First Impression
I’ll be real with you — when I first opened Pizza Boy A Pro, I wasn’t sure what to expect. My old GBA emulator (which I won’t name but it rhymes with “My Boy”) started getting super buggy after the last Android update. It would freeze mid-battle in Pokémon Emerald, and the audio started crackling like an old radio. Total dealbreaker. So I searched around, saw this app had a 4.8 rating, and figured for five and a half bucks it was worth a shot. The first thing I noticed was how clean the main menu looked. No random ads, no sketchy pop-ups asking for permissions. Just a simple file browser where I could point it at my SD card where I keep my ROMs. I loaded up Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones on a Tuesday night while waiting for my laundry at the local laundromat, and honestly I was shocked. It just worked. Full speed, no stutters, and the sound was crisp through my crappy earbuds. My immediate thought was “why didn’t I switch to this sooner?”
What It Does Well
Let me tell you, the performance on my Galaxy S23 is basically flawless. I’ve played through about 30 hours of Pokémon LeafGreen and the app hasn’t crashed once. Not one single time. That’s huge for me because my old app would crash if I looked at it wrong. The save state feature is a lifesaver — I can save right before a tough gym leader battle, and if I mess up, I just reload in one tap. No more walking back through Victory Road over and over. The fast-forward mode is also something I use constantly. When you’re grinding levels in Pokémon or just walking through a long dialogue sequence, being able to speed things up to 2x or even 3x feels amazing. I’ve also tested it with some action games like Metroid Fusion, where precise controls matter, and the on-screen buttons feel responsive enough that I actually beat the final boss first try. Another thing I love is that it reads compressed files directly. All my ROMs are in ZIP or RAR format, and I just pick them from my folders — no extracting needed. That saves me a ton of storage space and hassle.
Where It Falls Short
Okay, it’s not perfect. The settings menu is honestly a bit overwhelming at first. There are like a dozen different options for rendering, filters, audio buffers, and I have no clue what most of them do. I just left everything on default and it works fine, but if you’re like me and just want to play your games, it can feel like too much. Another thing is that the virtual d-pad could be a little bigger. When I’m playing fast-paced games like Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga, my thumb sometimes slips off the edge of the circle. I spent a solid 15 minutes in the settings trying to find a way to resize it, and while you can adjust the opacity and position, there’s no simple slider to just make the whole thing bigger. Also, I noticed that the app drains my battery faster than I’d like when using the fast-forward feature. I played for about an hour and a half at 2x speed on a bus ride and my phone went from 80% to 30%. That’s fine for short trips but if you’re planning on a long session, bring a charger. Oh, and the initial setup — finding where it scans for ROMs — took me an extra minute because the file picker hides your main storage behind a couple extra taps. Not a dealbreaker, but annoying.
Is It Worth the Price?
Absolutely. Five dollars and forty-nine cents is basically the cost of a fast-food meal these days, and this app gives me hundreds of hours of entertainment. I’ve already played through three full Pokémon games and a Zelda: The Minish Cap run, and I still have a backlog of RPGs to get through. Compare that to dropping sixty bucks on a new mobile game that’s full of ads and microtransactions — no contest. The Pro version unlocks all the features like save states and fast-forward, which the free version limits, and I think that’s fair. Developers deserve to get paid for good work, and this app is clearly a passion project. I also appreciate that there’s no subscription. You buy it once and it’s yours forever. I’ve had it for months and I’ve never felt the urge to uninstall it. If you care about playing GBA games on your phone, just buy this one and don’t waste time with the free alternatives.
Developer & Support
I actually had a small issue about two months ago. The app wasn’t detecting my external controller — a cheap Bluetooth SNES-style pad I bought off Amazon. I sent an email to the developer through the contact option in the app. It took about three days for them to reply, which felt like forever when I was impatient to play, but when they did respond, the answer was super helpful. They walked me through a specific pairing sequence and told me to disable “controller mapping” in Android settings. Worked perfectly after that. The email was friendly and written in plain English, not some robotic copy-paste garbage. I’ve dealt with app support that takes weeks or just ignores you, so three days with a real fix is actually pretty decent in my book. I get the sense that this is a small team or maybe just one dedicated person. They care about the app and it shows. Also, the app gets updated regularly — I’ve seen maybe four or five updates since I bought it, each one fixing small bugs or adding compatibility. That’s rare for a mobile emulator.
Privacy & Safety
Look, I’m not one of those people who reads every privacy policy, but I did check what permissions this app asks for. It needs access to your storage to read ROM files, which makes sense because your games aren’t stored inside the app itself. It doesn’t ask for camera, microphone, location, or contacts — those are the big red flags. I also noticed it has no internet permission except for the Google Drive sync feature, which I turned off because I don’t need my save files in the cloud. That’s a big plus for me. I’ve had apps in the past that tried to phone home with usage data or show intrusive ads that track you. This one is completely clean. No ads at all, no weird background services. It just sits there until you open it. I feel comfortable giving it full storage access on my phone, which is something I can’t say for a lot of apps. If privacy is a concern for you, this app is about as safe as it gets for an emulator.
Can Pizza Boy A Pro load ROMs directly from ZIP or RAR files without extracting them?
Yes, Pizza Boy A Pro reads compressed files directly. You can select ROMs from your folders in ZIP or RAR format, saving storage space and eliminating the need to extract files before playing.
Does Pizza Boy A Pro have a fast-forward feature for speeding up gameplay?
Yes, the app includes a fast-forward mode that lets you speed up gameplay to 2x or even 3x speed. This is great for grinding levels in Pokémon or skipping through long dialogue sequences, though it may drain your battery faster than normal play.
Why does my game freeze or have crackling audio in other emulators after an Android update?
This is a common issue with older emulators like 'My Boy' after system updates. Pizza Boy A Pro is optimized for modern Android devices, offering stable performance without crashes or audio crackling, as confirmed by users playing through full games like Pokémon LeafGreen without issues.
How can I make the virtual d-pad bigger in Pizza Boy A Pro?
The app lets you adjust the d-pad's opacity and position in the settings, but there is no simple slider to increase its overall size. If your thumb slips off during fast-paced games, try repositioning the controls to a more comfortable spot on the screen.
How does Pizza Boy A Pro compare to 'My Boy' emulator for GBA games?
Pizza Boy A Pro is a more stable and modern alternative to 'My Boy,' which often freezes and has audio crackling after Android updates. With a clean, ad-free interface, flawless performance on devices like the Galaxy S23, and support for compressed ROMs, it offers a much smoother experience for about $5.50.
