These Delta emulator skins make your phone look like a real Game Boy

I’ve been obsessed with the Delta emulator on my iPhone all summer. Playing DS games from my childhood anywhere has been a blast, but what really makes it all the sweeter is how nice Sean Fletcher’s skins look.

I’ve always dreamt of emulators on the iPhone since the design community that uses iOS aligns more with the styles and trends I like. That’s not to say there aren’t great emulators on Android; there are a ton, but I find more designers use Macs and iPhones, so by proxy, iOS apps tend to look nicer. This theory was validated when Delta launched on the App Store with a super clean design from the start, but roughly four months later, one skin pack has risen above them all, and it looks better than my dreams.

This green skin is from the Transparent pack.

Fletcher started by making skins for the Game Boy Advance and Game Boy Colour emulators, but he’s recently branched out to start work on the DS skins. The Game Boy ones are called Delta Pocket, and there are a few varieties depending on how much you’re willing to spend.

The free tier nets you eight skins with solid colours, and four ‘Unlimited Editions’ that include more ambitious colours and cool retro screen filter effects. There are 12 more skins if you’re willing to pay $2. Those offer all kinds of design combos, such as Pokédex, Pikachu and retro handheld themes. There’s also a gold triforce version that looks a lot like the upcoming Switch Lite. This pack is my favourite since it includes the Pokédex and gold versions, plus one called Glacier, which looks like the clear plastic Game Boy Advance I had when I was ten.

The skin on the left is called ‘Crystal’ and appears to have sparkly flecks in its clear plastic. The macro shot on the right is the ‘Glacier’ skin.

The final pack is $5, and it’s only skins that mimic transparent plastic. Like Glacier, these look stunning, and the amount of detail and design work Fletcher must have put into them is jaw-dropping. Not only do they look real, but you can see fake moulding under the transparent plastic, and there is even a Delta logo that looks like it was stamped onto your iPhone’s motherboard.

During June, Fletcher released another pack full of skins to celebrate pride month. These are the same GBA/GBC skin layout, but they feature fun summer colours or rainbow designs. The proceeds from these skins went towards the Rainbow Road charity during June. He also released a limited edition rainbow transparent skin called ‘Dazzle Gleam’ that looks incredible, but it is only available once a year during June, so we’ll have to wait until next summer to get it.

The skin on the left has a Game Boy Advance filter overlay.

It’s worth pointing out that the Pride skins all feature Pixel grid overlays, so if you don’t want your screen to emulate the actual screen of the Game Boy Advance, these may not be for you. The free version of Delta Pocket has no overlays, but the $2 Plus package includes a few skins with various Game Boy screen emulation overlays if you want to try some out. They look awesome, and very true to life, but I mostly avoid the overlays since they make the games a little darker.

The final skins are called Delta Duo, and they’re meant for the DS emulator. These look really clean in portrait mode, but they’re only meant for AirPlay when you turn them in landscape. These look just as good as the Delta Pocket skins, and I’m personally hoping Fletcher will make some landscape skins with both screens to be used on the go as well. My favourite one is Catchem FE, named after Ash Ketchum from Pokémon. It’s modelled after a Pokédex and has a really unique look with a faceted d-pad in multiple shades of teal.

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But it’s more than just the layout and the colours. When it comes to Fletcher’s designs, it’s the small details the make them a cut above the rest. The texture on the body of the fake controller looks so real you can almost touch it, and the soft shadows casting both from and on the buttons make them appear hyper-realistic. Don’t even get me started on the screens, which have been given soft round corners, and the shading around the fake bezels makes it almost look like there’s a sheet of glass over the displays.

If you want to download some of Fletcher’s skins, some are available for free, while packs can cost anywhere from $2-$5. He’s created a really fun retro-inspired instruction booklet and product catalogue that can help you learn more about skins as well. All of the skins are available on his Gumroad store.