save service is probably never going to not exist. But what if, for some reason, my account gets hacked, or I get banned for modding the PS5 in the first place? I can’t access any of those saves. My Ghost of Tsushima save becomes a ghost to me.
In short, back up your saves everywhere you can. Twice even. Thrice. Frice.
Wrap-Up
The Analogue Pocket is one of the most premium handhelds on the market. It’s also one of the only FPGA consoles available, and the only one that is a handheld that can hardware-emulate multiple consoles.
Analogue added support for Memories over two years ago and has included more features as the days go by. With such a pivotal, useful, and needed feature being present in the Pocket, it’s a mystery why it’s not discussed more openly and frequently. Hopefully, this guide will help save some people from the heartache that is realizing your saves are dead and long gone.
What did you think of this guide? Are you going to backup all of your cartridges? Let us know in the comments below, and chat with us in our Discord!
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