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GBA emulation started right after the console's release; any checks against emulation around that time were primarily targeting bootleg/flash carts.

Some PSP games also have anti-CFW (custom firmware) checks that will also trip emulators that haven't yet coded to deal with that.

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Fun fact: GBA emulation and homebrew development actually started before the system's release [1]. IIRC, the official devkit was leaked, then someone wrote a summary of the low-level documentation and started circulating that, which (since the CPU had an off-the-shelf ARM core) was enough to start making rudimentary emulators and tech demos.

[1] https://web.archive.org/web/20001214040900/http://www.zophar...

That's so interesting, I'm surprised I never knew that.

Also the GBA went on to sell 81 million units. Pretty good evidence emulation doesn't kill consoles.

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