What Pokémon Valiant changes
How the game plays differently from Pokémon Emerald, then what it does to the Pokémon.
How the game plays
Valiant is a new region, Lavan, laid over Pokémon Emerald and rebuilt on the modern pokeemerald-expansion engine, with Hoenn waiting on the other side of it. The roster is Generations 1 to 3 plus the later evolutions those families were given afterwards, so a Snorunt can become a Froslass and a Magneton a Magnezone. Battling follows the modern rules rather than Emerald's: every move carries its own Physical, Special or Status category instead of inheriting one from its type, the Fairy type exists and is used, and the ability list runs to three hundred and ten rather than Emerald's seventy-seven. Your first Pokémon follows you around the map. The story is about Celebi and about travelling through time. This is a beta: the documentation the creator generates from the game covers the whole map the engine carries, which is a good deal more than this release opens, and the guide says so wherever it matters.
Every move decides for itself whether it is physical or special
In the original Emerald a move was physical or special because of its type: every Ice move was special, every Rock move physical. Here each move carries its own category, so Ice Punch hits off Attack and Hyper Voice off Special Attack. It changes which Pokémon are worth building and what a held item or a stat boost is worth. Every move page in this guide prints the category the game gives it.
The Fairy type is in
Fairy did not exist when Emerald came out. It does here, on 19 of the game's Pokémon, and it resists Fighting, Bug and Dark, beats Dragon outright and folds to Poison and Steel. The type chart on every Pokémon page in this guide is drawn from the modern one.
Old families get their later evolutions
The roster stops at Generation 3, but 18 Pokémon from later games are here as the ends of Generation 1 to 3 families: Froslass, Magnezone, Roserade, Weavile, Mamoswine and the rest. Some of them need an item the original games did not have, and every species page in this guide says which one.
Nothing needs a second player
The evolutions that used to need a trade can be done with an item instead — a Linking Cord or a Trade Stone, depending on the Pokémon. The documentation lists both the old trade method and the item, and the species pages here carry both lines.
Your Pokémon walks with you
The first Pokémon in your party follows you around the map, the way it does in the Johto games.
From the documentation the creator generates from the game and publishes themselves.
The main changes
- A new region, Lavan, with its own cities and its own lettered routes from A to K, leading into Hoenn
- 404 Pokémon: Generations 1 to 3, plus 18 later evolutions of those families, so lines that ended in the original games can keep going
- The modern battle rules on Emerald's engine — 934 moves that each carry their own Physical, Special or Status category, 310 abilities, and the Fairy type on 19 Pokémon
- Your first Pokémon follows you around the map
- A story built on Celebi and on travelling through time
- 290 maps with wild tables, 574 trainer fights and 1,154 places to pick something up, all read from the documentation the creator generates from the game
How the Pokémon change
The game leaves the official base stats, types and abilities alone. What it changes is elsewhere: movesets, encounters and trainer teams.