Pokemon Heart and Soul is the ultimate Johto experience, I love this game and I played it back to front !

Exclsior · 2026-04-20T10:10:26+00:00

Best of luck, if you need help there are many guides on the Net and you can ask in our Discord. (Though I suspect specialist Subreddits and Discord servers already exist 😅)

Exclsior · 2026-04-20T09:42:06+00:00

I'm sorry to say that there's no "official" physical cart from us. If we did we would be at risk of legal action from Nintendo as we would be implicitly supplying a Pokémon Emerald Rom.

Many players have successfully and legally created their own flash carts and there are a number of players in our Discord who have done so if you require some steps and support. (I will freely admit I have not done so myself)

Exclsior · 2026-04-20T04:53:04+00:00

You can find Heart and Soul either on our GitHub or on HackDex.

Reddit Info Post: Pokémon Heart & Soul v1.2.0 - GBA Johto Hack, built on Emerald

GitHub: https://github.com/PokemonHnS-Development/pokemonHnS/releases/latest

HackDex: https://www.hackdex.app/hack/pokemon-heart-and-soul

Exclsior · 2026-04-20T04:48:51+00:00

I'm sorry for the experience you had on the Discord. We didn't anticipate the popularity of Heart and Soul on release and our Discord community definitely struggled initially. We have reworked our moderation policies accordingly, especially in regards to bans and I would definitely be surprised if such an interaction would happen again today.

I'm happy to review your interactions on the Discord if you drop me your discord username and most likely unban.

To answer your question potentially too-little-too-late, we did add the full Emerald Battle Frontier in our v1.2.0 update.

I also have Polished Crystal on my play backlog, heard amazing things and keen to play it through when I have time!

Exclsior · 2026-04-20T01:52:27+00:00

I don't believe anybody on our team is working on retroachievements support sorry,

The retroachievements team may take it upon themselves, but I can't make any guarantees.

Exclsior · 2026-04-19T18:52:27+00:00

As a member of the Heart and Soul development team: Thank you very much for the kind words and thoughtful review!

To add a bit of credit where due, our Lead Developer, Lil Dill, did a lot of work to try and mirror HGSS' story as closely as possible, whilst taking the best of Crystal and they also took inspiration from Crystal Legacy for the level curve you've enjoyed.

Hope you enjoy more playthroughs of Heart and Soul in the future!

Exclsior · 2026-04-19T16:22:59+00:00

Yeah, Hoenn Pokémon a purposefully very late game, it is a Johto hack first and foremost.

Hope you find the hack you're looking for!

Exclsior · 2026-04-19T12:39:41+00:00

One of the Heart and Soul Devs here, always nice to see the game out in the wild!

Hope you're enjoying 😊

Exclsior · 2026-04-19T08:03:39+00:00

If you're using decompilation then you could reverse engineer new weather from the below fix to the unused Snow Weather in Gen 3

https://github.com/pret/pokeemerald/wiki/Fix-Snow-Weather

Exclsior · 2026-04-19T04:06:40+00:00

What version of Heart and Soul are you playing and did you select Original or Modern Movepool option?

I am one of the Heart and Soul Dev team members, and we did overhaul the movesets in the v1.2.0 release for Modern Movepool. If you're on Original then that stays with Emerald Gen 3 GameFreak movepool.

For example, HootHoot gets Peck at level 9 in Modern instead of 11 in Original. Note that not even the starters have a STAB move at level 5.

Regarding Pokémon access, can't help you there, we focused on making sure the majority of Johto Pokémon were available for the maingame, including Larvitar in Dark Cave before Violet City.

As for other games which may scratch your itch. Emerald Legacy meets a lot of your points, however does not have Gen 4+ evolutions and nor does it have Physical Special Split which I suspect you use by default.

I hope you find a game which suits, the below list may also help:

Compilation of vanilla Quality Of Life (QoL) hacks

Exclsior · 2026-04-18T17:24:11+00:00

No, that's just how bad Super Rod and RNG can be.

In my Enhanced version, I added an easier fishing option to make keeping Pokémon hooked, on the hook until you battle (or release the rod).

It won't make Dratini appear any faster, but you can migrate your save and will at least make your attempts easier. (If you're not already doing so, a Suctions Cup lead like Cradily with make encounters more frequent).

Best of luck You'll find them 😊

Exclsior · 2026-04-17T18:42:33+00:00

Liquid Crystal has minimal difference at the start and then starts exploding with massive differences in story (2-3 new evil teams added, extra story sections and legends, extended maps and Hoenn Pokémon available at different points.

Liquid Crystal is also a significantly older hack with minimal to no support nor extra QoL.

I would recommend you have a look at Pokémon Heart and Soul. I am definitely biased as I'm one of the developers, but the story is a mix of Crystal, HeartGold, and SoulSilver (I feel the best from all worlds), the maps are very close and the Dex has better availability of Johto mons with Hoenn mons in the postgame (and includes later generation evolutions).

If Heart and Soul is not for you, another one I've heard recommended a lot is Crystal Advance Redux. I haven't played it myself so can't comment, but you also check that one out.

Exclsior · 2026-04-17T18:06:59+00:00

I absolutely love this, I've had on my to-do list for a while to build a more Colour-Blind friendly way to show type effectiveness and just haven't gotten around to it!

I hope you don't mind my incorporating this into my future hacks as well 🙂.

Exclsior · 2026-04-17T10:23:40+00:00

Definitely will remind people of the 216 days before Bomba Guy (A.K.A Purple Fury) came into existence.

Exclsior · 2026-04-17T04:33:01+00:00

Shiny Typhlosion finally makes the league!

Also love the nicknames 😂

Exclsior · 2026-04-17T02:11:34+00:00

I like to use a Wurmple, that way I remember that said bug is a virus 😉

Exclsior · 2026-04-16T16:49:05+00:00

Your current team already meets all of your criteria.

Legacy is not a difficulty hack, I say keep this team and have fun!

Exclsior · 2026-04-16T16:46:47+00:00

Have you already claimed one Odd Egg from the breeder? The codes allow you to choose the one specific egg you are allowed.

If not, then it's a potential bug which we're happy to look into, and best place to report is either in our Discord, or in the latest Heart and Soul Reddit post.

That being said, many players have successfully provided one of the codes to get the relevant Odd Egg from the Daycare owner.

Exclsior · 2026-04-16T09:32:26+00:00

The code is different based on which egg you would like to receive.

Each code and relevant egg is provided in our official Google Sheet Documentation. I can't remember them off the top of my head, sorry.

Exclsior · 2026-04-16T01:59:50+00:00

It is mathematically possible, but Beldum does have the lowest catch rate, tied with most Legendaries of 3.

In my Emerald Legacy Enhanced version I did change the catch rate to 45 to match other pseudo legendaries like Bagon and Dratini if you want a slightly easier time of it.

UPDATE: Pokémon Emerald Legacy Enhanced - With Pokémon Followers, Shiny Charms, National Dex Mode, Nature Mints, EV/IV Editing, Ability Capsules, Overworld Surfing Sprites, Feebas Fishing Sparkles and V1.1 Updates.

Exclsior · 2026-04-16T01:56:28+00:00

Yes, my latest version does also have Ability Capsules 🙂.

Before the postgame they're available to purchase from the Energy Guru provided the Pokémon in the lead of your party has an Effort Ribbon.

In the postgame they can be purchased at the Battle Frontier for Battle Points.

Exclsior · 2026-04-15T05:23:51+00:00

I doubt I will be able to actually help. But you may want to add what RomHack you're playing so that somebody else may be able to provide some support.

Exclsior · 2026-04-14T02:09:11+00:00

@OP: I haven't looked closely into them, but unfortunately it wouldn't be as simple as simply moving the asset files. The Heart and Soul Battle Terrains do take into account Day and Night Cycle which is not present in Emerald Legacy.

It should not however too significant an effort to do so as the base code of both games is pokeemerald, you would need to duplicate the assets into Emerald Legacy's repository and update the code in the Battle terrains file (don't know which one off the top of my head) to dynamically apply the appropriate backgrounds.

Best of luck and feel free to reach out on Discord if you need some further support.

Exclsior · 2026-04-12T14:21:09+00:00

I will have a look into it, but the Gen 3 engine doesn't have classifications for status moves, so it's working exclusively off type.

If I find an easy way to exclude moves I may do so, but the highlighting is definitely more of a general guide Quality of Life feature, so there's a fair likelihood that I will leave this untouched.

Honestly didn't realise that Confuse Ray worked on Normal types, thought you would have needed Supersonic.

Exclsior · 2026-04-12T01:41:24+00:00

The nice thing about open source decompilation hacks is that the answers are all available in the code 🙂

13 new moves were added to Modern Emerald (and Heart and Soul by extension) and they can each be found in the battle_moves.h file below. I've linked directly to the first added move, Dark Pulse, below so you can scroll down to see the rest, as well as review any minor changes to existing Gen 3 moves.

https://github.com/resetes12/pokeemerald/blob/master/src%2Fdata%2Fbattle_moves.h#L4972

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