The first is the USB Memory Card adapter from EMS (http://www.hkems.com/product/gc/gc%20usb.htm). This 64-MB save device is similar to its PS2 equivalent, though, unlike the PS2 version, you don’t need an original memory card to use it. Connect it to your GameCube, turn on the console, and access the Memory Card screen, then connect the USB connector to your PC. Because the USB cable provides power, you can do this without connecting to the GameCube at all. You’ll have the same options without being tethered to your GC.

However, in order to access the saves and make sure they’ve copied across correctly, connect to both PC and GC at once. Here’s how:

The other option, apart from the EMS device, is the GameShark GameSaves device (http://www.gameshark.com/), launched at the end of 2003. It provides similar USB-based hardware and even ships with 150 saves already on the device.

There are a few game-hacking tools available, many from the Game Save Sharing Community. In particular, check out Psydonia’s GC Save Convert software that allows you to change region codes ( [Hack #49] ) on most GameCube games. The latest EMS USB adapter bundles this software.

There are some save-hacking programs in progress, though the power of Action Replay codes has quashed some of the interest here. At the time of writing, there weren’t any worth recommending.

If you’re looking for help and trading information on game saves, the Nintendo Game Save Sharing Community (http://www.gci.net.tc/), a Yahoo! Group, has a mass of information, discussion, and a file area with saves. The GameShark web site itself (http://www.gameshark.com/) has a mass of saves in its particular format, but GameFAQs is still one of the most useful sources, with the Legend Of Zelda: The Wind Waker page (http://www.gamefaqs.com/console/gamecube/save/3447.html) featuring a whole bunch of near-completion saves.

Finally, Arson Winter has a good page of individual saves, including some cool custom emblems for F-Zero GX. Watch out for incompatible saves from the two major save devices, though; explicitly named GameShark saves (in GCS format) seem somewhat more popular than EMS adapter saves (in GCI format).

It’s fairly easy to copy Xbox saves with Action Replay or Mega X-Key hardware. The only exceptions are a small number of saves that are too big to move from the hard drive to a memory card, such as some Knights Of The Old Republic saves. You’ll need FTP access to the machine to grab those; search Xbox-Scene (http://www.xbox-scene.com/) for more information on this.

It’s easy to find Xbox saves online. Start at GameFAQs, but beware of the cryptographic signatures. You can’t simply hack in the data and expect it to work. However, you can resign saves with third-party utilities such as XSaveSig. There are plenty of interesting, completely legitimate saves too. For example, the GameFAQs Halo page (http://www.gamefaqs.com/console/xbox/save/32488.html) has saves in which the player starts in locations impossible to reach during normal gameplay. The Codejunkies site (http://www.codejunkies.com/) also has a very large number of Xbox Action Replay codes, often including very up-to-date games.

There are several handy Dreamcast utilities to back up and copy your saved games. If you’re connected to the Internet via your DC ( [Hack #54] ), you can easily download saved games or even email them to yourself from your PC. Obviously, most people don’t have their Dreamcasts set up with dial-up accounts, so an alternative is to burn CDs with memory card saves on them, as done when working with VMU games ( [Hack #52] ). Even this isn’t perfect, though, because you can’t write saves to CD from the DC. Even if you could, several games have protected saved games, such as those for Phantasy Star Online.

Fortunately, the EMS-created Nexus memory cards (http://www.segatech.com/technical/nexus/) plug into your PC much as those memory cards mentioned earlier. You can copy saves perfectly, even those from PSO! However, you must have your memory card plugged into a Dreamcast controller that is itself plugged into a Dreamcast to draw the power necessary for the transfer to happen, however, so make sure your DC is close to your PC.

There’s really only one major memory card copying device for the Nintendo 64: Interact’s DexDrive N64. A review mirrored on the Icequake N64 site (http://n64.icequake.net/mirror/64scener.parodius.com/dexreviw.htm) gives a good overview of its basic information. Plug your N64 Controller Pack into this device, then plug the device into your PC via the serial port. There are some minor complaints about its reliability, but it’s the only major option out there if you’re an N64 nerd who wants to transfer your saves around. Although you can see the relative unpopularity of the device by the paucity of its saves on GameFAQs, there are a couple of completed saves for Super Mario 64 (http://www.gamefaqs.com/console/n64/save/22511.html) to keep you going.

The first thing to stress with the Game Boy is that it doesn’t actually include standalone saves. Some Game Boy carts, particularly early ones, don’t even have any SRAM for saving information on them. Depending on the complexity of the title in question, each individual cart can have a differing amount of SRAM.

Surprisingly, there are devices that grab the .SAV data off the cartridge. In particular, the GBA Super Memory Stick (http://www.success-hk.com/review/gba_memory_stick/index2.htm) plugs into the EXT port on the Game Boy Advance and allows you to copy saved games from whatever cartridge is plugged in.

Don’t forget the usual suspects, though. Both the Action Replay and the GameShark allow you to save your Game Boy’s current save state via USB. This is handy if you’ve played 150 hours of Pokémon and want to make sure that nobody overwrites your save! Since these utilities also allow memory code hacking, they may be your best bet.

As for finding saved games online, the GameFAQs boards have a big selection, including a massive set for Pokémon Ruby (http://www.gamefaqs.com/portable/gbadvance/save/32745.html). You may be able to take .SAV files from archives such as Zophar’s Game Boy .SAV archive (http://www.zophar.net/sav/) and Game Boy Advance .SAV archive (http://www.zophar.net/savgba/) and put them on your GBA. Just remember that these files represent the entire save state of the cartridge and will entirely overwrite your current saves, so be sure to back up your existing saves first.