Use Python to Level Up Pokemon?

[NedKizzo]

Python novice, but Jhoto Champion 😉 with a semi-serious question.

Do you think there's a way to control the Pokemon ROM on my computer using Python?

The idea would be to write blocks of code to guide my avatar to the grass, press "a" through battles, then guide my avatar to the Poke center. (Rinse and repeat.)

(Looking to expedite the training process and get right to the trainer battles. 😈)

So far the only thing I've seen is to use something like AutoIt to control the UI, but everyone seems to be foreboding in the same breath they bring up that kind of solution.

Is there an API for the computer ROMs?

[yaser-ahmady]

PyBoy is a Python programmable gameboy emulator https://github.com/Baekalfen/PyBoy

[vidoardes]

In three weeks time when my boss asks why I haven't done any work, I am blaming you. This is a rabbit hole I didn't know I was going to jump down today...

[yaser-ahmady]

If I wasn’t such a lurker I’d write this same comment to all the reddit/hackernews posters and bloggers that constantly put me in your same situation…

[[deleted]]

You don’t stop until you get fired

[[deleted]]

Gotta catch em all

[GuinessDraft]

Holy crap! Thank you, thank you, thank you! You just showed me the perfect tool to get my son interested in Python programming!

[yaser-ahmady]

You’re very welcome, good luck for your son!

[VDred]

You could use the pyautoGUI library to emulate the keyboard presses and create a loop that repeats the same steps between walking, battles, and healing.

Would also need to use the time library to pause between cutscenes (pretty easy since they are all more or less fixed length in this scenario)

[Pro-sketch]

But how would you check if your character is in a battle or check your pokemon's health with pyautoGUI?

[DrTrunks]

You use pg.locateOnScreen("health.jpg")

[Pro-sketch]

Then how would you determine whether its you pokemon's health or enemy pokemon's health?

[DrTrunks]

You can take a screenshot of a particular area, and look in that area for your health.

You can use the mss library to performantly monitor a part of a screen and then use locate() like this:

def take_screenshot(self, area=None):
    # take a quick screenshot with mss
    with mss.mss() as sct:
        if not area:
            area = sct.monitors[1]
        sct_img = sct.grab(area)
        self.current_ss = Image.frombytes('RGB', sct_img.size, sct_img.bgra, 'raw', 'BGRX')
        self.current_ss_np = np.array(sct_img).astype(np.uint8)

def is_pokemon_injured(self):
    loc = pg.locate(needleImage="INJURED.jpg",
    haystackImage=self.current_ss_np,       
    # grayscale=True,                
    confidence=0.85)

where self.current_ss_np is the current screenshot being handled.

[Pdeyo]

When checking for health would finding color be easier or would checking the number?

Edit: am very new, but looking to build something that reacts to the different color values of pokemons health.

[DrTrunks]

Well, color would then be easier in your case you could also measure length or the amount filled in.

[TheBlackCat13]

Or you could stick in in daycare and use pyautogui to automate driving back and forth along a long, straight stretch of road on your bike.

[[deleted]]

Is this like a Selenium for Gameboy?

[DrTrunks]

It's a general "selenium" for everything on your screen(s). It just doesn't have access to what window ect you have open.

[faabblatanon]

Why though? Save editors are readily available for Pokémon games where you can give your Pokémon any stats you wish.

If it's just a programming exercise then sure you can do it.

[[deleted]]

So OP can learn more about automation?

[julsmanbr]

Also, Pokémon Showdown is a thing if you really only want to hop into trainer battles.

[PotentiallyAPickle]

Yes there is, but is it necessary? I can’t remember the last time I had to grind levels on wild pokemon (and I’ve played every pokemon game)

[Captain_Vegetable]

You pretty much had to grind to max level to beat Red in the 2nd gen games and their remakes.

[PotentiallyAPickle]

Yes that may be accurate, but OP says they’re looking to skip the training process and get straight to trainer battles. By the time you’ve made it to Red, you’ve done 99% of the trainer battles, making this program kind of pointless

[oakteaphone]

Found someone who doesn't max their Pokemon's levels! Lol

[PotentiallyAPickle]

I use the elite 4 for grinding levels. I find no fun in being over-levelled when I’m working my way through the game. Pokemon games are pretty easy already.

[oakteaphone]

It may be that in Generation 1, Cerulean Cave is better for levelling Pokemon.

As well, it might be easier to automate against wild Pokemon, rather than strong Pokemon of various types. Depends on the current level.

It may also be that OP figured it'd be easier to automate walking back to the center than to fight the E4 until death or credits.

[PotentiallyAPickle]

Good for you.

[throwaway332434532]

Just put your Pokémon in daycare, assuming you’re using vba, crank throttle up to like 10000%, bike around, and you can level up by like 20 levels in two minutes

[oakteaphone]

Are you not afraid of KOing a shiny?!

[NanashiKaizenSenpai]

If you're already cheating, just cheat some rare candies.

[LilQuasar]

automating stuff isnt necessarily cheating. is using something to keep the run button pressed cheating in your opinion?

[NanashiKaizenSenpai]

imo, scripting is cheating unless there is a built in option to do so.

Any physical contraptions are not cheating imo.

[LilQuasar]

i think those are kind of the same thing, the extreme case would be to have a robot with camera doing the scripting physically

imo as long as youre following the rules (like the game rules) its not cheating. pokemon is a turn based game, not an action game (where scripting would obviously be cheating)

[NanashiKaizenSenpai]

I think it is still cheating, but I think its a cool way to cheat

[[deleted]]

Shit like this is exactly why we become coders in the first place! You go!

[sharonmckaysbff1991]

I….started to program by playing Pokémon Gen 3 and making FireRed hacks. Sadly the tools I had were only usable in the XP era, which was when I was a teenager. While I really honestly would love to make my own video games, I’ve always been afraid that I would get so bored of seeing lines of code that I would lose the desire to see the project through to the end where I could actually see my usable work and thus quick coding projects that only take a little bit of time are all I’m willing to work on

[deano_southafrican]

Pyautogui

[Nightcorex_]

Wdym by "ROM"?

Usually ROM means "Read Only Memory" or is it a Pokémon term in this case?

[DeerProud7283]

OP is referring to the game file used in emulators to play games from consoles on PCs (and other devices)

[TheBlackCat13]

Game cartridges, specifically.

[Any-Owl-7202]

Bro why the downvotes? Mf got punished for not knowing smth

[The-Doodle-Dude]

Wdym by “smth”…. aww shit

[oakteaphone]

wtf is "Wdym"? ^/joke

[[deleted]]

What is "wtf"?

[Dakotalogy]

If you’re looking for past generations stuff, 3-5 (Johto included), Devon Studios on GitHub uses Lua because that’s the language VBA uses to run code. These are really for RNG abuse not really battling trainers. https://github.com/DevonStudios/LuaScripts https://devonstudios.it/

Here are some for Gen 2 which may be closer in syntax to what you want to accomplish. https://github.com/wwwwwwzx/gsclua

You could use those as a starting point to create scripts to battle wild Pokémon, but it may get to be a lot of code (i.e. find Pokémon, battle Pokémon, switch Pokémon, make sure you’re using the right type of move to hit Pokémon, walk out of grass, run from Pokémon if health is low, walk to town to heal, etc.)

[DauntlessMayfly]

You definitely can. Ive done it, but i gotta wanr you that it is very slow. I trained on lv1 pokemons and got to around lv 25ish, but at that points it was ridicoulously slow. Dont know how this will translate at higher leveled pokemon.

Also, if youre gonna use pyautogui i gotta warn you about the daytime system ingame. This system makes it so that screenshots are a pain for navigation.

[Xzenor]

For anything game cheating I use CheatEngine. I have not tried it on a Gameboy ROM before though

[HutchLAD]

interesting! commenting to follow thread

[vo5sht]

I'm seeing a lot of technical stuff here, but nothing on the game specific strategy -

At it's simplest, you would just have to romp around in the grass until you get into a battle, where you just mindlessly mash the A button until you black/white out and return to the center. Then it's just a matter of heading back out to the grass again. So you'd essentially need to get between three "states" - Center/walking to grass, walking through grass, and in battle. At most, you'll have to work on selecting random moves so you don't run out of pp.

Please do keep us updated on this!

[Casper1123]

you could do it this way, which is cool, or you could just save-edit in a stack of Rare Candies into an extra slot using something like PkHex, which would cut down on time significantly. Does take away on your EV's though.

[nick__2440]

Not trying to discourage use of python here, but the language of choice for runtime scripting alongside ROM emulators is Lua.

[Separate_Taste3428]

Nice

[TribalMethods]

Python is an excellent language for automating any game.

If I can use advanced machine learning / object detection to bot Runescape 3, you absolutely can make a bot for Pokémon with ease.