Did you know that there are a ton of in-game glitches in the earlier Pokemon games?
In Red, Blue and Yellow, there are many oversights on the programmer's parts, including ways to duplicate items, catch any Pokemon you want, and even find Pokemon over level 100.. all very easily and completely safely!
You just have to know where to go and what to do, and it becomes really easy.
Surprisingly, none of these glitches were patched out for the 3DS Virtual Console releases of Pokemon Red, Blue, and Yellow.
It's possible to transfer your Pokemon from these games into Pokebank using the PokeTransfer application! So, with the help of this guide, you can easily get all the level 100s, hidden abilities, and Mewtwos you'll ever want.
Disclaimer: All the glitches here, if followed correctly, should be completely safe for your Pokemon and your save file.
However, depending on what you mess with -- such as using more unusual symbols in your player name to spawn weird things on the Cinnabar coastline, or using extremely high Special stats for your Mew Glitch encounter -- you may encounter potentially-damaging factors ingame.
Most of the stranger things in the game, such as odd glitch Pokemon and glitched trainers, will cause the game to harmlessly crash at absolute worst. However, others such as the Pokemon .4 and the TMTRAINER effect, can corrupt saves. Please don't seek these particular glitches out unless you are 100% sure what you're doing!
Please do research and stay safe while glitching, and if you encounter something you're uncertain about, do not save after the encounter.
Additionally, Pokebank will not transfer "abnormal" Pokemon.
These include 1. Pokemon above level 100, 2. some Pokemon at very low levels (elaborated on later), 3. Pokemon with moves/traits they should not have, 4. Pokemon that just don't exist in later games, such as Missingno. and 'M, and 5. any Mew without the ID and OT matching the special event one.
You shouldn't get in trouble for trying to transfer any of these, but the application simply will not transfer these Pokemon to your Pokebank Transfer Box, and will instead leave them in your RBY save game.
You can "normalize" a Pokemon by teaching it new moves through levelup/TMs, or by leveling it up (or down with manual battle EXP if it's above 100) to a correct level.
I. The Old Man Glitch, Glitch Pokemon & the Cinnabar Island Coastline
This is one of the more famous glitches out there due to its sheer utility and how safe it is. It allows effortless item duplication as well as, on occasion, access to rare and interesting Pokemon. It can be done in Red, Blue and Green: it's still possible to find Missingnos in Yellow, but it tends to use the glitch after this.
Necessary for this glitch are: 1. Access to Fly and Surf.
And that's literally it.
So, what's this glitch useful for, and how might it be relevant in Gen 7 and beyond?
1. Item duplication. You can transfer over all the level 100s you want, with all the fun TM moves you want. There's no limit. You can move items in your bag by moving the pointer over an item and pressing SELECT, and then pressing SELECT again when you find the item to switch it with.
Just try not to get an item stack of more than 255 items, because then the stack will turn into multiple stacks, which takes up more inventory space. It's a little annoying.
2. Rare Pokemon. Depending on your name, you might find starters and legendaries on the Cinnabar coast, and with patience, you can catch tons of them. These make fantastic tradebait on the GTS, and people will eagerly trade other legendaries, rare species, and Ultra Beasts for charismatic stuff.
Similarily, it's also great for completing your Pokedex... but the next glitch is even better for that.
3. Freaking out all your friends with the weird glitch Pokemon you caught. You can't move them to Pokebank, but they sure are neat.
And now for our second glitch, which is a real game-changer.
With this glitch, you can encounter any Pokemon in the game, including Mew with relative ease. It can be done in all four Gen 1 games.
Necessary for this glitch are: 1. A Pokemon that can use Fly
2. Specific trainers that have not yet been defeated
+ I would also recommend Pokeballs, preferably Master Balls, to catch whatever you spawn.
This glitch has a few steps, and takes a bit to get used to, but once you know how to do it, it's incredibly useful.
This glitch is invaluable for finding any Pokemon you want at a low level, and allows fairly easy dupes of legendaries, starters, and rare species. And you can transfer almost all of them to Pokebank, too!
There's a few exceptions, however. The below Pokemon all require to be these levels, or higher, to pass through Pokebank.
Hilariously, it isn't true for all Pokemon.. I've gotten nearly everything through at level 7, even stuff like Gengar that can only be obtained after level 25 due to Gastly evolving at that level!
Here's a list of Pokemon with required levels to pass through Pokebank:
Ivysaur, Charmeleon, and Wartortle: Lv16+ Venusaur, Charizard, and Blastoise: Lv32+ for Venusaur, lv36+ for Charizard and Blastoise Dratini: Lv15+ Dragonair: Lv30+ Dragonite: Lv55+ Articuno, Zapdos, Moltres: Lv50+ Mewtwo: Lv70+ Mew: Lv15+, must have the OT "GF" and an ID No. of 22796
Now, those two glitches are the two "big" glitches in Gen 1 games that you can exploit quite a bit. Being able to duplicate items and being able to catch any Pokemon in the game are both a lot of fun, and you can put them to a lot of use by transferring your spoils through Pokebank!
But there are some other interesting little errors here and there that you might be able to put to use...
~ ~ ~
1. Experience Underflow
Up until Generation 4, it was impossible to get level 1 Pokemon. Or was it?
With the use of the Long-Range Trainer glitch above, it actually is possible to catch a level 1 Pokemon.. and do some fun stuff with that odd level.
Interestingly, it's possible to evolve a Stone-evolution Pokemon without using a Stone on it whatsoever. This can be a lifesaver if you don't have any Moon Stones to duplicate, because there's a limited amount of them in the game!
Cloning has always been at least somewhat present in earlier Pokemon games, usually brought about by resetting the game during a trade or while changing PC boxes after depositing Pokemon. Some methods are hazardous to your save file, and as such, will not be discussed here!
a. Storage System Cloning
This method is simple, and works in all Gen 1 and Gen 2 games.
I may add more glitch tutorials later if I find ones that are substantially worthwhile, useful, or interesting. Or, if you want me to cover a particular glitch, I would be happy to do so for you, so just ask!
Figuring out how to break Pokemon games for fun and profit is one of my favorite pastimes. :')
Last edited by Star Dream; 09-10-2018 at 09:16 PM.
Reason: working on The Big One
Glitched speedruns are all kinds of awesome, I love seeing all the creative solutions that people come up with. Whether that's just warping directly to the hall of fame or messing with item stack underflow to make some ACE magic happen, or just steamrolling gyms with exp-underflow'd level 100s.
Maybe I'll put a section in the guide linking to some of that stuff, we'll see.
Pokemon Green is a really straight up, easy, and fast run if anyone ever wants to try it. I'd recommend linking the guides from speedrun.com or PokemonSpeedRuns.
Also if you're interested in other Pokemon glitches I highly recommend checking out Glitch City too! Basically a big wiki/forums of Pokemon glitches.
I'd love to see you cover various glitched items, I'm not an expert but I think one of the bigger ones is 8F
8F is an incredible tool for all sorts of things, so I'll think about it.
It could be useful to have a guide on it when the ones on Reddit and Glitch City Forums are kind of scattered/not perfectly compiled..
I'm not awful knowledgable about other glitch items, but that's what research is for.