compumaxx/gba-video-studio

GBA Video Studio is a desktop application that converts any video file into a playable Game Boy Advance ROM. You load a video, trim it, configure encoding settings, and the tool produces a .gba file that plays on original hardware or an emulator. It is aimed at people who develop for the GBA or who mod Pokemon and other GBA game ROMs and want to add video sequences. The conversion pipeline uses FFmpeg to pre-process the video, then scales it to the GBA's native 240 by 160 pixel resolution. Frames are encoded using vector quantization, where each group of frames shares a compressed color codebook. Non-keyframes are stored as compressed deltas relative to the previous frame, similar to how modern video codecs work but tailored to the GBA's limited hardware. The tool streams frames directly to disk rather than loading them into RAM, so it handles longer videos without running out of memory. Audio can be encoded as raw PCM (cleaner but larger) or IMA ADPCM (about 50% smaller). Sample rate and volume are adjustable, and ADPCM rates are snapped to values the GBA hardware handles cleanly to avoid playback stutter. The visual editor lets you set trim points, preview how the video will look on the GBA's small screen with cropping and letterboxing applied, and choose from six built-in presets or configure every encoding parameter individually. Parameters include frames per second, codebook size, keyframe interval, and motion compensation, each with documented trade-offs between file size and quality. The tool integrates with GBA decompilation projects like pokefirered and pokeemerald, outputting ready-to-use C source files and binary assets that drop directly into those codebases. It is a Python desktop app using PySide6 for the interface, runs on Windows, macOS, and Linux, and requires devkitPro for the final compilation step. The project is GPL-3.0 licensed.