3rd Gen UNKNOWN PROBLEM W/ MY SAPPHIRE GAME PLEASE HELP

I'm having the weirdest problem with my sapphire version. I recently bought a copy off craigslist from a respectable seller. Everything worked fine, save file and internal battery were all good and everything. I played through the story as usual, starting with a mudkip, and catching a shroomish as my second party member, later on catching trapnich as my third. I continued the game with no problems, defeated the 5th gym leader, and headed towards fortree city. By the time I arrived in fortree, my trapnich had evolved into Vibrava. And that's where the problem started. After defeating the fortree gym, I continued down route 120. I encountered the first trainer sent out my Vibrava and all of a sudden the game restarts. Thought it was just a one time glitch. Retried and again, as soon as Vibrava was sent out the game restarted. THIS ONLY HAPPENS IN BATTLES AGAINST TRAINERS AND ONLY WHEN I SEND OUT VIBRAVA. This did not happen when I used my other pokemon.(Swampert, Breloom, and my hm ♥♥♥♥♥ were my only other pokemon, all of which I cought early on) I thought maybe vibrava was just cursed. It even happened when he evolved into flygon which achieved using the exp share. Cut my losses and just dropped him from my team. I went to catch a Vulpix on mt pierre in replace of my lost flygon. AND WOULDN'T YOU K NOW IT VULPIX HAD THE SAME CURSE. The game just RESTARTS when I send her out. I cought multiple other pokemon as a test and it happens with any pokemon I catch except for a zigzagoon I caught on route 121.


The person I bought it from exchanged the game for a second copy, AND IT HAPPENED AGAIN AT THE SAME POINT IN THE GAME WITH THE SAME POKEMOM STARTING WITH VIBRAVA. This had happened twice with two separate games.

I know this is a long, random and complicated question. Might be unanswerable.

Basically I just need to know:
-could this be a problem with my gba console (seeing as its the same problem with 2 different games)
-am I just getting screwed over with glitched games?
-and is there any way to possibly fix this?

Hope someone has some sort of answer, really frustrated with this :l THANKS GUYS :-)

This sounds like a bootleg copy of the game.

Try and Migrate Pokémon from your Sapphire to a DS game. If the data is deleted, you've a bootleg copy.

Yeah, that's a telltale sign of a bootleg. Constant glitches due to faulty copying jobs cause the game start over again and again and again if you do certain triggers that cause a reset. If you can, do like Sonkitts suggests and migrate Pokémon to a DS via Pal Park. A legitimate copy won't be deleted, but bootlegs will due the copy protection programmed into legit DS Pokémon games.

Your copy is not real. Don't but these things off Craigslist, their not very reliable. I did this once and had the same thing happen, but this time with a Claydol and the game was Sapphire. Well the game wasn't real and I contacted the guy who sold it to me and he actually didn't know. He ended up giving me another game that he said he bought himself. That one worked. But yeah, just be very carful where you purchase things from.

I'm not going to repeat what the others said, but do what they said. XD

Cheers

Although your description has led many of us to confirm it's a bootleg, including myself, would you mind posting pictures of it? Generally, just looking at the cartridge will tell a story, even if the seller faked a Nintendo Official Seal.

I'm actually having exactly the same issue with vulpix on a copy from ebay- I didn't realise there were bootlegs like this to look out for...

The same is true even after evolving with fire stone, but I'm at 8 badges and wanting to head to the elite 4. Do you know if there are more red shards available on Sapphire?

This is a telltale sign of a bootleg. Just a piece of advice for the future: buy the actual games. As cheap as the prices may seem on eBay or craigslist, there are a ton of bootlegged games going around and in my opinion just avoid those sites altogether for video games.

This sounds like the start of a creepypasta story.

Can't say I've ever heard of this happening. I usually buy games from the local retro game stores around me, so I guess I've never encountered this. Hope you can get a replacement. :)