1st Gen Battling Prof. Oak in Pokémon Blue

[Gentexce36.]

Hello,

I saw a couple of clips on YouTube where a guy was battling Prof. Oak. Does anyone know if this is genuine or if it is a fake/hoax? You could probably use a couple of GameShark codes to battle him, but, why would Nintendo include a text in the game saying "PROF.OAK wants to fight!"? The same goes for the graphical image of Prof. Oak on this picture. Does anyone have an explanation? Thanks.

 

[-Jared-]

I don't know of an "official" explanation, but I personally believe that the producers of the game decided at one point that they would include a fight with Prof. Oak, but for some reason, decided against it and removed the fight from the game. You are right, there are a few Gameshark codes that allow you to fight him.

This link has some info as well:
Bulbapedia Article

 

[mew_nani]

Simply put: Yes you can battle Prof. Oak, if you have a Gameshark or can make him appear via Mew Glitch. He even has three different teams, using one of them based on your starter. It seems you were supposed to battle him at some point, but they cut him out.

 

[Gentexce36.]

Simply put: Yes you can battle Prof. Oak, if you have a Gameshark or can make him appear via Mew Glitch. He even has three different teams, using one of them based on your starter. It seems you were supposed to battle him at some point, but they cut him out.

Looks like it yes, and it is interesting to discover that Nintendo did in fact program a team consisting of five Pokémon into the game. Just for the record, here Prof. Oak's team:

lv. 66 Tauros
lv. 67 Exeggutor
lv. 68 Arcanine
lv. 70 Gyarados

And finally one of the three starter Pokémon. That's a pretty crazy team for an NPC.

 

[Skaterzpenguin]

The dude is using gameshark. Trust me! ;)

 

[Guest123_x1]

From what I read, the player was supposed to battle Prof. Oak at least a few times through the game play, but as has been said already, this plan was scrapped during development. However, the code for battling Prof. Oak was left in the final versions of the games, and thus can be accessed with GameShark or other such cheating devices.

 

[Gentexce36.]

It's said that he was to be the Elite 4 champion initially, due to his team being similar to the Rival's and the text message from the E4 to him in his PC(we hope to see you here or something like that). That message can have been just for him to evaluate or spectate the matches, or simply inaugurate one to the Hall of Fame too.

My guess is, that he were the final challenge right before becoming the champion. The levels on his Pokémon are higher than the rivals, which indicates that he originally were to be battled against right after the rival. I wonder why Nintendo decided to remove him from the game. The rival weren't that big of a challenge really, so putting Prof. Oak as the final challenge would had made it more challenging imo.

 

[TheBestOne]

https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Pokémon_Red_and_Green_beta#Battling_against_Professor_Oak

 

[Echidna]

well the sprite is explainable by the intro, if he appears there in Blue cause i gorget, as for the text, the code could just flip around a few hex values moving his name from the intro to a battle script. its not unlikely to happen.

 

[Gentexce36.]

well the sprite is explainable by the intro, if he appears there in Blue cause i gorget, as for the text, the code could just flip around a few hex values moving his name from the intro to a battle script. its not unlikely to happen.

True, but the sprite in the intro only shows Prof. Oak seen from the front. There is no sprite available in the intro or in the entire storyline of the game that features Prof. Oak seen from behind ( first person view ).

This is the sprite in particular that I'm talking about. I'm sorry for the bad image quality.

 

[vaporeon7]

I once battled him when I was you while using the Missingno cheat. I was really hard to beat.

 

[Guest123_x1]

In all seriousness, that back-sprite only should exist in Pokémon Yellow, as he cateches Pikachu for you when you step out in the grass.

It's possible that during development of Pokémon Red and Green, back-view sprites of all trainer classes, gym leaders, Elite Four, rival, and the like were programmed into the game (just as all the Pokémon had back-view sprites programmed in), however, these have never actually been seen.

 

[Sawakita]

It's possible that during development of Pokémon Red and Green, back-view sprites of all trainer classes, gym leaders, Elite Four, rival, and the like were programmed into the game (just as all the Pokémon had back-view sprites programmed in), however, these have never actually been seen.

Actually I'm pretty sure they were not. Since I've reverse-engineered the sprite loading code in the game Pokemon Blue, I can safely say that the only backsprites in the cartridge, excepting pokemon, are Hiro's and "Old man"'s ones.
That image showing Oak's backsprite in Blue is a RAM hack or a video/screenshot modification.

 

[Lord Varion]

I heard that Prof.Oak was going to be champion or something like that instead of blue.
As for the sprite it's also used in the intro lecture(with the whats your name?)
And the only known way to fight him is by gamesharking/hacking.

As for the Backsprite image ... clearly it's hacked or modified after having a usual blue/red screenshot taken.

 

[Dragoniteisliberal]

This may have been a scrapped idea by Nintendo, but they kept the data in-game, so it is acessable to hackers.

 

[Echidna]

True, but the sprite in the intro only shows Prof. Oak seen from the front. There is no sprite available in the intro or in the entire storyline of the game that features Prof. Oak seen from behind ( first person view ).

This is the sprite in particular that I'm talking about. I'm sorry for the bad image quality.

true, but gf could've originally wanted to make him battle, then decided otherwise. In this case, the back sprite could've been written into the rom, but never used. If anyone was to find it, he could've written a code to bring it forth.

 

[Bernardo1994]

Prof. Oak

That is glitch that is caused by messing up with glitches. Eventually you will fight with Prof. Oak and he even has a set up team. I don't know how to trigger the battle with him but it sounds funny :)