Introduction

With the release of Pokémon Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire in 2014 the Hoenn Region received a complete overhaul with familiar, but improved and expanded storyline, new battle mechanics, gameplay improvements and more and more. Some people theorized that Delta Emerald will be released alongside Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire, but of course, it never happened. We never received a full Hoenn experience in one package. Omega Ruby provided us an expanded look on Team Magma and Groudon, Alpha Sapphire did the same for Team Aqua and Kyogre, and neither of them had the Battle Frontier, which is an Emerald-only feature. Everything is just scattered between different games and we do not have all-in-one version.
That's what I was aiming for when creating this hack. I wanted to bring everything that ORAS improved on into one, complete Hoenn game.
New character designs and new dialogues from ORAS, updated movesets and abilities, Gen 4+ evolutions, Megas and many more!
So let's have a closer look on new features!

Features

• Character Designs and Storyline updated, including:
  • Primal Kyogre, Primal Groudon and Mega Rayquaza incorporated into the story
  • Most of the trainer sprites are updated to the ones from ORAS
  • Almost all main story dialogues are updated to the ones from ORAS
  • Zinnia is included into the main plot, along with her theme songs
  • Wally can be encountered at the Battle Frontier in the postgame, instead of the Victory Road
    • also his ORAS theme songs are included as well
  • Steven is the Champion again and Wallace is the Sootopolis Gym Leader
  • Some Trainer teams are tweaked to be more akin to the ones from ORAS (Wally has a Gallade, Brendan/May has a fully evolved starter and so on)
    and a lot of other things
• Emerald Battle Engine Upgrade V1, which includes:
  • Fairy-type
  • Gen 4-7 Moves and Abilities
  • Mega Evolutions and Primal Reversion
  • Physical/Special Split
  • Pokémon gain experience after capture
    and many more
• Pokémon stats updated to the standards of Gen 7
• Updated Pokémon sprites and cries
• Gen 4+ Evolutions of Gen 1-3 Pokémon with their respective Evolution methods and items
• Hoenn Dex and National Dex are expanded to include new Pokémon
• All 211 Hoenn Dex Pokémon are catchable without trading or events
  • All Trade evolutions now evolve also by just holding their evolution item and leveling up
    (Machoke, Kadabra, Graveler and Haunter need a new Link Cable item to evolve)
  • all non-Hoenn Dex Pokémon that are available in vanilla Emerald are also catchable (except Lugia and Ho-Oh), including all three Johto starters
• Rematch trainers have higher-leveled Pokémon
• Proper rematches for the Elite Four and the Champion
• Game is fully decapitalized
• Day and Night System
• In-game trades are changed to ones from RS/ORAS
• Menu colors from Ruby and Sapphire were restored
• Items pocket is expanded from 30 to 60 possible items
• Infinite TMs
• Infinite Move Tutors
• FireRed-style fishing
• Pokémart items depend on your badge count
• Running indoors
• Eggs hatch at level 1
• Poison survival at 1 HP
• B2W2 Repel System
• Max amount of money is 9,999,999
• Nature-colored stats
• ipatix HQ Sound Mixer
  and a few more features I probably forgot about :')

To-Do List (not relevant anymore since the project is cancelled):

Screenshots

Music Examples

Changelog

Bugs

• Doesn't work on regular VBA, use VBA-M instead
• Bugs that occur on mGBA (and probably on the actual GBA and the 3DS):
  • Torkoal's attacks may freeze the game
• Roaming Lati@s bugs:
  • Its HP and status resets between every battle
  • It doesn't change location after fleeing
  • It continues to roam after capture or defeat
• Breeding mechanics are partially broken:
  • New Eeveelutions produce same species instead of an Eevee (e.g. Leafeon produces another Leafeon, not an Eevee)
  • New baby Pokémon take extremely long time to hatch (e.g. Chingling, Mime Jr.)
  • Some Pokémon Eggs freeze the game when you try to take them from the Day-Care Man (e.g. Heracross, Pinsir)
  It is recommended to save before taking an egg and backup that save file until the egg hatches
• Battle facilities saving bug: loading save files made during your Battle Tent or any of Battle Frontier facilities challenge erases all your Pokédex data and all items from Items and Key items pockets. Could also occur when loading saves made during trades, but it's not confirmed.
  Be sure to use save states instead while challenging battle facilities. After you leave the facility, you can save your game manually and it will be fine
• When you switch out a Mega Evolved Pokémon, it reverts back to its regular form
• Glitched rotating doors in Fortree Gym. Can be fixed by entering any menu
• Sometimes Pokémon can Mega Evolve on their own
• "Opposing trainer sends out your Pokémon" text appears in battle sometimes
• Groudon, Kyogre and Rayquaza stay Primal/Mega after capture, they revert to their regular forms after any battle
• Link features between two Delta Emerald roms don't work (but seems like they work when connecting Delta Emerald to vanilla Emerald or any other game)
• Numerous battle engine bugs (Ghost-type Pokémon immune to Fairy-type moves, missing move animations etc.)
• Numerous minor graphical glitches

Download

Delta Emerald v1.1.5
Notes: the ZIP archive includes the Delta Emerald patch, a ReadMe file, Pokémon and Items Location Guide and NUPS Patcher.
Patch: required ROM for patching is "1986 - Pokemon Emerald (U)(TrashMan).gba."


Compatibility with Mega Blue:
Delta Emerald is compatible with my other hack, Pokémon Mega Blue for the sake of the ability to fill up the National Dex. That means all Pokémon in both hacks have exact same index numbers and can be moved between games freely. There is only one problem here - Delta Emerald has more moves than Mega Blue, so many move slots don't exist in the latter game. Here is a list of all Pokémon moves from Bulbapedia. Every move that comes in that list after Incinerate (No.510) must be removed from your Delta Emerald's Pokémon's movesets before performing a trade. Also, a lot of new moves can change after trading because of two different moves being assigned to the same index number between games. So I recommend you to use link features between Delta Emerald and Mega Blue only to fill up your Pokédex and not for battling.

Credits

DizzyEgg and ChaCha Dinosaur - Emerald Battle Engine Upgrade, Emerald Hacked Engine, Pokémon and Item Expansion
Sugimori Palettes: The DS-style 64x64 Pokémon Sprite Resource Thread - Gen 1-4 Pokémon Sprites and Icons
Gen VI: DS-style 64x64 Pokémon Sprite Resource Thread - Sylveon and Mega Evolution Sprites and Icons
DS Style Gen VII and Beyond Pokémon Sprite Repository in 64x64 Thread - Alola Forms Sprites and Icons
ipatix - High-quality Sound Mixer
Le pug - Decapitalization Patch
Chaos Rush - Color Restoration Patch
Seer - this very thread you're looking at right now
IceJkai - Wally and Courtney Trainer Sprites
LeeHatake93 - Brendan and May Front Sprites
supajackle - Tabitha Trainer Sprite
MelodyCrystel - Zinnia Trainer Sprite
paterDM - Zinnia Battle Theme MIDI
FL.Remix - Wally Battle Theme MIDI
Nnwt - Wally Encounter Theme, Zinnia Encounter Theme and Zinnia's Sorrow MIDIs

And huge thanks to all of you for playing my hack and bug reporting!

The hack is good, it gives the feeling of a regular Ruby with Sapphire, but with Emerald features. If you do not have 3DS, but want to play ORAS - download this

From "Team M"

Yooo! This looks pretty dope, although I must ask, are the sprites updated from the standard gen 3 fare? Also, is there a difficulty increase or is it vanilla emerald difficulty? Do you plan to release a harder mod? Thank you!

Inner Rhymes said:

Yooo! This looks pretty dope, although I must ask, are the sprites updated from the standard gen 3 fare? Also, is there a difficulty increase or is it vanilla emerald difficulty? Do you plan to release a harder mod? Thank you!

Click to expand...

Difficulty of the main game is unchanged, but rematches are more difficult due to increased Pokémon levels. And I'm sorry, but I don't have any plans on making a more difficult version, as it was never a goal of my project. Also, what do you mean by "standard gen 3 fare"?

STikER said:

Difficulty of the main game is unchanged, but rematches are more difficult due to increased Pokémon levels. And I'm sorry, but I don't have any plans on making a more difficult version, as it was never a goal of my project. Also, what do you mean by "standard gen 3 fare"?

Click to expand...

Aye, not an issue at all, still looks really dope. By standard Gen 3 fare, I mean to ask if the sprites have been updated to Gen 4 or plus, or are they just gen 3 sprites?

Really fun hack so far! I just started on it. How far into the game does version 1.0 go?

Inner Rhymes said:

Aye, not an issue at all, still looks really dope. By standard Gen 3 fare, I mean to ask if the sprites have been updated to Gen 4 or plus, or are they just gen 3 sprites?

Click to expand...

Aha, thanks for clarifying. All Pokémon sprites have been updated to their Gen 4+ variants, but they have custom palettes based on official Sugimori artworks.

PkmnTrainerKonner said:

Really fun hack so far! I just started on it. How far into the game does version 1.0 go?

Click to expand...

It's fully completed, from the beginning to an end (postgame included). The only things left to do are those in the To-Do List in the post.

Awesome! Since fairy-types are in this is Sylveon obtainable or does it just go up to the gen 4 Eeveelutions?

PkmnTrainerKonner said:

Awesome! Since fairy-types are in this is Sylveon obtainable or does it just go up to the gen 4 Eeveelutions?

Click to expand...

Sylveon is added into the game, but you have to trade an Eevee from another game, as only Pokémon catchable in Ruby, Sapphire and Emerald are obtainable here.

One final question. Where is HM04 located? It doesn't seem to be in Rusturf Tunnel where it usually is.

PkmnTrainerKonner said:

One final question. Where is HM04 located? It doesn't seem to be in Rusturf Tunnel where it usually is.

Click to expand...

You can get it from Wally's Uncle in Verdanturf Town.

Question how many pokemon are available in this hack and how do you upgrade your pokedex?

Where can I get all the new items? Also are any of the TM/HM locations changed from the original Emerald? And what about the wild encounters, have they been changed from the original game?

Oh my! 😍♥️ A emerald hack with updated features ! I gonna play this pretty hack! I love Hoenn and I also love your hack! Goodluck! on hacking, we are supporting you. 😁

Amazing upgrade of Emerald! Many thanks for sharing...

oscariothetrainer said:

Question how many pokemon are available in this hack and how do you upgrade your pokedex?

Click to expand...

If I'm not mistaken, you can catch 254 Pokémon in the game, 211 of them are from the Hoenn Dex. You upgrade Dex to National Mode the same way as in the original Emerald.

supanut2000 said:

Where can I get all the new items? Also are any of the TM/HM locations changed from the original Emerald? And what about the wild encounters, have they been changed from the original game?

Click to expand...

Most of the new items are at the same locations they are in ORAS, with few exceptions here and there. Some TMs that were previously only buyable are now scattered across the region as you cannot buy them anymore. HM04 Strength is the only HM that had its location changed, you can get it from Wally's Uncle in Verdanturf Town.
Wild Encounters are mostly the same, though some Pokémon were made more common (for example Seedot, Mawile, Duskull) and Pokémon available only in Ruby and Sapphire and not in Emerald where also added to the routes where they can be encountered in RS (for example Zangoose, Lunatone, Roselia).

Also a quick update on the hack: today I realized there is no way to get a Meowth in Delta Emerald, so in version 1.0.1 I changed an in-game trade at the Battle Frontier to what it was in the original.

Is Battle Bond included? If so how do we get it?

Paul4 said:

Is Battle Bond included? If so how do we get it?

Click to expand...

Unfortunately, no, Battle Bond is not included, as there is no Greninja in the game.

Paul4 said:

Is Battle Bond included? If so how do we get it?

Click to expand...

Why would Battle Bond be available if Greninja itself isn't.

STikER said:

Features:

• Emerald Battle Engine Upgrade V1, which includes:
  • Fairy-type
  • Gen 4-7 Moves and Abilities
  • Mega Evolutions and Primal Reversion
  • Pokémon gain experience after capture
    and many more

Click to expand...

I know and I understand that this project may have been a Work in Progress for a long time, but man! You missed a really big opportunity by not using the Emerald Battle Engine Upgrade V2. The project is amazing though, even without V2 Battle Engine ngl.