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Agent skill

Game Boy ROM Playthrough Driver

by trekawek in trekawek/coffee-gb

Plays an authorized Game Boy or Game Boy Color ROM in one persistent headless Coffee GB session, inspecting frames and keeping an action trace for replay or tests.

MITAuto-check passedGame Development

Install Game Boy ROM Playthrough Driver

skills CLI
$ npx skills add trekawek/coffee-gb --skill play-gb-rom -a claude-code

Project install by default; add -g for ~/.claude/skills/.

GitHub CLI
$ gh skill install trekawek/coffee-gb play-gb-rom --agent claude-code

Project scope by default; add --scope user for a personal install. Needs GitHub CLI 2.90.0 or later (public preview).

Manual copy
$ git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/trekawek/coffee-gb.git skills-src && mkdir -p .claude/skills && cp -r skills-src/.agents/skills/play-gb-rom .claude/skills/play-gb-rom && rm -rf skills-src

Use ~/.claude/skills/ instead of .claude/skills for a personal install. The folder must contain SKILL.md.

Claude Code skills documentation · loads skills from .claude/skills/

Facts

Skill name
play-gb-rom
GitHub stars
1.2k
Token cost
~1.3k tokens
SKILL.md length
667 words
Files
4 (incl. scripts)
Skills in repo
5
Repo updated
First seen
Licence
MIT

At a glance

Plays an authorized Game Boy or Game Boy Color ROM in one persistent headless Coffee GB session, inspecting frames and keeping an action trace for replay or tests.

  • Works in 4 steps: Work from a clean or task-specific… → Resolve exactly one user-authorized ROM.… → Start the bundled driver in a PTY so… → …
  • Exploring a Game Boy game to reproduce a bug or reach a specific state
  • SKILL.md covers Start one private session, Drive and inspect, Preserve reproducibility and Finish safely
  • Runs Java and Shell scripts from its folder

What it does

One emulator process is kept alive while the agent loops: look at the latest PNG frame, choose the next input, send it and append the action to a private trace. A bundled shell script builds Coffee GB, compiles a Java driver in a private directory under `/tmp` and prints the session folder; the ROM is read in place and never copied, hashed, uploaded or committed.

Commands are sent one per line: `BUTTON` with an optional hold and dwell length, `STEP` to advance frames, `CAPTURE` to record a frame, `STATUS` for emulated state and `QUIT` to end the session while keeping the trace and frames. Long waits are split into several steps. The emulator backend disables battery writes and has no serial peer, so saves, clock persistence and link features such as multiplayer or the printer cannot be exercised, and the agent should say so.

When your agent uses it

  • Exploring a Game Boy game to reproduce a bug or reach a specific state
  • Recording a frame-accurate input trace to replay or turn into a test
  • Running a long playthrough without restarting the emulator between inputs

Example prompts

  • “Load the ROM at ./roms/adventure.gb in Coffee GB and get past the title screen.”
  • “Reproduce the crash in the second dungeon and keep the input trace so we can write a regression test.”
  • “Step the game forward a few seconds and show me the latest frame.”

Requirements

  • A Coffee GB checkout that the bundled script can build
  • A ROM file you are authorized to use
  • A terminal session with stdin kept open

Workflow steps

4 steps, taken from the first numbered list in SKILL.md.

  1. Work from a clean or task-specific Coffee GB checkout.
  2. Resolve exactly one user-authorized ROM. Honor local AGENTS.md instructions. Never guess among
  3. Start the bundled driver in a PTY so stdin stays open
  4. Keep the returned process/session ID. Do not relaunch the driver for each action.

What it can do on your machine

Read from SKILL.md and the folder at commit 554ea56. It shows what the files ask for, not the result of running them.

  • Tool permissions

    Pre-approves nothing: there is no allowed-tools line, so your agent's usual permission prompts apply.

    From allowed-tools in the SKILL.md frontmatter.

  • Runs code

    Ships 2 files in scripts/ (Java and Shell), which the agent can run.

    From the folder's file list and the shell code blocks in SKILL.md.

  • Network

    No URLs in SKILL.md.

    From URLs in SKILL.md, links to its own repository left out.

  • Credentials

    Names no API keys, tokens, secrets or passwords.

    From names ending in _API_KEY, _TOKEN, _SECRET, _KEY or _PASSWORD in SKILL.md.

Context cost

Game Boy ROM Playthrough Driver loads about 1.3k tokens when it runs. Until then it costs about 92 tokens; SKILL.md has 667 words of instructions outside code blocks.

Always · name and description, kept in context so the agent knows when to use it
~92
When it runs · the whole SKILL.md, loaded when a task matches
~1.3k

Estimates: characters ÷ 4, the usual rule of thumb; real counts depend on the model's tokenizer. Scripts and assets cost tokens only if the agent reads them.

Safety

Auto-check passed

The automated check found no risky patterns in SKILL.md.

Automated static check — not a guarantee. Review scripts before installing. It scans the text of SKILL.md for risky patterns (piping downloads into a shell, reading credential files, hidden Unicode, destructive commands); the scripts in this folder are not scanned.

SKILL.md

The full file from trekawek/coffee-gb at commit 554ea56, republished under its MIT licence (© trekawek). 667 words, ~1,273 tokens.

Download SKILL.mdSave it as .claude/skills/play-gb-rom/SKILL.md (or your agent's skills folder). This skill also uses 3 other files; get the full folder from GitHub.
name
play-gb-rom
description
Run an authorized local Game Boy or Game Boy Color ROM in one persistent headless Coffee GB session, inspect captured frames, send controller input interactively, and retain a frame-accurate action trace for replay or test authoring. Use when asked to play, navigate, explore, reproduce, or automate gameplay without restarting the emulator between inputs.

Play GB ROM

Keep one emulator process alive, inspect its latest PNG, decide the next input, and append every action to a private trace. Use this loop for long playthroughs as well as short reproduction work.

Start one private session

  1. Work from a clean or task-specific Coffee GB checkout.

  2. Resolve exactly one user-authorized ROM. Honor local AGENTS.md instructions. Never guess among ambiguous revisions, and never print, copy, hash, upload, or commit the ROM or save data.

  3. Start the bundled driver in a PTY so stdin stays open:

    text
    .claude/skills/play-gb-rom/scripts/play-gb-rom.sh <authorized-rom>

    Use a tool invocation with tty: true and a short initial yield. The wrapper builds Coffee GB, creates a mode-700 directory under /tmp, compiles the driver there, and prints the private session directory plus sanitized build progress. A cold build may take about a minute. It reads the ROM in place and does not copy or symlink it.

  4. Keep the returned process/session ID. Do not relaunch the driver for each action.

The current Agent backend intentionally disables battery writes and attaches a null serial endpoint. A session therefore starts from the ROM's normal initial state, retains progress only while the process lives, and cannot exercise link peripherals. Report this limitation when the requested playthrough depends on saves, RTC persistence, multiplayer, printer, or Mobile Adapter traffic.

Drive and inspect

Send one newline-terminated command at a time:

text
BUTTON A
BUTTON RIGHT 12 60
STEP 120
CAPTURE map
STATUS
QUIT
  • BUTTON <RIGHT|LEFT|UP|DOWN|A|B|SELECT|START> [hold_frames] [dwell_frames] presses, advances the held frames, always releases, advances the dwell frames, and captures the resulting frame. Defaults are 3 held frames and 30 dwell frames.
  • STEP <frames> advances without input and captures the resulting frame.
  • CAPTURE [label] records the current frame without advancing. Labels are optional safe tokens.
  • STATUS reports emulated tick/frame, CPU/PPU state, and the latest frame token without advancing.
  • QUIT releases input, closes the owner thread, and leaves the private trace and frames available.

Counts are bounded per command. For long waits, issue several STEP commands so the user receives regular progress updates and tool calls do not block for more than 60 seconds.

After each action, open the reported PNG from <session>/frames/ with the local image-viewing tool. Use the visible screen—not guessed menu timing—to choose the next input. Keep commentary concise for long runs: report milestones, ambiguity, and blockers rather than narrating every button. The initial one-frame capture may legitimately be black during startup; issue STEP and inspect the next capture before classifying that as a failure. Use about a one-second stdin-tool yield for normal commands because the resident process remains alive after printing its result; poll again only when no action marker has arrived.

Show full SKILL.md (239 more words)Show less

Preserve reproducibility

actions.tsv records command order, starting and ending emulated positions, hold/dwell/step frame counts, and PNG basenames. It deliberately contains no ROM identity or filesystem path. Treat the trace as the source for a later deterministic input script or integration test; copy only generic button/timing facts into repository tests or documentation.

When a destination is ambiguous, capture and inspect instead of restarting. If an action produces an unexpected screen, continue from the resident session when safe and record the correction. Do not claim a complete playthrough from transport or memory evidence alone; confirm the visible end state.

Finish safely

Send QUIT, confirm cleanup_buttons=true and session_closed=true, then remove only the exact private session directory when its frames and trace are no longer needed. Prefer QUIT over a signal so the completion markers are observable; the shutdown hook still releases input and closes the Agent if the process is interrupted. Never commit or publish generated class files, ROMs, saves, local paths, or an action trace that identifies private gameplay. Prefer openly licensed or public-domain game imagery for screenshots that will be published. A commercial-game screenshot may be committed only when a project maintainer with release authority explicitly approves that exact image for editorial or promotional use from a lawfully available local copy. Publish no more than three such screenshots per release, keep them limited to demonstrating Coffee GB's UI or compatibility, and identify the game and rights holder without implying endorsement.

© trekawek, MIT. Rendered from Markdown: HTML in the file is shown as text, images as links, and headings moved down two levels. Raw file

Files

SKILL.md and 3 other files (scripts) in .agents/skills/play-gb-rom of trekawek/coffee-gb.

  • SKILL.md
  • agents/openai.yaml
  • scripts/PlayGbRom.java
  • scripts/play-gb-rom.sh

Open the folder on GitHubat commit 554ea56

Compare with similar skills

Game Boy ROM Playthrough Driver next to the 5 skills that share the most tags, products or categories with it. Stars are the repository's; “used in” counts other GitHub owners with a copy.

Game Boy ROM Playthrough Driver compared with similar skills
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Game Boy ROM Playthrough Driver this skilltrekawek/coffee-gb1.2k—~1.3kAutomated safety check: PassMIT
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Validate GsdkPlayFab/gsdk170—~645Automated safety check: PassApache-2.0
Tiny Game Controllerminigdx/tiny164—~874Automated safety check: PassMIT
Evidence-Based Game QAzenstory-ai/novel-to-game841—~389Automated safety check: PassMIT
Build Game Inventorynirholas/three.ws2291 repos~418Automated safety check: PassApache-2.0

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Works with

Categories

Questions about Game Boy ROM Playthrough Driver

What does Game Boy ROM Playthrough Driver do?

Plays an authorized Game Boy or Game Boy Color ROM in one persistent headless Coffee GB session, inspecting frames and keeping an action trace for replay or tests. One emulator process is kept alive while the agent loops: look at the latest PNG frame, choose the next input, send it and append the action to a private trace. A bundled shell script builds Coffee GB, compiles a Java driver in a private directory under `/tmp` and prints the session folder; the ROM is read in place and never copied, hashed, uploaded or committed.

When should I use Game Boy ROM Playthrough Driver?

Game Boy ROM Playthrough Driver fits situations like: exploring a Game Boy game to reproduce a bug or reach a specific state; recording a frame-accurate input trace to replay or turn into a test; running a long playthrough without restarting the emulator between inputs.

How do I install Game Boy ROM Playthrough Driver in Claude Code?

Run `npx skills add trekawek/coffee-gb --skill play-gb-rom -a claude-code`. Or copy the skill folder (.agents/skills/play-gb-rom in trekawek/coffee-gb) into .claude/skills/play-gb-rom in your project. Claude Code loads it when a task matches its description.

How do I install Game Boy ROM Playthrough Driver in Codex?

Run `npx skills add trekawek/coffee-gb --skill play-gb-rom -a codex`. Or copy the skill folder (.agents/skills/play-gb-rom in trekawek/coffee-gb) into .agents/skills/play-gb-rom in your project. Codex loads it when a task matches its description.

Can I use Game Boy ROM Playthrough Driver in Cursor, Gemini CLI or GitHub Copilot?

Cursor, Gemini CLI, GitHub Copilot and OpenCode also load SKILL.md folders. With the skills CLI, run `npx skills add trekawek/coffee-gb --skill play-gb-rom -a cursor` (or -a gemini-cli, github-copilot or opencode for the others). To copy it by hand, put the folder in .cursor/skills/play-gb-rom, .gemini/skills/play-gb-rom, .github/skills/play-gb-rom and .opencode/skills/play-gb-rom in your project.

What does Game Boy ROM Playthrough Driver need to run?

Going by SKILL.md and its folder, Game Boy ROM Playthrough Driver needs Java and a shell for the scripts in its folder. Our summary lists: A Coffee GB checkout that the bundled script can build; A ROM file you are authorized to use; A terminal session with stdin kept open.

Does Game Boy ROM Playthrough Driver access the network?

SKILL.md contains no URLs. Any network use would come from the scripts or tools the agent runs. This is read from the text; nothing was executed.

Is Game Boy ROM Playthrough Driver safe to install?

Our automated static check of SKILL.md found no risky patterns, such as piping downloads into a shell, reading credential files or hidden Unicode. It is not a guarantee. The check reads SKILL.md only: the scripts in the folder are not scanned, so read them before running anything.

What licence does Game Boy ROM Playthrough Driver use?

Game Boy ROM Playthrough Driver is published under the MIT licence (the repository's licence). It allows redistribution, so the full SKILL.md is shown on this page.

How many tokens does Game Boy ROM Playthrough Driver use?

About 1.3k tokens (SKILL.md is roughly 5.1k characters). Agents keep only the skill's name and description in context until a task matches; then they load SKILL.md in full.

What are the alternatives to Game Boy ROM Playthrough Driver?

Skills that share tags, products or a category with Game Boy ROM Playthrough Driver: Ship Web Games (nirholas/three.ws, 229 stars), Validate Gsdk (PlayFab/gsdk, 170 stars), Tiny Game Controller (minigdx/tiny, 164 stars) and Evidence-Based Game QA (zenstory-ai/novel-to-game, 841 stars). The comparison table on this page puts their stars, adoption, token cost, safety result and licence side by side.

Who maintains Game Boy ROM Playthrough Driver?

trekawek (a GitHub user) maintains it in trekawek/coffee-gb, which has 1,171 GitHub stars. The repository holds 5 skills in this directory. The repository was last updated on October 1, 2026.

Source: trekawek/coffee-gb on GitHub. Facts on this page come from the repository at the commit we read; the author's words are quoted as theirs.