Our Compute Module 4 isn’t just for industrial applications. Turns out it can also resurrect childhood memories. Jeff Geerling blended sentimentality and innovation by sneaking one inside an old SEGA Game Gear to bring it, and his memories of Christmases past, back to life.

Though the Game Gear was often seen as the poor cousin of the Game Boy, it still offered approximately 390 games. Not enough to satiate some modern gamers’ desires, however, so Jeff found a thoroughly 21st-century workaround.

RetroPie to the rescue

Compute Module 4 is running RetroPie inside a salvaged Game Gear handset, giving the user access to as many classic games as the innards of their machine will allow. Jeff explains in his build video that he could have used a Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W or a 3A+, which would draw less power but wouldn’t be quite as fast.

Custom modding kit

Jeff found a used, broken Game Gear handset online, and turned to John Maddison’s Zega Mame Boy, a Game Gear modding kit designed for use with Raspberry Pi, to help with the transformation. A smaller, more powerful audio board stepped in to improve the Game Gear’s sound. He also got a new screen and some fresh buttons from Hand Held Legend to disguise the battle scars from hours and hours of use in the handset’s previous life. I know from personal experience that your screen will get scratched if you throw your Game Boy at the wall every time you fail to complete the Bowser’s Castle level in Super Mario Bros.

With more time, Jeff would have addressed the battery life issue and swapped out the device’s original battery for something a bit punchier.

Anyone got a time machine?

Using Raspberry Pi to bridge the gap between past and present is one of our favourite things. If 2003-me had known that 2024-me could use my hot pink Game Boy Mini to play any retro game I wanted, I would’ve kept hold of it. Alas, off to eBay I go to source another one.