Pokémon Gold and Silver 97: Reforged

Pokémon Gold and Silver 97: Reforged

released on Apr 11, 2022

Pokémon Gold and Silver 97: Reforged

released on Apr 11, 2022

Gold and Silver 97: Reforged is a totally new re-imagining of the world from the 1997 Spaceworld demo of Pokémon Gold and Silver. Featuring an entirely new campaign and story through the Nihon Region based on all of Japan. Graphics have been totally overhauled to match the look and feel of the final 1999 release of Pokémon GSC, and gameplay spruced up with lots of entirely new content and places to explore.


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What a lovely romhack! This hack makes a full game out of the Spaceworld 97 demo of Gold and Silver, and it's so charming. Early generations of pokemon had a strangeness that has slowly been sanded out as the games kept going. By Scarlet and Violet, as much as I like those games, it's almost gone entirely. This hack is like an alternate universe where that weird energy kept going, and it made me feel like a kid playing through Gold on my game boy for the first time again.
The region of Nihon is full of oddball areas and concepts, so many surprises around every corner. How about a secret cave inside a fountain in Sanskrit town? How about a zoo? How about the entire Kanto region but shrunk down to the size of one huge map inside a city?
That's not even mentioning the pokemon differences. Some are completely unique to this version, like Raitora and Plux. Some would be revisited later, with early versions of Leafeon and Lickilicky and such. Some would be completely different versions of existing pokemon, like the poison type Umbreon and the infinitely cuter Hoppip line.
It's absolutely fascinating as someone who grew up with these games, and arguably a better balanced experience given it lacks Johto's obnoxious level problem. I don't think this will be my preferred way to play through Johto going forward, but I'll definitely be playing it again in the future.
Can't recommend it enough! I want Raitora in real pokemon goddammit!

a sequencia que me fez voltar a nostalgia do Yellow, pokemon é sensacional (antigos

long long ago in the distant past of 1997, Nintendo hosted their annual SpaceWorld trade show, where they would showcase all the new consoles and games they were developing. one of the games that was shown during the event was an early demo version of Pokémon Gold and Silver, created by Game Freak fresh off of Pokémon Blue’s development. after the event this early version would fall into obscurity, with the only evidence left of its existence being a couple of screenshots and short clips on the internet. twenty years later, this prototype would suddenly remerge online in all its glory, revealing just how different this game would have been compared to what we got. Gold and Silver 97: Reforged (which I’ll be referring to as G/S Reforged from this point onward) is basically a what-if game. what if Game Freak went through with the ideas they had in the ‘97 build of Pokémon G/S and polished them up for the final release?

a lot of things are different in this Gen 2: the story, the region, the type matchups, and of course the Pokémon. welcome to Nihon, where Victory Road lies right near your home, a town’s located in the middle of a desert, and Kanto has been stitched up into one giant Frankensteined city! not only that but your rival’s not an ass, Blue’s helping out Oak on research, and the Gym order has changed a bit and even includes two newcomers. Nihon is an excellent region and I’d go into more detail about it, but I don’t want to spoil you on everything. probably the biggest appeal for everyone going into this game is being able to use the scrapped and cut Pokémon, and yes, they’re all here.

immediately 2/3 of your starters are different as you can start off with a fire bear or a water seal, Chikorita fans rejoice they’re still here (unless you’re a Bayleef fan then you’re out of luck). many old Pokémon like Ponyta and Vulpix now have pre-evolutions, some like Tangela and Lickitung who got evolutions later on have their own variations here, and some like Pinsir and Farfetch’d that had no evolutionary line are given their own much deserved ones to help keep up in the endgame. as for the completely new ones, if you ever wanted to use a Water/Fire Pokémon that’s not a Mythical, this game’s got you covered. how about some cool Water/Steel shark with an anchor attached to it? you can get one easily as soon as you get Surf. you know that thing biting Slowking’s head? it’s a Pokémon here! how about a cursed voodoo doll that evolves into a jiangshi panda? now you can! need a cool Ice Type that wears the fur coat of its dead enemies? easily findable in the ice areas! and of course the best for last, you can encounter the Electric Type “Kotora” early on in the game, a goofy little tiger that absolutely mogs Pikachu in every category (except in Speed but let’s pretend it does). You want to know who deserves the mascot title more than Pikachu? this guy. Fun Fact: Kotora was also planned to be in Gen 1 as well, which means that Game Freak had the audacity to get rid of this little guy twice, this is why we can’t have nice things. to lighten things up, did I mention that all the new Pokémon featured here have their own Dex entries? it’s really cool to see all the new Pokémon get fleshed out with Dex information for both versions. oh yeah, there’s two versions of this hack: one with Gold styled sprites and one with Silver styled sprites. they could have just left it with one version but they went all the way and created two sets of sprites for all the scrapped Pokémon, and I really appreciate that.

another thing I like about G/S Reforged is that it also incorporates the SpaceWorld 97 type chart, which is fairly different from the final game. Steel Types has less resistances but is no longer weak to Fire Fighting and Ground Types, Poison still deals super effective damage to Bug, Ghost Type does neutral to itself as does Steel to Ice, and Dark Types suck! imagine being weak to not only Normal but your own Type couldn’t be me. if this wacky type chart I’m describing is too much for your liking, you can change it back to the final game’s type chart through the Options anytime you want, which I’d recommend to do whenever you need to grind up levels for any Dark Type mons in your party. speaking of levels, I’m sure most of you already know this, but the official G/S has a bit of a problem with its level curse, as after the fourth Gym the path splits two ways, with both paths being low leveled so you can go through them in either order. due to this you’re likely to be overleveled by the time you start the Team Rocket gauntlet full of the same few static Pokémon. thankfully in G/S Reforged you’ll mostly be going through a clockwise circle with very few detours, which while it means the journey is more straightforward than the ones in Kanto and Johto, it also means the level curve moves perfectly fine here. say goodbye to facing off Lv. 20 Rattatas and Poison Types for a third of the main game!

honestly I really can’t think of many problems with G/S Reforged, it’s really just a better G/S/C, at least from a gameplay standpoint. I guess I could at least mention that there’s quite a lack of proper online guides for this hack, meaning your best bet into figuring out where to find things like items is by scrolling through the data on its GitHub page, which can be kinda cumbersome.

this is probably going to be the most you’ll hear someone talk about this hack unless a later reviewer comes along and gives their thoughts about it. this review definitely could have been longer and more in-depth, but not only am I lazy, but I think you’re better off experiencing everything else on your own. Gen 2 and Johto really mean a lot to me as it’s pretty much the first Pokémon region I went through from start to finish, so being able to witness an alternative reality of what my childhood Pokémon could have been is an absolute treat. judging from the lack of full playthroughs online as well as how few reviews have been written before mine, it doesn’t really seem like a lot of people have played this specific hack, which is outright a shame. I myself have done two playthroughs: my 2021 Gold one with the final type chart, and my 2023 Silver one with the SW97 type chart, so you can tell I really like this rom hackl. if you’re a Gen 2 enthusiast like I am then I’d highly recommend playing G/S Reforged if you haven’t already, which you probably haven’t. boot it up and check the game out, you won’t regret it.

Kotora Gang

Pokémon Oro pero de primera generación. Hay ideas muy interesantes que me sorprenden que descartasen como un líder de siniestro, ciertos pokémon super chulas y otras que menos mal porque el tipo siniestro funcionando así era rarísimo.

Ha sido interesante dedicarle unos días.

¿Qué pasaría si el Pokémon Plata hubiese salido en el 97? Pues no sé si hubiera sido mejor que este juego, pero la verdad es que me lo he pasado muy bien con él. Tremendo hack, probadlo si os gusta la segunda edición de Pokémon y los universos alternativos.

It's a really cool and well crafted game. It feels like a new game from a distant past and you can not experience a lot of these things.