Leftover Prototype Gen 3 Pokémon Data: First Looks

[breh]

Something an anon on 4chan noticed - the "Flower" Pokemon may be Ralts.

zpokeb:

It has the power to read people's hearts. Raised by cheery people, it grows fast and blooms pretty flowers.

Ruby:

Ralts senses the emotions of people using the horns on its head. This Pokémon rarely appears before people. But when it does, it draws closer if it senses that the person has a positive disposition.

Sapphire:

Ralts has the ability to sense the emotions of people. If its trainer is in a cheerful mood, this Pokémon grows cheerful and joyous in the same way.

The Sapphire one is a bit of a stretch, but the wording is similar for both of these sets in Japanese.

This is also supported by the red spider lily Pokemon being, well, another flower and probably Kirlia / Gardevoir.

Another 4chan anon also noted that the final battle you have with Wally in ORAS Victory Road has him surrounded by red spider lilies, both in the overworld area and in the battle itself. Although the flowers have their own host of symbolism by themselves, I think it's somewhat interesting that this relationship may have carried over.

 

[R_N]

I wonder if that "Lottery" pokemon might be proto-wurmple? Or maybe even proto-silcoon/cascoon. While the cocoons are present later in the list, "Lottery"'s entry is tucked away in the Unowns so it sounds like it was on the outs by this point.
But we know it:
-only has eyes, but reacts to other stimuli
-no one in-universe understands why/how it evolves

The first bit brings to mind the cocoons immediately.
Meanwhile the last bit would equate rather nicely with Wurmple effectively being the only random evolution in the game. Without extensive knowledge of information you're not normally pirvvy too there's no way to know what your wurmple evolves into until it's already evolved.

Something an anon on 4chan noticed - the "Flower" Pokemon may be Ralts.

zpokeb:</p><p></p><p></p><p>Ruby:</p><p></p><p></p><p>Sapphire:


The Sapphire one is a bit of a stretch, but the wording is similar for both of these sets in Japanese.

This is also supported by the red spider lily Pokemon being, well, another flower and probably Kirlia / Gardevoir.

Another 4chan anon also noted that the final battle you have with Wally in ORAS Victory Road has him surrounded by red spider lilies, both in the overworld area and in the battle itself. Although the flowers have their own host of symbolism by themselves, I think it's somewhat interesting that this relationship may have carried over.

The spider lilly thing does give this some credence, I think. Especially since it sounds like the Spider Lilly pokemon was male-only;

It hypnotizes its opponents with its dance-like gestures
and deep stare.
No female of this Pokemon has ever been found.

and oh hey, now Wally has Gallade, the male only evolution, funny that.

 

[breh]

The spider lilly thing does give this some credence, I think. Especially since it sounds like the Spider Lilly pokemon was male-only

It's the opposite; "only females have been found". I had a small heart attack thinking I typoed something that badly, but that was some other translation's error lol

 

[R_N]

It's the opposite; "only females have been found". I had a small heart attack thinking I typoed something that badly, but that was some other translation's error lol

Ah I see, it was on the google sheet linked by Fraczewski which is where I was referencing them


flashbacks to early translations of "super luck" actually being "bad luck"

 

[doipy hooves]

There was a separate rain type called ooame/heavy rain/downpour that would be basically rain but more intense, quartering Fire/SolarBeam and doubling water damage. Its text even still exists in the final game, but the actual battle effects are basically commented out (poketool.c).

Unrelatedly, Emerald's source code leaked in September or so. I may as well mention it while I'm bumping this thread.

EDIT: For what it's worth, pret's pokeemerald decompilation has been done for a while, but it's worth noting that Emerald seems to have code for the localizations on top of the Japanese version, while the RS/FRLG code was only for the Japanese games. Emerald's file dates are all set to 1/1/1980 though. There's also debug stuff in this like debug menus and instant text, and plain unused stuff like this post where the internal labels shed some light on things.

EDIT 2: More on heavy rain. I think this is saying that Rain Dance would allow you to create heavy rain if you used it while regular rain was already on the field. (server.c)

This is present in Emerald code but not FRLG, probably because Emerald was more built on top of RS.

 

[Imperial Magala]

flashbacks to early translations of "super luck" actually being "bad luck"

I mean, Absol and Honchkrow are more associated with bad luck than good luck. It wasn't until Gen 5 that the Togepi and Pidove line got the ability. Someone's bad luck could be another person's good luck.

 

[breh]

Not too big or anything, but something I never noticed because the word was spelled in kana is that the spelling of the word used for "Shrub" for the bizarre sprinkler Pokemon's category name (かんぼく / 灌木) has the first kanji as one that is also used for 灌水 (to spray water, especially onto plants and crops). So this concept that looks extremely strange on the outside is instead some dumb kanji pun.

Thanks to C2H4 on the discord for helping me notice this.

 

[doipy hooves]

There are a few battle effect scripts that go unused in the final game and are pretty much dummied out. However the source code (waza_seq.s) still has comments describing every effect though, so we can see what was intended. Spoiler alert: most of it is just Gen 2 remnants.

I will be referring to the effects first by their labels based on pret's documentation. For the most part it doesn't really matter, but pret uses hex numbers and the source is in decimal. Also these are machine translations but they seem to get the point across.

EFFECT_UNUSED_60 = @096 攻撃力を１段階上げる＋こおり状態の場合はこおりが溶ける

"Increases [Attack] by one level + Ice melts in the case of ice"

The first translator I used mentioned something about fog which actually started my. However later I tried Google Translate and it turns out this is probably just the (also unused) DEFROST_OPPONENT effect from pokecrystal, since it's even in the same relative spot. However that label is probably wrong since apparently it was supposed to defrost the user. Something to support this is that it does have the same parts of the Flame Wheel/Sacred Fire effect descriptions (burn and defrost the user) (@125 やけどの追加効果＋こおり状態の場合はこおりが溶ける). I'm not sure if this was just left over from Gen 2 or actually considered for Gen 3 because I don't think spaceworld had a move that did this either, but in the end we never got a Fire move that boosts Attack anyway.

EFFECT_UNUSED_6E = @110 こばんなげ
Googling just gives some Pay Day results. However, this site pointed out that this actually has the same name as a removed Meowth family move back from Spaceworld 97, which sources seem to have translated as "Coin Hurl" or "Coin Throw" and ended up replaced by Aeroblast. The unused effect exists in the same place in pokecrystal and was assigned in spaceworld. I doubt anything was intended for this, but it's cool to see that this random move lived on to a degree by having its name in the Gen 3 source code.

EFFECT_UNUSED_8D = 相手をひるませる（未使用）
"Make the opponent flinch (not used)"

I am pretty sure this is also just a carryover from Gen 2. This comes right after the omniboost/all_stats_up_hit and before Belly Drum's effect. Once again in pokecrystal those effects exist in the exact same relative location, and in that spot is the unused move effect that was basically Fake Out.

EFFECT_UNUSED_83 = 未使用
EFFECT_UNUSED_A3 = 未使用
Just unused.

Overall there isn't much new here. I haven't looked at all the comments since they mostly just describe the move/its name, but I noticed that the weather healing moves are still commented with their time-based descriptions. In general it seems like a lot of Gen 3 was based on Gen 2 in a way.

There's also a couple commented out parts of battle animations (west.s) that I looked into a while ago, but there weren't much major changes as far as I could tell, so I wasn't sure about making a standalone post.

few gifs/video

This Withdraw animation has a shell effect (the graphic is used in final Clamp), making it more similar to the Gen 1/2 versions. The final Gen 3 Withdraw is actually pretty generic.

Seismic Toss adds spins to go with each set of rocks. Fun fact, Seismic Toss has 3 slightly different animations depending on level.

This was a commented out part of the levelup animation that I found thanks to pret documentation. Its parts still exist in the final code and I thought it was a neat effect. I made some personal changes for the video like repurposing it rather than showing on every level up, and adding a small delay so the sound effect would actually play, but otherwise this is what gamefreak originally had.

 

[Zlblosser19]

There's other prototype data left about trainers in trainerp.dat + tr_pokep.dat from 7/10/2002. The roster would be finalized 2 months later in 9/21 (trainer) and 9/30 (tr_poke). Most of it seems to be placeholders or part of a draft, without many custom moves or anything. The mons are referred to by their old names and probably had a different ordering, with things like Spheal being made before Walrein based on that spreadsheet.

Gym leaders = TRTYPE_ZIMURIIDAA (136-143)
1 = l15 Baltoy (Has sprite, others use youngster/lass)
2 = l15 Makuhita x2 (Tackle/Focus Energy/Sand Attack/Knock Off, Headbutt/Focus Energy/Sand Attack/Knock Off)
3 = lv19 Electrike x2
4 = lv21 Numel, Camerupt (old name: Ayame -> Asuna)
5 = lv24 Spinda x3
6 = lv27 Swablu, Pelipper
7 = lv34 Grumpigx2 (not 2v2)
8 = lv38 Spheal x2

e4 = TRTYPE_SITENNOU, (132-135)
1 = l42 Sableye, Absol
2 = l44 Shedinja, Duskull
3 = l47 Spheal
4 = l49 Altaria

Champion = TRTYPE_TYANPION, (170)
L51 Lairon

people = TRTYPE_POKEMONTOREENAA
Wally: L40 grumpig

Rivals just have level 5 starters. Brendan/Yuki = Sora
Archie (1-3) has Huntail + Sharpedo in a set of level 36/20/17. The level 17 version survived to final in the first trainer slot, though unused.
Maxie (285-287) is just a regular "magumadan" and not a leader yet. 285 has level 36 Kaenoo + Camerupt and 286/287 is the same at level 20/17. He also survived in final, though Torkoal took Kaen2's spot.

Lady Cindy is the only trainer defined to use items at this point and she has none. In final she has a full restore like most ladies. Her base team has 3 level 7 Skitty, but there's a repeat/rematch with just a Zigzagoon.
EDIT: Accidentally posted early

So, what're the other old names?

 

[doipy hooves]

So, what're the other old names?

All the old pokemon names are in the first post.
Flannery is the only gym leader name that changed between trainerp.dat and trainer.dat (final).

 

[Daylight]

Its large wings stir up strong, fast, 30 meter [per hour?] winds. Legends suggests that it blew away clouds and brought people the light of the sun. // "Great Hawk Pokemon"

So whatever pokemon this was, it was completely different from final.
This is every Bird in gen 3:
-Taillow, Swellow
-Wingull, Pelipper (already accounted for)
-Swablu, Altaria

Pelipper is already accounted for so either this is an entirely "new" cut Pokemon or Swellow (dropped the mighty hawk for a more "early game friendly" swallow?) or Altaria (massive bird of legend got switched to a more serene cloudy bird?) got a complete redesign.

By the way, no, Braviary's dex entries dont match up.

Well, according to Bulbapedia…

“Altaria is likely based on a Peng, a Chinese legendary bird of enormous size, said to travel 3000 li in one flap of its mighty, cloud-like wings.”

…which makes that theory about Altaria seem pretty reasonable, at least to me. (Also Altaria is actually a HUGE bird—like larger than a person, so really the only that doesn’t fit with its design as-is is the “great hawk” thing.)

 

[Sonikku A]

This seems weird, but looking at final palettes and sprites might help identify the stages of dev, or who did who for mons

I noticed that the first transparent color of the palette strangely varied, though not for "ease in contrasting the base color of the mon" . Noticeably there was a set pattern

The transparent color was either
-Tan (most repped for Gen 1/2 mons)
-White/off white (second most repped Gen 1/2, though seen in some Gen 3 mons too)
-Light blue
-Cyan (Kecleon and Nidoking notably, though different shades)
-Deep green*
-Beige Green
-Light green
-Orange (Cacnea line)
-Light red ( Grovyle)
-Yellow for Milotic
-Purple for Treecko/Sceptile

What I noticed was, despite Torchic and Combusken having the same deep green, Blaziken was Beige Green. It's also notable that;
-Lati Twins are the same deep Green
-The weather duo (Groudon, Kyogre) are the same deep green
-most paired single staged mons bar Volbeat are the same deep green
Which implies these were Sugimori done sprites, since we know he did Torchic, Latias, and Groudon. But then Blaziken sticks more since that's clearly based on his early design for Latias
So potentially the reason it looks off compared to Torchic/Combusken was because another artist did the design for Combusken based on scrapped Sugi elements
Which makes sense, cuz we know it was meant as a Fire Flying type in leaks initially, and was rushed changed to fighting in final if movesets are an indicator
Admittedly we should consider that the sprites aren't equal to the pokemon designer, but it's interesting to see sprite patterns
For those curious, other mons that use the same color Blaziken does;

Chimecho, Grumpig, Makuhita, Roselia, Volbeat, Vibrava, Flygon

Which implies
-Trapinch had a different designer or spriter than Vibrava/Flygon
-Grumpig and Hariyama a different designer to Spoink/Makuhita respectively
-That these mons were sprited later, given how "late" Chimecho was

Kinda wish we had visuals in the leak outside docs, but we can only hope for a 2001 Festa Build to pop up...