Recent Discoveries Roundup

[Sherkel]

There have been many groundbreaking advances in glitchology over the past few years. While most viewers know of these either through the forums, checking recent edits the wiki, or other platforms such as Pokémon Speedruns or PRAMA Initiative, they deserve a front page announcement too. I won't try to cover everything at once, as I'm likely to be missing things here and there, and the original discoverers know these exploits in greater detail, so expect a continuation of this post in the near future. With that, let's get started!


Speedrunning has provided previously unheard of incentive for glitch research, as reaching the credits without save corruption involves many possible arbitrary code execution entrypoints. The most recently discovered one in this category, currently a required step in all "race to the Hall of Fame" runs, is the Red/Blue Viridian Forest D618 script. The previous "no save corruption" route involved very calculated use of Move 0x00 corruption (the "Cooltrainer move" we've known about for over ten years!), never previously so thoroughly documented. Those looking to "catch 'em all" also need to learn the LOL glitch in addition to its many variants. Ever wanted to throw a Master Ball out of battle and catch whatever you wanted with it? Now you can!

However, not only were glitched runs affected by advances in research; glitchless ones were too, thanks to the discovery of luck manipulation mechanics! Forms of this exist in all games and were mandatory skills for competitive players in Generations IV and V; however, its discovery in Generation I led to greater attention being given to the accuracy of emulators, as due to instructions passed from the BIOS to the ROM, none of the existing ones worked the same way as a console until these discoveries, giving us forks of emulators such as Dabomstew's Gambatte-Speedrun, in addition to updates to BGB.


Generation IV research has undergone startling advancements this past year.

Not only did GCL's Cryo discover a way to finally obtain the Hall of Origin Arceus via the void glitch, but the aptly-named RETIRE also found a way to change the location Arceus is located! If you've ever felt like the real place Sinnoh was birthed was the Veilstone Department Store or the Hearthome Contest Hall, as we all have at some point or another, watch this.

Various other discoveries by these two can be found in the forums' Generation IV section. The RETIRE trick itself is a central part of many of these new exploits.

Saving the best for last, it turns out tweaking itself has been obsoleted, thanks to RETIRE's Union Room Wrongwarp! The thread and video explain it best; go check them out! Navigating through Sinnoh has never been easier.

Speaking of which, did you think Generation I had the only games where you could change tiles at will to trigger whichever event you wanted? That's not quite correct anymore.


Returning to work done by the GCL crew, Torchickens has been working on a brand new MetascriptDex, which seeks to point out highlights within the countless sets of instructions the Generation I games run through meta-map script activation, those being parent scripts for each map in Kanto. To get a clearer idea of what that all means, have a look at any of the contents (the aforementioned Viridian Forest exploit is among them.)

Thanks to the tremendous efforts of coloradohugge and Torchickens, we now have expanded the GlitchDex to include species from games in regions overseas! (Psst: This includes the leaked Gold and Silver demos!)


Finally, massive thanks to everyone involved with making these discoveries and explaining them to the public. We understand the GCL Wiki has much to catch up on as PSR continues chugging along, and have been internally discussing what to do about the heavily-outdated layout and article organization. Rest assured, glitchology itself is still alive and kicking. Whether we know you or not, any contributions to the wiki are both appreciated and encouraged!

[Princess Torchic Owl Lover ☽ ❤]

Nice article and thanks for the mention!

About the meta-script dex, you may want to add it's specifically parent scripts for each map, and add the exact cause happens due to a modified RAM address for the scripts that occur on the map (e.g. D5F0 is Professor Oak's Lab), where 256 index numbers for each metascript address tell the game which script to run on the map.

"When the player performs certain actions" is also technically true, but the usual cause is due to Trainer-Fly trickery (such as performing a death warp and then returning to the route without opening any new text box, to reload the original fight), or by modifying the contents of a PC item beyond slot 50 (the only reliable non-ACE method for many cases like maps without Trainers).

[Sherkel]

No need for thanks there; you can consider any wiki link a testament to your dedication throughout this time.

I did my best to clarify about the MetascriptDex. You can tell me how close to the mark it is...it's one of those things you're better off just looking at, isn't it?

From a few glances at guest activity it seems like at least the Generation IV section is getting more of the attention it deserves. I'm keeping an eye on Discord for any input before the next post!

[Parzival]

Did colorado, epsi and I ever get our Translated Green researh brought over from Discord yet or not?

[coloradohugge]

Did colorado, epsi and I ever get our Translated Green researh brought over from Discord yet or not?

I didn't atleast. I mean i still have everything I documented stored locally. But I was never sure if it would fit along with Official Pokémon games on the site or not.
seeing as the translation is far from official.

I mean i'm still for it if we want to publish it somewhere. I'm fine with whatever =)

[ISSOtm]

I'm a bit torn about this. One one hand, I don't see why not more documentation; on the other, that's a ROM hack, after all, which is two problems: illegal (possibly?) content, and opening the door to all ROM hacks, of which there's a lot, and what gives one hack priority over the other?

[coloradohugge]

I'm a bit torn about this. One one hand, I don't see why not more documentation; on the other, that's a ROM hack, after all, which is two problems: illegal (possibly?) content, and opening the door to all ROM hacks, of which there's a lot, and what gives one hack priority over the other?

Exactly. I agree with you.
And no, I don't think one ROM Hack should be granted priority over any others. So it's a tricky question if it would even be appropriate to publish.

[ISSOtm]

You could publish it on a different place (your own website, for example, if you got one), and we would link to it -- an "official unofficial documentation".

[Parzival]

It's a fan translation, which IMHO makes it worth it. Obv we wouldn't do ALL rom hacks, but translations would be worth the effort for cases like Green, since there was no English release till LeafGreen.

[Sherkel]

About the Green translation, I don't think this site's really the place for it, at least not on pages we consider an official part of the wiki. Userpages might be fine, or whatever platform you want to publish it on, and discussing it here would also be fine, but...yeah, I don't really know how to put it more clearly than the other users here. It's a ROM hack. The foremost site on glitches in the official games doesn't seem like the place for that kind of thing.

I'm actually surprised how much I'm leaning toward the "it's a full published game in and of itself" argument as I type this, but thinking back to when I was more invested in the series, I'd have wanted documentation of it in an explicitly separate place from where I'd look up official info, just as all hacks are in a clearly separate place from official releases. Hope this makes some sense.

[Sherkel]

A "Part 2" to this is still possible; it just now occurred to me that I never took the chance to properly look through responses after taking a survey from the foremost glitchologists on what was most notable from recent years. If there's enough front-page-worthy material to warrant another post, I'll do one (or another staff member could). For now, though, just take this as a "we're not dead and here's why".