Pokémon Game Automation

Automate Pokémon games using mGBA (Game Boy Advance emulator) with scripting support. Read RAM state, inject button inputs, and build bots for grinding, breeding, or exploration.

When to Use

• User wants to automate repetitive tasks in a Pokémon game (grinding, breeding, shiny hunting)
• User wants to read game state (player position, party HP, item count) programmatically
• User wants to build a battle or movement bot
• User wants to run a headless emulator for scripted playthrough
• User wants to replay a battle or scenario automatically

How to Use

1. Install mGBA

powershell
# Download mGBA from https://mgba.io/downloads.html
# Portable version — no install required
# Extract to C:\tools\mGBA\
# Verify
& "C:\tools\mGBA\mgba.exe" --version

2. Understand mGBA scripting (Lua)

mGBA has a built-in Lua scripting interface accessible via Tools → Scripting Console.

lua
-- Read a memory address (example: Pokémon FireRed player X position)
-- Addresses vary by game — look up RAM maps for your ROM
local playerX = memory.read8(0x02036E2C)
local playerY = memory.read8(0x02036E28)
print(string.format("Player position: %d, %d", playerX, playerY))

3. Send button inputs via Lua

lua
-- Simulate pressing A button
input.press("A")
emu.frameadvance()   -- advance one frame

-- Walk right 5 steps
for i = 1, 5 do
  input.press("Right")
  emu.frameadvance()
  emu.frameadvance()
end

4. Automate shiny hunting (soft reset loop)

lua
-- Pokémon FireRed shiny hunting — keep soft resetting until shiny found
-- Shiny flag address varies by game version
local SHINY_ADDR = 0x020244B0   -- example address

local resets = 0
while true do
  local isShiny = memory.read8(SHINY_ADDR)
  if isShiny == 1 then
    print(string.format("SHINY FOUND after %d resets!", resets))
    break
  end
  resets = resets + 1
  -- Soft reset: L+R+Start+Select
  input.press("L"); input.press("R"); input.press("Start"); input.press("Select")
  emu.frameadvance()
  emu.reset()
end

5. Read party Pokémon HP

lua
-- FireRed/LeafGreen party struct base addresses (Gen 3)
local PARTY_BASE = 0x02024284
local STRUCT_SIZE = 100   -- bytes per Pokémon in party

for slot = 0, 5 do
  local base   = PARTY_BASE + slot * STRUCT_SIZE
  local species = memory.read16(base + 0)
  local hpCurr  = memory.read16(base + 56)
  local hpMax   = memory.read16(base + 58)
  if species > 0 then
    print(string.format("Slot %d: species=%d HP=%d/%d", slot+1, species, hpCurr, hpMax))
  end
end

6. Control mGBA from Python via socket

mGBA can expose a scripting socket for external control:

lua
-- mGBA side: open a socket and listen
local sock = socket.tcp()
sock:bind("127.0.0.1", 8888)
sock:listen(1)
local client = sock:accept()
while true do
  local cmd = client:receive("*l")
  if cmd == "press_a" then input.press("A") end
  emu.frameadvance()
end

python
import socket, time

s = socket.socket()
s.connect(("127.0.0.1", 8888))

def press(btn):
  s.sendall(f"press_{btn}\n".encode())
  time.sleep(0.05)

press("a")
press("right")

Examples

"Automate grinding by walking in tall grass until party is fainted" → Use step 3 to loop walking movements. Read party HP from step 5 to detect all fainted.

"Count how many soft resets it takes to find a shiny Starter" → Use step 4 with the game's shiny flag address. It increments the counter and stops on shiny.

"Read my current party's HP and print a status report" → Use step 5 inside the mGBA Lua scripting console.

Cautions

• ROM files are copyrighted — only use ROMs of games you legally own
• RAM addresses differ between game versions (FireRed v1.0 vs v1.1, Japanese vs English) — verify with RAM maps from romhacking.net
• mGBA Lua API differs from older emulators (VBA-M, BizHawk) — code is not directly portable
• Automated soft-reset loops run very fast — add frame limits to avoid 100% CPU usage
• mGBA's socket scripting is not enabled by default — must be started from Tools → Scripting