Pokémon Emerald

Pokémon Emerald Version
Also known as: Pocket Monsters Emerald (JP) Developer: Game Freak Publishers: The Pokémon Company (JP), Nintendo (INT) Platform: Game Boy Advance Released in JP: September 16, 2004 Released in US: May 1, 2005 Released in EU: October 21, 2005 Released in AU: June 9, 2005 This game has unused areas. This game has hidden development-related text. This game has unused music. This game has unused sounds. This game has unused text. This game has a hidden sound test. This game has regional differences. This game has a development article This game has a prototype article This game has a notes page This game has a bugs page This game has a Data Crystal page

Pokémon Emerald is an updated version of Ruby and Sapphire that pits the player against Team Aqua and Team Magma, adds a new Deoxys form, and introduces the Battle Frontier.

To do: Zigzagoon seen from cable car Stuff from the Emerald source code of the 9/2/2020 and 7/20/2021 Nintendo data leaks. There may be more unused or normally-unseen text. Document unused code/data at Notes:Pokémon Emerald.

Sub-Pages

Development Info

Prototype Info

Notes

Bugs

Debugging Tools

To do: Search for more.

Sound Check

Japanese Emerald has a Sound Check like Ruby, Sapphire, FireRed, and LeafGreen, and akin to the latter it was removed in localizations.

To access it, patch 0x301AC to 21 83 0E 08 to replace the Options entry on the main menu with a call to Sound Check.

The changes to the "stereo" entry in the Driver Test made in FireRed and LeafGreen were carried over to Emerald.

Unused Music

Emerald contains all the unused tracks with the same IDs from Ruby and Sapphire, except the track at ID $01D3, the Goldenrod Radio Tower invasion track from Gold, Silver, and Crystal, which has been removed. This game also contains the entire soundtrack from FireRed and LeafGreen, although only a few music tracks from that particular soundtrack are used in Emerald.

In the sound test, the tracks from FireRed and LeafGreen are prefixed with "RG". MUS-KAIHUKU remains unused; it is now labeled MUS-RG-KAIHUKU, and its new ID is 01ED.

Unused Map Data

The maps from the Pokémon Festa 2002 demo of Ruby and Sapphire are still in Emerald, but their event data has been deleted.

The Magma Hideout maps used in Ruby and unused in Sapphire are also unused in Emerald, as well as the Contest Hall, Seafloor Cavern, Cave of Origin, and the unused Lilycove City Poké Mart maps from Ruby and Sapphire. The unused duplicate landmark names for Meteor Falls, Fiery Path, and Jagged Pass also remain.

• 

  Magma Hideout 6F unused eastern section.

• 

  Battle Frontier unused warp.

• 

  Battle Frontier unused house (no NPC event data).

The landmark name for the version-based evil team hideout from Ruby and Sapphire is now unused. Pokémon caught in the old Magma Hideout or Aqua Hideout preserve their caught location, but it is rendered as "HIDEOUT" (Japanese: アジト, Hideout) like in Ruby and Sapphire.

The quirky landmark C4 from FireRed and LeafGreen is now unused and was renamed to "SPECIAL AREA" (Japanese: あかみどりとくしゅ, Red & Green Special).

Navel Rock and Birth Island have their own landmarks for Emerald as IDs D3 and C8, respectively, whereas the original IDs from FireRed and LeafGreen are AE and BB. This distinction may be important as there is no known distribution of the Aurora Ticket for Japanese Emerald, meaning that Deoxys caught in Emerald's Birth Island could be treated as illegitimate if their language byte is set to Japanese.

This needs some investigation. Discuss ideas and findings on the talk page. Specifically: How is such a Deoxys recognized by modern Pokémon games and services like Bank?

Emerald added an optional rival fight in Rustboro City. In the released game, you cannot walk out the city without triggering a cutscene with the rival that registers the rival in your PokéNav and prompts for a fight. You can get around this line of triggers only by teleporting back to Petalburg by never using the Pokémon Center in Rustboro and then using Teleport or by blacking out, in which case you never run into your rival. Perhaps because of this potential situation, there is another trigger in front of the doorway into Mr. Briney's house, and this will trigger a different cutscene with the rival (where the rival exits Mr. Briney's house) which also registers the rival and offers the same battle as the Rustboro cutscene. However, due to a programming oversight, the trigger in front of Mr. Briney's house is never activated, so this cutscene is left unused in the map scripts.

Unused Graphics

Sprites

• 

  Mendel Palace wrestler.

• 

  Acro Bike bunny hopping.

• 

  Littleroot Town boy from Ruby and Sapphire.

• 

  The "??" graphic used for Pokémon index numbers 252-276.

• 

  Early interface graphics.

• 

  More early interface graphics.

• 

  Unused berry graphic.

• 

  Unused Natu doll graphic.

• 

  Unused Magnemite doll graphic.

• 

  Unused Squirtle doll graphic.

• 

  Unused Wooper doll graphic.

• 

  Unused Pikachu doll graphic.

• 

  Unused Porygon2 doll graphic.

• 

  Unused Timer Ball frame.

Shiny Celebi

Because the only way to obtain it legitimately was through distributions, none of which allowed for a Shiny, the Shiny version of Celebi was left unobtainable through normal means. It can still be seen when a Shiny Ditto or Mew Transforms into Celebi, however.

Tilesets

• 

  Tileset 16

• 

  Tileset 22

• 

  Early Ruby and Sapphire Mossdeep City Gym

• 

  Tileset 57

Unused Birch Spritesheet

There is an unused uncompressed sprite sheet in location 557A90 to 55A94F in between the used Birch opening sprite and palette. This contains the following clockwise from top left:

• A duplicate of the used Beauty Trainer Class sprite.
• An unused seemingly early design of Professor Birch with both hands in his pockets and different-colored shorts.
• A duplicate of the Birch sprite from the opening sequence in Ruby and Sapphire, unused in Emerald.
• A duplicate of the Birch sprite used in this game's opening sequence.

Unused Greta Color

To do: Image.

A unused color exists in Greta's palette; a dark yellow color, likely meant for the hair color. Greta in the final game uses her skin tones for her hair's darker colors.

Unused Weather

The unused weather types from Ruby and Sapphire remain so in Emerald.

Unused Wild Held Items

Some Pokémon, when encountered in the wild, have a chance of holding an item. Held item data also exists for some Pokémon which cannot be caught in the wild in the final game, rendering such assignments unused.

#	Pokémon	Held Items	Note
012	Butterfree	(5%) Silver Powder
015	Beedrill	(5%) Poison Barb
022	Fearow	(5%) Sharp Beak
027	Sandslash	(5%) Quick Qlaw
035	Clefairy	(5%) Moon Stone (50%) Leppa Berry
036	Clefable	(5%) Moon Stone (50%) Leppa Berry
038	Ninetales	(50%) Rawst Berry
046	Paras	(5%) Big Mushroom (50%) Tiny Mushroom
047	Parasect	(5%) Big Mushroom (50%) Tiny Mushroom
058	Growlithe	(100%) Rawst Berry
059	Arcanine	(100%) Rawst Berry
061	Poliwhirl	(5%) King's Rock
062	Poliwrath	(5%) King's Rock
064	Kadabra	(5%) TwistedSpoon
065	Alakazam	(5%) TwistedSpoon
068	Machamp	(5%) Focus Band
075	Golem	(5%) Everstone
079	Slowpoke	(5%) King's Rock
080	Slowbro	(5%) King's Rock
083	Farfetch'd	(5%) Stick
085	Dodrio	(5%) Sharp Beak
090	Shellder	(5%) Big Pearl (50%) Pearl
091	Cloyster	(5%) Big Pearl (50%) Pearl
094	Gengar	(5%) Spell Tag
104	Cubone	(5%) Thick Club
105	Marowak	(5%) Thick Club
110	Weezing	(5%) Smoke Ball
113	Chansey	(5%) Lucky Egg
117	Seadra	(5%) Dragon Scale
121	Starmie	(5%) Star Piece (50%) Stardust
122	Mr. Mime	(5%) Leppa Berry
124	Jynx	(100%) Aspear Berry
126	Magmar	(100%) Rawst Berry
143	Snorlax	(100%) Leftovers
147	Dratini	(5%) Dragon Scale
148	Dragonair	(5%) Dragon Scale
149	Dragonite	(5%) Dragon Scale
151	Mew	(100%) Lum Berry	Available though a limited event in Japan.
161	Sentret	(5%) Oran Berry
162	Furret	(5%) Sitrus Berry (50%) Oran Berry
171	Lanturn	(5%) Yellow Shard
173	Cleffa	(5%) Moon Stone (50%) Leppa Berry
186	Politoed	(5%) King's Rock
199	Slowking	(5%) King's Rock
200	Misdreavus	(5%) Spell Tag
208	Steelix	(5%) Metal Coat
215	Sneasel	(5%) Quick Claw
230	Kingdra	(5%) Dragon Scale
238	Smoochum	(100%) Aspear Berry
240	Magby	(100%) Rawst Berry
242	Blissey	(5%) Lucky Egg
250	Ho-oh	(100%) Sacred Ash	Available though a limited event in America and Japan.
251	Celebi	(100%) Lum Berry
267	Beautifly	(5%) Silver Powder
269	Dustox	(5%) Silver Powder
284	Masquerain	(5%) Silver Powder
295	Exploud	(5%) Chesto Berry
301	Delcatty	(5%) Leppa Berry
306	Aggron	(5%) Hard Rock
315	Roselia	(5%) Poison Barb	Was available in Ruby/Sapphire.
317	Swalot	(5%) Big Pearl
323	Camerupt	(100%) Rawst Berry
332	Cacturne	(5%) Poison Barb
337	Lunatone	(5%) Moon Stone	Was available in Sapphire.
356	Dusclops	(5%) Spell Tag	Was available in Ruby.
362	Glalie	(5%) Never-Melt Ice
372	Shelgon	(5%) Dragon Scale
373	Salamence	(5%) Dragon Scale
374	Beldum	(5%) Metal Coat
375	Metang	(5%) Metal Coat
376	Metagross	(5%) Metal Coat
385	Jirachi	(100%) Star Piece

Altering Cave

As with FireRed and LeafGreen, Mareep, Aipom, Pineco, Shuckle, Teddiursa, Houndour, Stantler, and Smeargle were also meant to replace the Zubat found in Altering Cave after using Mystery Gift.

The event distribution was probably scrapped because the evolutionary lines of these Pokémon can be obtained from Colosseum. They can instead be found in Emerald in the extended area of the Safari Zone (except Smeargle, which is found in Artisan Cave instead). There is a change from FireRed & LeafGreen however: Each of the wild Pokémon can hold an item that could not otherwise be obtainable 5% of the time in Emerald!

Thank you for using the MYSTERY
GIFT System.

There appears to be a rumor about
rare POKéMON sightings.

The sightings reportedly came from
the ALTERING CAVE on ROUTE 103.

Perhaps it would be worthwhile for
you to investigate this rumor.

ふしぎなおくりもの　を　ごりよう
いただき　ありがとう　ございます！
さいきん　１０３ばんどうろ　にある
へんげのどうくつ　で
めずらしい　ポケモンが　でる　という
うわさが　ながれてる　ようです
ぜひ　いって　たしかめて　みては
いかがで　しょうか？

Altering Cave Held Items

The Pokémon encountered in Altering Cave are programmed to each have a 5% chance of holding an item that are exclusive to this location, and this event. All items cannot be obtained anywhere else in Emerald alone.

#	Pokémon	Item	Notes
179	Mareep	Ganlon Berry	This berry could only be obtained in Colosseum/XD, or through certain events
190	Aipom	Berry Juice	Apparently Shuckle isn't the only one to have Berry Juice after all...
204	Pineco	Apicot Berry	This berry could only be obtained in Colosseum/XD, or through certain events
213	Shuckle	Berry Juice	Wild Shuckle hold Oran Berries in the Safari Zone
216	Teddiursa	Petaya Berry	This berry could only be obtained in Colosseum/XD, or through certain events
228	Houndour	Big Mushroom	Big Mushrooms are otherwise unobtainable in Emerald
234	Stantler	Petaya Berry	This berry could only be obtained in Colosseum/XD, or through certain events
235	Smeargle	Salac Berry	This berry could only be obtained in Colosseum/XD, or through certain events

Berry Juice

The only source of Berry Juice in any of the Generation III games would've been as a held item on wild Shuckle in FireRed and LeafGreen, but the item is effectively unused because the Altering Cave event was never used. Wild Shuckle in Emerald instead hold Oran Berries when encountered in the Safari Zone. If, however, a Wonder Card containing the Altering Cave event was injected into a Pokémon Emerald save, wild Shuckle & Aipom(!?) would have a 5% chance of holding a Berry Juice.

BERRY JUICE

きのみジュース

A 100%
pure juice
that restores HP
by 20 points.

きのみ　１００パーセント
ポケモンの　たいりょくを
２０　かいふくする

Unused Text

• Script “Text_ThisIsATestSignpostMsg” contains a test message, which was localized:

Japanese	English	French	Italian	German	Spanish
テストよう　メッセージです！ かんばん　です	This is a test message. This is a signpost.	Message test. Panneau.	Questo è un messaggio di prova. Questo è un cartello.	Dies ist ein Test. Ein Schild.	Éste es un mensaje de texto. Esto es una señal.

• Pokémon 0000 (Ten question marks) is an error handler which doesn't appear under normal gameplay. However, if caught by manipulating the game, its fully-coded Pokédex entry can be seen. Note that the text has been re-translated for this game (though the Japanese entry is identical to Ruby and Sapphire's).

Japanese	English	French	Italian	German	Spanish
あたらしく　はっけんされたポケモン げんざい　ちょうさちゅう	This is a newly discovered POKéMON. It is currently under investigation. No detailed information is available at this time.	Il s'agit d'un POKéMON découvert récemment. Des études le concernant sont en cours. Aucune information détaillée n'est disponible.	Specie di POKéMON appena scoperta e attualmente oggetto di attenti studi. Al momento non sono disponibili ulteriori informazioni in merito.	Dieses POKéMON wurde erst vor kurzem entdeckt und wird noch erforscht. Zurzeit sind keine genauen Informationen über dieses POKéMON vorhanden.	Lo han descubierto recientemente. Está en proceso de estudio. De momento no se dispone de datos concretos.

To do: Rydel's text mentioning the bike stored in the PC is still present but unused because Key Items cannot be stored anymore

Development Text

Multiple cases of miscellaneous development text are present in the ROM.

GameFreak inc.
TEST PRINT
P0
P1
P2
P3
RFU WAIT
RFU BOOT
RFU ERROR
RFU RESET
RFU CONFIG
RFU START
RFU SC POLL
RFU SP POLL
RFU START
RFU SEND ERR
RFU CP POLL
RECOVER START
DISSCONECT
RECOVER SUUSES
RECOVER FAILED
PokemonSioInfo
CLOCK DRIFT
BUSY SEND
CMD REJECT
CLOCK SLAVE
CHILD
PARENT
SEARCH

pokemon ruby version
sapphire

Build Dates

Japan	2004 06 30 18:43
US/Europe	2005 02 21 11:10
France/Spain	2005 07 01 18:30
Italy	2005 07 07 18:00
Germany	2005 07 11 16:55

Regional Differences

Title Screen

Japan	US

The logo is different and the "Push Start Button" text instead reads "Press Start".

e-Reader Support

Similarly to Japanese FireRed and LeafGreen, Japanese Emerald contains e-Reader support and its Mystery Gift system uses it in addition to the Game Boy Advance Wireless Adapter, specifically for the Pokémon Battle Card-e+ Emerald set that changes the NPC Trainers encountered in Trainer Hill. When in Wireless Adapter mode, its Japanese name is ふしぎなおくりもの (focus on the giver), while in e-Reader mode its Japanese name is ふしぎなもらいもの (focus on the receiver); both names were translated as Mystery Gift in English.

Like Ruby and Sapphire, Japanese Emerald also supports the Mystery Event system (ふしぎなできごと), which requires the e-Reader. It was used for the Eon Ticket distribution between December 9, 2006 and January 5, 2007 for Ruby, Sapphire, and Emerald in Japan.

Overseas, Emerald only supports the Wireless Adapter mode of the Mystery Gift system from FireRed and LeafGreen, although it still contains code for Mystery Event and the e-Reader mode of Mystery Gift.

To do: Confirm this last part.

Player's House

Japanese Emerald has a minor audio oversight where the moving Vigoroth incorrectly use Machoke's cry, which was fixed in western releases of Emerald. These Pokémon were changed from Machoke in Ruby and Sapphire, where they play their correct cry.

Faraway Island

The Old Sea Map is an event item that allows the player to board the S.S. Tidal from Lilycove City to access Faraway Island and subsequently catch Mew. However, as it was only distributed in Japan during Pokémon Festa 2005, the item is unobtainable in western versions of Emerald, thus rendering the associated content unused.

To do: Other unused content beyond the item icon should be here, too.

Birth Island

Because the AuroraTicket was never distributed to Emerald in Japan, Birth Island, and thus the ability to catch Deoxys, is completely inaccessible in the Japanese version. The only way to obtain Deoxys in the Japanese version of Emerald is by trading one from FireRed and LeafGreen.

Sootopolis City

There is an NPC in Sootopolis City who would host battles using Mystery Gift, leaving only the NPC and the stairs blocked by trees. However, no e-Reader Cards were released for this feature even in Japan, as the only Battle-e cards released for Japanese Emerald were for Trainer Hill rather than Sootopolis City.

(Source: RFX)

To do: Check whether it's Mystery Gift or Mystery Event in Japanese Emerald.

Trick House Puzzle Room 4

Japanese	English

In the international versions, the layout of Trick House Puzzle Room 4 was altered to make two passageways wider. The first boulder was also removed; in the Japanese version, it's a beginner's trap since the player can block the narrow passageway if they push the boulder to the right.

Despite the change, it's still possible for the player to get trapped in the Trick House in all versions.

(Source: luckytyphlosion (theory re: becoming trapped), ChickasaurusGL (video of boulder reset detail), Altfalcon (how to trap the player in all versions))

Aqua Hideout Dive Glitch

"Would you like to use DIVE here?"

In Japanese Emerald, due to a bug, it is possible to Dive in the deep water tiles found on Aqua Hideout B2F after saving and rebooting the game. Because the water is not programmed to lead anywhere, the game throws the player back to warp 0 in entry 0 of map group 0, which is Petalburg City.

This was fixed in western versions of Emerald by not allowing the player to Dive in any circumstances.

This does not happen in Ruby and Sapphire as the entrance to the Magma/Aqua Hideout (game-dependent) is blocked after obtaining the Mind Badge, which is required to use Dive outside of battle.

(Source: Evie (ChickasaurusGL) 🌺)

Special Wallpaper Layout

In Emerald, players can unlock custom wallpapers by giving special codes to Walda's father in Rustboro City. In the international versions, the ribbon background and the cross, bolt, and Plusle symbols were removed. The latter two may have been removed due to semi-unintentional resemblance of the Red Cross.

(Source: Bulbapedia, Magic)