Cheating

Missingno

This cheat applies to the Red and Blue versions.

If you see a Missingno, you will get a lot more of your sixth item (if it has a number beside it).���You will end up with more than 100 items of that type.���The first digit of the number will be a small picture from somewhere in the game.���(Each picture stands for two digits, but it changes depending on where you are.)���Items that this is particularly useful for are Master Ball and Rare Candy.

If you see a Missingo, your Pok�mon League Hall of Fame on PC gets scrambled.���This may be because if you cheat, you can't be famous :P.���The Hall of Fame is written directly to the saved state, so there is no fixing it by switching off.���This suggests that Missingno is potentially more dangerous than I have had experience of.

If you catch one, the pictures of the Pok�mon in battle become scrambled.���The battle still works fine, as the status bars of the Pok�mon and the text at the bottom are intact, but it looks strange.���You can fix it by releasing the Missingno, or even by depositing it in the PC.���Missingnos are very weak, and useless for battling with.���I have heard rumours of people losing their saved games from catching Missingnos, but have never heard a report of it from anyone it's supposed to have happened to.���I don't do it any more, but the danger may just be a rumour.���Bringing one into the multiplayer environment, however, is seriously asking for trouble.

Explore the ledge in the water on the right hand side of Cinnabar Island.���You will meet Pok�mon from the last cave or patch of grass that you visited.���This is especially useful with Pok�mon from the Safari Zone.���Safari Zone Pok�mon are much easier to catch if you damage them before throwing balls!���There is also the added bonus that they can't run.���This cheat is also useful if you are training a Pok�mon in an area far from a Pok�mon Center.���Just Fly to Cinnabar Island and use the lovely convenient Ledge.���When using this cheat, try not to go into any other wild Pok�mon area on the way to Cinnabar Island.���You do not actually need to walk on the grass for the cheat not to work.���It fails if you even stand on a route with grass in it.���If you are in the deepest chamber of a cave, you may want to Dig, because you meet different Pok�mon on different floors.���Then Fly to Cinnabar.

To make Missingnos appear, go to Viridian City and get the Old Man to show you how to catch a Weedle.���Then Fly to Cinnabar and Surf on the Ledge.���Missingnos will appear.���You will also meet some ordinary Pok�mon, and possibly a few Pok�mon above level 100.���You can safely catch these, but they grow to level 100 if they get any experience points.���They can be used in the Colusseum, and levelled to level 255 using cheat Rare Candies.���Any more candies after that overflows the 1 byte used to store the level, and makes them grow to level 0.���Putting them in the PC can make them lose levels, and will for certain if the XP required for their level is too much to be stored in the 3 byte XP variable.���Pok�mon above level 100 are not very useful.���It is no fun carrying a Pok�mon all the time when you can't even battle with it :P.

In Red and Blue, the Pok�mon you meet on the Ledge are determined by the name of your character.���I won't write the details here, because I didn't work this out myself, and I've forgotten where I found it.���

There are no Pok�mon on the Ledge in Yellow.���Summoning Missingnos in the way mentioned below frequently freezes the Game Boy, and forces a hard reset.���There's a good chance that trading one onto Yellow would wreck the saved game.


The Action Replay

For serious cheating power, or to accomplish any cheating at all in Yellow, you need to buy a piece of hardware such as an Action Replay or GameShark.���I have an Action Replay, but by all accounts the two are identical.���There is also the Game Genie which works slightly differently.���I don't have one to comment on, but it's less popular than the other two, and there are far fewer sites with help or codes for it.���All of these are discouraged by Nintendo, but the chance of them doing anything about it is very small.

With an Action Replay, you can in theory change any of the variables that make your individual game different from others on the same version.���Things which can be changed include your Pok�mons' stats, their attacks, the Pok�dex, your items, and changeable properties of the Pok�mon world.���Generally, there is not much scope for changing what the game itself does.���It is possible to change temporarily the attributes of enemy trainers, Pok�mon, and to some extent the map, but the rules the game is built from are out of reach.���For instance, it is possible to get Mew with an Action Replay, but the mythical Pok�mon Pikablu, Charcolt and the others do not exist, and there is no way to make them exist.

I will mention here that teaching Surf to Pikachu on Yellow is significant.���When he surfs, he looks like a Pikachu on a surfboard, not the usual fish, and the Surfing Game appears south of Fuschia City.���Also, you can catch more Pikachus with the same trainer ID.���They all behave like the original one, but you only get one Pikachu picture following you.���They all talk, and they all get angry if you put ONE in the PC.

My Action Replay says it is not fully compatible with Red or Blue, and that the "use of codes may result in the loss of game save data", but I have had no problems so far.���My Link's Awakening saved games, however, have been irreperably corrupted twice while the Action Replay was in.���I emailed the manufacturer once to ask what was meant, but got no reply.���Since then, I heard from a semi-reputable source that the warning was there because there was always a risk, but children would normally be more upset about losing a Pok�mon saved game than any other.���Still, even if this is true, the Action Replay is not completely safe, and it is important to be aware of this before using one.

It is possible to do quite a lot of cheating just by using codes which other people have found.���But the Action Replay has a built-in code generator which enables the hacking of new codes.���Not only does this allow more codes to be found every day, but the Action Replay is a tool of learning.���It can be used to find out how Pok�mon works, for interest alone, or so as to become a better trainer.���Hacking for codes also creates a gradual knowledge of the workings of computers and machine code.���It is a skill which can be developed, and although it is frustrating at times, it can also be quite rewarding, and even fun.


Advanced Code Hacking Tips

For people who already know some.���Basically Pok�mon tips, but some of these will be useful for other games.

The Action Replay forces values into the Game Boy's RAM.���While the switch at the top is on, they are held there, even if the game itself tries to change them.���Some things, like the attacks Pok�mon know, only need to be changed once, then you can save the game and they stay as they are until you change them again.���Other things, such as the infinite HP code, use the "holding" in the way they work.���When your Pok�mon is hit, it loses HP, but the Action Replay immediately restores it to the value you set, so the Pok�mon never faints, however many times it is hit.

The Action Replay uses 8-digit codes.���In all the codes I have found for Pok�mon, the first pair of digits is always 01.���The last pair is the area where the code is, eg. most of the codes for the first Pok�mon's stats end in D1.���The second last pair is the exact location of the code.���The last 4 digits, therefore, determine the variable to be changed.���I will usually type only these last 4 in my codes section.���(For interest, it is normal for addresses inside a computer system to be listed with their bytes in reverse order.)���The second pair is the value for that variable.���Sometimes it is the number you want in Hexadecimal, and sometimes it is a code.���Sometimes, even if it looks like it should be a number, there is a code for it.���The > and < commands usually still work.

When you go to "View Cheats" on the Code Generator, there is only one of each combination of the last 4 digits (in the 01 section). The second pair is the value of the variable the last time you pressed the AR Button.���This can be useful, eg. if your Pok�mon's Attack was 255 and you still had too many codes to try for it, you could look through the codes you had and pick out codes with the second pair FF.

Another use for this : If you have found the address of the variable, and want to find more codes for what is stored there (eg. you have found a code to paralyze a Pok�mon but want a code to heal it), you can simply heal your Pok�mon, press the AR button and see what the second pair of digits changes to on the View Cheats list.���This can also be used when looking at how Pok�mon works : sometimes I record what a variable changes to in different situations and then try to work out why.

If the number you are hacking for is greater than 255, it is being held in more than one byte.���Convert it into hexadecimal, split it into the separate bytes and hack each byte separately.

Save yourself some work.���Instead of changing the stats of the first Pok�mon over and over again, try switching it with another Pok�mon, ie. place a Pok�mon in the first position with the required stats.���It is almost always time saving to do this, and sometimes necessary (if you are hacking something that cannot be changed without using a code, eg. the IDNo).���However, be careful not to end up with codes that damage your other Pok�mon along with the codes that improve your first one.���Put the same Pok�mon in first position several times, rearrange the others so no other Pok�mon are in the same place, and use =.

Even if the second pair of digits does not change a number, but a letter or word, often the same code will mean the same thing in different circumstances.���Once you know that the code for Mew is 15, you can catch a Mew, make your opponent send out a Mew, or turn one of your existing Pok�mon into a Mew, without having to hack the 15 again.


What to do if your hacking fails

There are two main problems that can occur when code hacking.���The number of codes can stop falling when there are still far too many to try them all.���The second problem is when none of the codes in the list work, or you are left with no codes.

Dealing with the first problem :

The first thing to do is to try various strategies to reduce the number.

• If possible, hack using more than two situations.���For example, cycling a Pok�mon between levels 2 and 3 is not very effective.���Using 2, 3, 4 and 5 will leave a much smaller selection of codes.
• Wherever possible, use "greater" and "less" instead of "different".���This will eliminate a large number of unwanted codes.
• Cycling "= !" or "= > = <" can be helpful.���For example, with the Pok�mon's level, have it at level 2, use "start", then level 2, "equal", level 3, "greater", level 3, "equal", level 4, "greater", level 4, "equal", level 3, "less", etc.
• Once you know which pair of digits stands for which Pok�mon, attack etc, you can use "greater" and "less" when hacking something that uses them.���For example, Magikarp > Pikachu > Rhydon.

• A likely cause of this problem is that you made a mistake and pressed the wrong button at some point.���Run the generator again and see what happens.���One feature of the code generator is if you press the AR button at the wrong time, it won't count it unless you use one of the generator functions.���This is useful in most situations, but can cause problems in others.
• If you made any assumptions about the nature of the code, try running the generator again without them.���Try using = ! instead of < >.���Also, in some circumstances the same action may not always have exactly the same effect, so it may be worthwhile working out a system that doesn't use =.���Time is an example of this, because in computer terms it is almost impossible to time the pressing of the AR button exactly.
• Make sure you are actually changing what you think you are changing.���I lost an opportunity to hack a "fly to all towns" code because I saved just outside the next Pok� Center without realising that you only need to enter the area to be able to fly to it.���I knew that you need to heal your Pok�mon to set your "home" Pok� Center, that you go back to if you Teleport, Dig or faint.
• The code may need time to take effect.���Some of the Pok�mon stats codes require the Pok�mon to be deposited in the PC and withdrawn again.
• Perhaps the code has had the exact effect that you wanted, but for some reason it appears to have not.���The Type code caught me out this way.���My Pikachu was still weak to Ground when I tested the code because I had only changed one Type.���I made this mistake because Pikachu's info only mentioned Type 1.���In another situation, I found the low-byte of a Pok�mon's invisible in-battle Attack, but passed that code by, because changing the low-byte had no significant effect.���I eventually solved the problem by hacking with a lower-level Pok�mon.