Panajev2001a
GAF's Pleasant Genius
Message(#[edited out])
Hello and thank you for contacting Nintendo,
Great question! The Nintendo DS will not play older Game Boy games from the 8-bit Game Boy systems (DMG, MGB and CGB.)
The Game Boy Advance contained a Z80 processor which allowed it to play original 8-bit Game Boy games. Because of the age of the processor, and the difficulty in adding that processor to an already highly complicated architecture, the Z80 was not included in the final design of the DS.
For more information about the Nintendo DS, be sure to check out our website at www.nintendo.com.
Do not get me started on the issue of software emulators (we have a 67 MHz ARM9 and a 33 MHz ARM7 with a fulkly integrated sprite engine in Hardware plus 4 MB of main RAM)... or on the "ultra high" cost of adding a minusculous chip like the GBC CPU to the ARM7 SoC.