List of glitch effects

This is a list of glitch effects that can be encountered in Pokémon games.

Many generations

Game freeze

A Generation I game freezing

Main article: Game freeze

A game freeze is an event when the game stops responding to the player's input, caused by a glitch or hardware failure. During it, the player cannot move, speak to NPCs, select objects or use any buttons. The only solution to escape a game freeze is to simply turn the power off and restart the game from the player's last save file.

A game freeze can be caused by a lot of factors, such as walking out of the boundaries of an area. Performing some glitches can also cause the game to freeze, such as executing the Mew glitch incorrectly. They may also be caused by physical harm to the gaming system or the game cartridge, like dropping or hitting by a major force, or a dirty game cartridge. In Ruby and Sapphire, it may happen, with a tiny probability, when using Thunderbolt or Thunder unless battle effects are turned off.

Mostly, game freezes are accompanied by an odd buzzing sound, but sometimes, the normal music can play, either normally or looped at one or several sounds. Modern consoles, however, only display an error message.

Softlocking

A softlock is a variation of game freezing. However, the game is not actually considered frozen, so soft resetting is still possible. The player is unable to move, but the music still plays and NPCs can still move.

Examples include a level 0, 1 or 171 Pokémon using Psywave or every action that results in division by 0 in Generation I, or the Lumiose City save glitch in version 1.0 of X and Y.

Glitch battle

4(h4?'s glitch battle, after screen corruption

Main article: Glitch battle

A glitch battle is a battle which is initiated by a handful of types of glitch Pokémon. It happens when an encounter starts with a glitch Pokémon whose sprite causes memory corruption, or, more rarely, when the player has no Pokémon in their team. Glitch battles have a lot of very unpredictable effects, such as corruption of Hall of Fame data, but almost all of them eventually cause the game to freeze.

Glitch battles most frequently follow a constant string of events:

1. The screen tiles get scrambled. However, this does not always happen.
2. The game refreshes the corrupted values and makes changes visible.
3. Music usually fades to a single sound or is replaced with a static or low pitch noise, or even the low HP beeping loop starts playing for no reason.
4. The game may try operating solely on the corrupted values.
5. Eventually, the game crashes in its confusion.

Glitch song

Main article: Glitch song

A glitch song is a continuous sound produced by a glitch Pokémon, glitch text strings or the game freezing. Glitch songs may take on a melodic or a chaotic tune. Certain glitch songs can result in a game freeze, while others just force the player to reset the game.

A glitch song can be triggered by:

• A glitch Pokémon's cry, e.g. ♀ .
  • If it is a chaotic song, it may play even for half an hour.
• Viewing sprites of certain glitch Pokémon.
• Game crashes, such as going out of bounds in Pallet Town in Pokémon Green.
• Parts of glitch dialogue.

Generation I only

Glitch screen

Main article: Glitch screen

A glitch screen is an overlay of color over a Pokémon's sprite and the immediate surrounding area. These can only be noticed when playing the games on a Game Boy Color because of the Super Game Boy's inability to replace the color white, and the Game Boy's screen being able to only show the colors black and white.

• Glitch screens
• 

  The red-tint glitch screen recolors already colored pixels red.

• 

  The purple-tint glitch screen recolors all pixels a dark purple hue.

• 

  The purple glitch screen recolors all non-black pixels purple.

• 

  The glitch screens also affect the battle menu.

• 

  The blackout glitch screen recolors already colored pixels black.

TMTRAINER effect

Main article: TMTRAINER effect

The TMTRAINER effect is the common name for glitch effects associated with the -- move and most Super Glitch moves occupying hexadecimal identifiers between A6 to C3, which translate to index numbers between 166 and 195.

The most common occurence of this effect follows this pattern:

1. The opponent is burned.
2. The music fades, then it usually plays a sound effect once fully faded.
3. Presuming that all pre-battle processes were running as they should've been, using a move or item results in displaying the text that the opponent Pokémon is frozen solid, but a glitch dialogue (which often takes a lot of space) and TMTRAINER appear before the species name.
4. Then, the same text is displayed, except that it's about the Pokémon being burned.
5. The enemy Pokémon's health bar will wrap several times across the screen and will slowly deplete. The enemy Pokémon may faint after this.

If the player is fighting a Trainer, the opponent will send out the Pokémon that was in battle before the glitch was activated. In Pokémon Red and Blue, unless the battle occured in a cave, the game will freeze upon finishing the battle. In Pokémon Yellow, the TMTRAINER effect does not crash the game, but when the player returns to the overworld, the sprite graphics will become scrambled.

Inverted sprites

Main article: Inverted sprite

Inverted sprites are the result of encountering certain glitch Pokémon or viewing their stats.

When entering battle, the player's sprite is broken and partially reversed, and the opponent's sprite is simply reversed. The player Pokémon's sprite is broken. Once that Pokémon uses an attack, the enemy's sprite breaks as well.

To fix this glitch, one must look at the Pokédex entry or the summary screen of a non-glitch Pokémon.

• Example
• 

  The battle starts. Red and Rattata's sprites are reversed.

• 

  Rhydon's sprite is already broken upon entering battle.

• 

  Rhydon attacked Rattata, and its sprite broke as well.

Generation II only

Glitch dimension

Ho-Oh in a clear glitch dimension

Main article: Glitch dimension

A glitch dimension is a glitch that affects the game's visuals. The game alters all the colors on the screen. This makes it possible to go through pitch-black caves like the Dark Cave without using Flash. All fade-in and fade-out animations are disabled.

It can be caused by Coin Case glitches or viewing ????? (FE)'s Pokédex entry in Gold or Silver.

• ????? (FE)^GS's Pokédex entry
• 

  What shows while the game is reloading

• 

  The game's title screen afterwards

Glitches in the Pokémon games Multiple generations Transform glitches • Glitch Trainers • Cloning glitches • Error messages • Arbitrary code execution Generation I Glitches • Battle glitches • Overworld glitches -- • 0 ERROR • Broken hidden items • Cable Club escape glitch • Dual-type damage misinformation Experience underflow glitch • Fight Safari Zone Pokémon trick • Glitch City • Item duplication glitch • Item underflow Mew glitch • Old man glitch • Pewter Gym skip glitch • Pokémon merge glitch • Rhydon glitch • Rival twins glitch Select glitches (dokokashira door glitch, second type glitch) • Super Glitch Time Capsule exploit • Walking through walls • ZZAZZ glitch Generation II Glitches • Battle glitches Bug-Catching Contest glitch • Celebi Egg glitch • Coin Case glitches • Experience underflow glitch Glitch dimension • Glitch Egg • Teru-sama • Time Capsule exploit • Trainer House glitches • GS Ball mail glitch Generation III Glitches • Battle glitches • Overworld glitches Berry glitch • Dive glitch • Pomeg glitch • Glitzer Popping Generation IV Glitches • Battle glitches • Overworld glitches Acid rain • GTS glitches • Pomeg glitch • Rage glitch Surf glitch • Tweaking • Pal Park Retire glitch Generation V Glitches • Battle glitches • Overworld glitches Charge Beam additional effect chance glitch • Charge move replacement glitch • Choice item lock glitch Frozen Zoroark glitch • Sky Drop glitch Generation VI Glitches • Battle glitches • Overworld glitches Charge Beam additional effect chance glitch • Charge move replacement glitch • Choice item lock glitch Lumiose City save glitch • Symbiosis Eject Button glitch • Toxic sure-hit glitch Generation VII Glitches • Battle glitches • Overworld glitches Charge Beam additional effect chance glitch • Charge move replacement glitch • Choice item lock glitch Toxic sure-hit glitch • Rollout storage glitch Generation VIII Glitches Charge Beam additional effect chance glitch • Charge move replacement glitch • Choice item lock glitch Toxic sure-hit glitch • Rollout storage glitch • Party item offset glitch Generation IX Glitches Glitch effects Game freeze • Glitch battle • Glitch song Gen I only: Glitch screen • TMTRAINER effect • Inverted sprite Gen II only: Glitch dimension Lists Glitches (GO • Mystery Dungeon • TCG GB • Spin-off) Glitch Pokémon (Gen I • Gen II • Gen III • Gen IV • Gen V • Gen VI • Gen VII • Gen VIII) Glitch moves (Gen I) • Glitch types (Gen I • Gen II)

This glitch Pokémon article is part of Project GlitchDex, a Bulbapedia project that aims to write comprehensive articles on glitches in the Pokémon games.