r/PokemonROMhacks • • 3d ago

Sticky Weekly Questions Thread & HackDex

12 Upvotes

Have any questions about Pokémon ROM Hacks?

If they're about ROM hacks, tools, development or anything Pokémon ROM Hacking related, feel free to ask here!

Before asking, make sure that you've searched on the subreddit or Google. Many ROM hacks and tools have their own documentation or communities that may be able to provide better answers than here.

Looking for recommendations or a new ROM hack to play?

The HackDex is a community hub for discovering and downloading ROM hacks, making it easy to browse hacks while listing details in a mobile-friendly format. It has an in-browser patching system to make hacks easily accessible, and focuses on legal distribution by sharing patches, not ROMs. Find out more here.

Useful sources for Pokémon ROM hack-related information: (* = Unaffiliated)

Please help the mod team by reporting posts outside of this thread that break Rule 5.
Please avoid answering those posts to deter users from breaking the rules.


r/PokemonROMhacks • • 55m ago

Trailer Pokemon Z Advance - A Kalos demake

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• Upvotes

Hello everyone!

I’m excited to share an early look at Pokémon Z Advance, a GBA demake of Pokemon X & Y built using pokeemerald-expansion and free public ressources (tilesets, sprites...)

Here is a video showing the first 7 minutes of the game.

The game will release in French (it is Kalos after all 🇫🇷) and English, and a public demo (up to the first visit to Lumiose city) is planner before the end of the year!


r/PokemonROMhacks • • 8h ago

Other Release date is finally official!!! 11/26/26

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218 Upvotes

I can't wait for this. I've never actually played gen 6 but heard a lot about how people didn't care for it all that much outside of the mega evolutions. I'm glad my first time playing will be on this version! 😁


r/PokemonROMhacks • • 8h ago

Development Testing out my custom menu UI

105 Upvotes

Hey gang.

Thought I'd share something I've been working on after a short hiatus from hacking. Since I'm clearly compelled to customise all graphics 😅.

This custom fossilised start menu was made possible thanks to this feature branch of the pokeemerald-expansion (put together by miriamlefae) which I used as a base.

Some final tweaks to be done with the clock and such, but as a concept, It turned out alright, I reckon.

Totally consider using the expansion if you aren't already for your Gen III hack, by the way.


r/PokemonROMhacks • • 17h ago

Development Pokemon Emerald Color. Coming soon

517 Upvotes

Pokemon Emerald Color

Emerald running on modified Crystal.

Playable on the Game Boy Color. All 3 regions.

Once a dream. Releasing in a few days.


r/PokemonROMhacks • • 16h ago

Development Gen 3 Tech Demo - Gen 5 Animated Sprites (96x96 support too)

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396 Upvotes

I just wanted to share this small tech demo I made, I have been working on using a custom emulator (that runs on multiple systems like windows, android, linux handhelds, etc), to connect and expand the game, I have been working on replacing the sprites of the game from outside the rom due to a feature I'm working on to let the player make their own custom trainer sprites and add them to the game, however using this as a base and the work on

https://github.com/Jengolus/ramanimator

to do it inside the emulator by just opening the game on said emulator without having to modify anything on it due to the existing connection between the game and emulator, this has a lot of limitations due the GBA using a max of 64x64 sprites most mons wouldn't fit on it (ramanimator for example only works on 64x64 mons) however since I built the demo also modifying the game code I made it so there are 4 sprites per Pokémon and the emulator replaces them with parts of the animated sprite, I also modified the Pokémon coordinates to better fit gen 3 interface and used a transparent interface to be able to see more of the Pokémon, this was also by modifying the emulator itself because it would break a lot of move animations if I took a whole layer just for transparency.

Just wanted to share this on the possibilities a custom emulator can give to romhacks in the future if someone has enough time to iron everything up and users agree to use said emulator

In case you care about the game I make you can find it here, its called Pokémon R.O.W.E. and I plan to add custom trainers and infinite PC Boxes in a future update thanks to the custom emulator development

Hackdex Link

and if you want to join the discord you can find it here

Discord Invite Link


r/PokemonROMhacks • • 5h ago

Discussion Little side menu showing real time and weather information! (Doesn't work inside buildings.)

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22 Upvotes

And the season! Follow me to follow the project! (The vision is Emerald Vanilla + QOL and customization)


r/PokemonROMhacks • • 14h ago

Development In my RomHack, your parents race will match your chosen race! *Still in development* (Not a repost) ⬇️

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95 Upvotes

Hey everyone! This is my actual developer profile so please follow me for updates! I will start slowly leaking more details as time goes on and tidying things up so stay tuned! 🎃

No longer needing to create the head cannon of adoption! *Not that there's anything wrong with that. :)


r/PokemonROMhacks • • 14h ago

Recruitment Requesting additional players for the final wave of testing - Project Platinum Multiplayer

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86 Upvotes

Hey everyone! We at the Project PM team are looking for more players to help squash out the last little bugs of our game. If you have no idea what we are, we first revealed this mod back in January as a hack of Pokémon Platinum to play multiplayer. This is based off of the PRET decomp, so this game will run on emulator and original hardware. You can play online from anywhere in the world. (Original hardware does not support online, and is only up to 4 players at the moment)

Play with your friends: Up to 8(NEW!) players can play Multiplayer at once. You can see each other in-game, battle each other, trade, give items, or fight enemy trainers. The idea of the hack is to battle trainers in a 2v2 battle, where you control one side(your team) and your friend controls the other side(their team).
Customizable Characters: We have each protagonist from Platinum, Heartgold/Soulsilver, Black/White and Black/White 2. We have Brendan and Lance as well, with more soon to come. (Any gen 4 sprite artists are welcome! We would love to have your help.)
All local wireless minigames are playable in multiplayer: The underground supports 8 players, and the rest support their cap.
Quality of Life: We have and IV/EV checker and Nuzlocke mode built in, as well as a 60FPS optional patch and better visual optional patches, with translations into Spanish, French, Italian, and Polish (If you want your language translated and are bilingual in English, we would love to have you translate our hack into your language!)
The game is playable on MelonDS, DeSmuME, Bizhawk, and original hardware. (as a note: a user recently created an unofficial android build for Project PM)

Here is what we hope to target and get assistance on:

Playing with 5 or more players on emulator
Playing with 3 or more players on original hardware
Playing the wireless minigames on original hardware
The distortion world (in general, it is very unstable)
Battle Desyncs (rare, but any and all need to be fixed)

If this is something that interests you, all you need to do is join our discord here: https://discord.com/invite/bTZfjHqbVd

(Photo #2 is from Nakulemonade, and Photo #3 is from Nioko)


r/PokemonROMhacks • • 15h ago

Review Pokemon Hyper Emerald 5.7 Honest Review

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77 Upvotes

NOTE - I am playing the 5.7 QoL updates which are accessible only through the discord server, so the journal thing in the 2nd image might be something new for you.

So I have basically 100% the game, beat every boss possible, did every emerald thing I can do and currently waiting for the next QoL, here's what I found the pro's and don't

PROS -

1) The difficulty of the game is alright, for a storyline game + a difficult rom hack, you definitely need to create a good team for each battle

2) Pokemons from gen 1-8 are available (with 9 said to be coming in the next qol, with more stuff to do) there is an absolute roster for you to team build

3) This one might be called cheating but you can literally open your pc anywhere and do ur stuff 😭🙏(note that it gets blocked during special events and missions)

4) The journal i felt like is a game changer because this game is so big and feels so random at times that you don't even know what to do

5) Honestly I loved the story, it's just how a pokemon movie would be, I don't understand the hate for good vs evil typa rom hacks

6) Every gimmick possible is available in the game

7) People might hate this but shiny rates are 1/8k, which I feel like are the best

8) The game is 100% translated, Yes, only some Chinese letters might be said by the final game bosses, but that won't affect the gameplay much

9) There are some cool custom pokemons like a form for Typhlosion, Mega Flygon, Slugia, A LITERAL WAIFU ENAMORUS, and the armour mewtwo forms

CONS -

1) Visual glitch in the hisui region in pizzaboy emulator, so beware it gets ugly real bad

2) Some of your key items can actually get consumed or literally vanish from your inventory, preventing you from doing some quests (late game like Lost artifacts 17-18)

3) Cheats don't work, this one is interesting because I tried it and they work in the older version, but when you try to reload your sav file to the newer version with the stuff you added, your items are vanished

4) Some of the quests are misleading, notice how I have completed only 38/43, because the others are just impossible to do

5) After the Hall of fame, there is a weird black screen glitch for a proper 30-40 second? Like I genuinely first thought that my game crashed but it's just how it is

6) The same black screen thing happens in the sinnoh Elite 4,however this time, they did give a warning so that's cool

7) Some people enjoy a slow team building style of game, then I am sorry, you are getting Roxanne with 6 mons in the first gym, it's a fast-paced game

8) Game can be tiring and grindy at times, because to get access to good moves, you need a good amount of shards and BP

Overall, I just wanna say that the game itself is pretty solid, the problem lies in the execution, it is very ambitious, it's like that one guys who tries to do everything but messes up a bit in each of its task, overall a 7/10 from my side. You can ask me about stuff about this game.


r/PokemonROMhacks • • 21h ago

Release Your ethically source AI-free way to have epic battles against Red: Random Red Rumble!!!

112 Upvotes

After the "daily red" people have been talking about, here's your favourite randomizer dev (yes, I am now your favourite randomizer dev, just go with it) released a MUCH BETTER VERSION OF IT!

  1. it's an actual romhack
  2. it doesn't force you to wait ONE WHOLE DAY to play again (like, seriously, who decided that?)
  3. It has modern gen 9 mechanics
  4. You get way cooler custom sets for your pokemon all made by me as opposed to some boring generic gen 3 movesets
  5. It's all grass fed, ethically sourced, AI-free romhack development.
  6. You can play against faithful versions of red's crystal team, red's hgss team, or a version that features competitive movesets for all of red's pokemon (oh, and they it will not be the exact same every time so good luck)
  7. It has a super cool name ! RANDOM RED RUMBLE!

If you'd make me the honor of playing the game, here 's the link https://www.pokecommunity.com/threads/random-red-rumble-battle-against-red-with-random-modern-teams.544173/

I wish you a RAD RUMBLING!

KH!


r/PokemonROMhacks • • 15h ago

Resource Vertical In-Battle Type Indicators + my Battle HUD Show Off

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35 Upvotes

Hey gang!

I also could not find vertical in-battle types so I wanted to throw them up here in case anyone needs em. They're more square and the designs are expanded where needed. Unlike the type sprites I posted yesterday, these DO NOT follow the original size spec, so you made need to fiddle with some code to get them to display properly.

The last few slides are the hud for the romhack I'm working on that I'm super proud of. The more I get my hands dirtier with Pixel level editing, the more comfortable I get with extending different shapes.

I'm also super proud of the L and R indicators at the top of the screen which I think ends up being a lot more intuitive than an R button bind showing up on the left side of the screen. Also very proud of the run indicator. ALSO very proud of not having to compromise on the quick Pokeball sprites. A small offset ended up framing it really well.

I really like that the hud is also theme aware (No frames my hack, just themes of the same hud), but I definitely cant take the credit for this particular part. While the plot, characters, setting, map layouts, teams and sprite adjustments are all me (with a custom OST by my homie!), Codex has been doing a LOT of the heavy lifting when it comes to game code changes, but never for any artistic aspect (No art, no music, no dialog, no nothin'. Only code!).

For example, doubling the health bar size but still having it function properly, figuring out odd graphical glitches or palettes that shouldn't be where they are.

While I have a lot of qualms with AI as a whole, the technology behind it is really remarkable. I've learned an incredible amount during this project and have pumped about 48 hours of work in to this in the last week alone, just because I've been having the most fun I've ever had on a personal project. I hope that the mention of AI doesn't sour too many folks.

The hud I ended up with was largely inspired by u/bulbasauric's hud, posted a couple years ago! I would not have even been able to get start without their initial design, but man, getting these parts just right is really tough!

As a side note, idk how any of you ever finish any of these projects. Every time I see something I think I can change or have an idea, I end up getting insanely distracted trying to make it work.

PS. Highly recommend Aseprite for sprite level editing!


r/PokemonROMhacks • • 1d ago

Discussion A very underrated feature I don't see anyone talking about

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158 Upvotes

Being able to see what version you're on from the menu is a huge feature I don't see anyone discussing.

I quite often have to delete older versions for the new updates, but I remove the name of the update from the game title so I have no idea what version I've got downloaded. This completely solves that issue. Also is there a way besides constantly checking hack dex for newer numbers in the version section? I was several updates behind on soul gold and had no idea there was even one newer version an I frequently check this sub more than a person should tbh


r/PokemonROMhacks • • 22h ago

Trailer Pokemon White Double Drive - a reimagining of Unova in an all doubles ROM hack, with in built level caps, tons of quality of life features, custom crafted cutscenes and advanced doubles AI (demo available now!)

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52 Upvotes

Hi everyone! This is my first time trying to develop a ROM hack. As a big fan of VGC, I love playing doubles and have always found it ridiculous that the official competitive format and the mainline story games have so little in common.

This is my attempt at a doubles ROM hack. Everything is playable up to the first gym. All documentation is available here and I plan to keep it up to date as and when I create teams for the AI.

If you give the game a try, please share any feedback you have. I am always looking out for it. I also would appreciate bug reports in case you run into them


r/PokemonROMhacks • • 1d ago

Development Pokemon White 2n1 Announcement! [Rushed because of AI]

374 Upvotes

So, I really didn't wanna go public with this, like anytime soon, but due to AI being used to Open Source everything, I figured i'd get ahead of the curve by posting this.

I am working on a private Decomp of Pokemon White 2, 2n1 is gonna have a northern Unova post game expansion, But here's the issue, I really only got it working recently. I'll post the decomp stuff in a seperate post, I was gonna shadow drop it as a surprise for you guys, Which timeline wise was supposed to be sometime in 2028 to 2030, So that's why it says "Rushed" in the title, however for the time being, here's a couple screenshots of the successful graphic remapping, Each tile selected on the bottom is evident of what the remap will be on the top screen, I'll then move the rendering to the bottom screen so each option is touchable.

NONE of this final, It WILL be subject to change, But the purpose of the decomp is to accelerate NDS rom hacking, and serve as a base, similar to CTFU or hg-engine.

2n1 will be a technical demo of what the decomp can provide if utilized correctly, Naturally, It'll be open source when it's released, OBVIOUSLY.

Some of the main goals will include screen stretching while maintaining pixel accuracy, Aka, when ported to APK, or Windows, it'll run natively to the displays resolution.

Due to the nature of the post, should go without saying, No AI.

Only posting to stake my claim so ppl know that it's being worked on and no one with AI tries doing this, Because it's been 4 years to get to this point.


r/PokemonROMhacks • • 1d ago

Discussion Hot Take: Cramming Gen 4 graphics into a Gen 3 hack ruins the game.

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769 Upvotes

Which is why I couldn't get into Unbound.


r/PokemonROMhacks • • 1d ago

Other Firered Rocket Edition - DIY

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115 Upvotes

Hi everyone

I’m super new to the world of rom-hacking after coming back to the world of gba/pokemon after 20-ish years. Decided to give “making” my own firered rocket edition a go! Super happy with how the artwork turned out so here’s an ASMR-style video of the process.

Let me know what you guys think!

Special shoutout to colonelsalt for this amazing hack that I can’t wait to play!


r/PokemonROMhacks • • 1d ago

Development Pokémon Azoth / Mercury (口袋妖怪 水银) now has an English translation in active development: playable beta, tracked issues, fast fixes

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141 Upvotes

Had to repost because my post body got somehow wiped.

Pokémon Azoth (also known as Pokémon Mercury, 口袋妖怪 水银) is a big Chinese FireRed ROM hack that remakes Johto on the Complete FireRed Upgrade engine. As far as I can tell there was no English patch for it, so I've been building one.

Quick disclaimer up front: this is only a translation, done with Claude (Anthropic's AI) driving a lot of the reverse-engineering and text work. The hack, its name and all of its content belong to the original authors. This is not an official release and I'm not affiliated with them.

Where it stands

  • Playable from boot through Johto (my own playthrough is currently in Sprout Tower / Violet City area)
  • About 20,000 strings translated: dialogue, menus, items, moves, abilities, trainer names, achievements, help tips
  • Some text was baked into graphics (logo, UI labels), so those are being redrawn tile by tile
  • Beta: it's playable, but there are still rough edges

It's moving quickly

Beta 2 went out on Oct 11 and we're on beta 22 as of today. Roughly 45 of 49 tracked issues are already closed. A lot of what's been fixed is the nasty stuff: freezes on talking to NPCs, a Sprout Tower softlock, crashes in the achievements screen and the Ilex shrine, text overflowing boxes, status icons, ability pop-ups, and so on. Every report gets a number, a root cause and a verified fix, and the patch notes list all of it.

What's still rough

  • Parts of the Pokédex UI are still Chinese (the labels are baked into graphics; it's tracked and being worked on)
  • A handful of mid-block Chinese fragments and some wording that needs a human pass. If you read it and something sounds off, tell me
  • Save states don't survive between patch versions, but normal in-game saves carry over

How to get it / help

If you've been curious about this hack but the language wall stopped you, now's a good time to try it and tell me what breaks. Screenshots below.

Also, original post: https://www.bilibili.com/opus/1252832734680711169

Wiki: https://sum-light.github.io/azoth-wiki/


r/PokemonROMhacks • • 1d ago

Development [BATTLE INFO MENU] displaying my new mid battle live information

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68 Upvotes

Hi! I used the Battle Factory to showcase the battle info menu I created! Its purpose is basically to display information, for both your team and the opponent's, that is hard to keep track of mentally, such as stat buffs/debuffs, abilities, movesets, special moves (like substitute, taunt), field effects, and held items. It’s far more complex than the standard summary screen, which doesn't show any info about the opponent at all. I included a "full info" toggle in the debug menu (granting access to the opponent's entire team data), though I added a restriction preventing it from being enabled in Hard Mode. If you don't use the debug menu's full info feature, you only gain access to information as the battle unfolds; for instance, if a Pokémon uses "Water Gun," you obviously know it has that move, so it gets added to its visible moveset list. And so on. The menu was developed for the Emerald Expansion; I relied heavily on the existing battle debug menu as a base, and Ember (the other DEV of HLW) also helped me a lot with debugging it and fixing some issues we had! It was created for our project *Hoenn's Last Wish*.

(Disclaimer: AI was used to assist with coding only.)


r/PokemonROMhacks • • 2d ago

Discussion Are Triple Battles possible in GBA?

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461 Upvotes

Reference edition


r/PokemonROMhacks • • 1d ago

Discussion What are yalls opinions on fake Mon in your romhacks?

5 Upvotes

So I started playing a hack recently that has the new winds and waves starters with some fan made evolutions and I fully avoided using them because in my head it’s not a real Pokemon so it wouldn’t feel like I’m playing a Pokemon game? I do this for any Pokemon that’s fully new and not apart of the main like games .Oddly enough for some reason I’m alright with new fan regional variants but just not whole new Pokemon as it just doesn’t feel right. Anyone else like this? Would you just push through the reluctance and use the new fakemon? I think another reason I don’t use em is because if I do end up liking them there isn’t any merch or anything I can buy with the guy that I like on it lol

I do really feel like this may be limiting me from some hacks so I wanted to see what the general opinion of others was to know if I’m just being a bit of a baby about it and just need to give it a try!


r/PokemonROMhacks • • 1d ago

Development Every Gmax forms are now on Ultra sun and moon [W.I.P]

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61 Upvotes

The first version only had kanto mon's.

This mod's GUI has been tweaked yesterday. Altough the dev said he will translate to english next week.


r/PokemonROMhacks • • 2d ago

Resource Alternate Type Sprites for Emerald/Gen 3 Romhacks

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424 Upvotes

Hey folks!

I'm working on a romhack and had a really hard time finding a single cool different version of the type sprites, so I wanted to upload the ones I made here for anyone to use if they like em, no credit required.

Shaved a couple pixel rows off above and beneath the text to get a bit more vertical space, and thought they came out pretty okay.

Sprite editing is tough dude lmao, this took forever.


r/PokemonROMhacks • • 1d ago

Development They are kinda romhacking Pokémon SV

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6 Upvotes

r/PokemonROMhacks • • 1d ago

Discussion Out of curiosity, how's the current situation of Gen VI romhacking?

26 Upvotes

Gen VII has showed great steps by people adding Gen IX Megas, but I haven't seen someone interested in doing something like that for X/Y/OR/AS, which I find interesting as those are the mainline games where Megas have more of a role in the main story, and seeing things like, a X/Y romhack where you can actually mega-evolve your starter, sounds like something people would be interested on.