In 2024, Apple updated its guidelines once again to allow game emulators in the App Store to offer downloadable games. Following a week of this news, the Game Boy emulator iGBA was one of the first Apple-approved emulators for iPhone on the App Store. However, the emulator’s existence was short-lived.
Apple removed the emulator iGBA from the App Store on the grounds of violating the company’s App Review Guidelines related to copyright and spam. That said, Apple did not provide any specific details.
In a thread post, Testut said “So apparently Apple approved a knock-off of GBA4iOS”. He further added, “I did not give anyone permission to do this, yet it’s now sitting at the top of the charts (despite being filled with ads + tracking).” He quipped that he was “so glad App Review exists to protect consumers from scams and rip-offs like this.”
Testut also created another Nintendo game emulator called Delta, which is distributed outside of the App Store and via the third-party marketplace AltStore in the EU. We have no idea if Testut has plans to bring Delta to the App Store following the rule change.
iGBA emulator lets iPhone users play Game Boy games by loading free ROMs downloaded from the internet. ROMs can be found on the web for various games, the most popular ones being Pokémon and The Legend of Zelda franchises.
