Never Catch Gengar in Pokémon Yellow

You could say that I was one of those big Pokémon fans as a kid. I had first gotten into the fandom by the age of ten. I watched the Anime every chance I got, I even bought a few of the toys, along with the trading cards, and of course I played every Pokémon game there was.

However, as time went on, I stopped caring about Pokémon and eventually forgot about it. It wasn’t until years later, on a boring day mid-Summer, while I was checking through some of my old stuff, that I found my old Gameboy Color. I decided to play for the nostalgia and fun.

As I was going through my collection of games, I found one that caught my attention: my old copy of Pokémon Yellow. Weird, since I remembered throwing it away because the save went dead, and I hadn’t gotten a new copy ever since. Geez, I still remember how upset I was about that.

Anyways, I decided to try it to see if I could still play and, much to my surprise, the game still worked well. The screen flashed the nostalgic intro of Pikachu running towards the screen before the games title. There was no previous file since mine’s had gone corrupted, so I decided to start a new game.

I did the usual stuff, named my character and my rival, went out of my house and to the north path towards the tall grass where Professor Oak stopped me and the wild Pikachu appeared, Oak caught it and I followed him to his lab, where he gave me the Pikachu after my rival took the Eevee that was intended for me, then I proceeded to defeat him in a battle. You know, the usual stuff you do at the beginning of the game.

After that I got the Pokédex and caught myself a Spearow. As I was thinking about what other Pokémon to get on my team I suddenly remembered something, there was a Pokémon I always had on all of my previous games: Gengar. I always liked Ghost types as a kid, and Gengar was one of the best Ghost types, so naturally it was one of my favorite Pokémon.

However, I remembered that Haunter, Gengar’s previous form, only evolved through trade with another player, and no one I knew still had their Gameboys on them. I didn’t have another console for that matter. I also would have to wait all the way to Lavender Town to get myself a Gastly or Haunter at the Pokémon Tower.

Then I remembered something I once read on the internet. You see, in the original Pokémon games there are a lot of glitches you can get by doing certain actions, the best known are the MissingNo. and the Mew glitch, both of which I had done before. However, there was a certain glitch I had never tried before, one that you could only do in Pokémon Yellow and that allowed you to catch a Gengar at Viridian Forest, just before battling Brock, which was helpful because I didn’t have any Pokémon that would give me an advantage at that gym.

I searched for a guide on how to do it and followed each step. I went to the Viridian Forest to activate the event and surprisingly it worked, however that’s when things started to get weird: a wild Gengar appeared, as expected, but its sprite was much darker then I remembered it being and instead of being purple and black as I recalled, it had a blood red around where it was supposed to be purple.

I sent out my Pikachu, which was level 10 so the battle was pretty easy. I used Thunder Shock to lower its health and paralyze it. Gengar used Night Shade, which didn’t do much damage since it was level 1. I threw a Poke Ball at it and another weird thing happened: a text appeared saying ''“Are you sure you want to catch it? Consequences may be fatal for you…”''

What? I didn’t remember a text like that ever appearing when you are about to catch any Pokémon, not even glitch Pokémon like MissingNo. I shrugged it off thinking it probably referred to the game data could be corrupted do to the glitch if I kept Gengar, but I was there for the fun anyways.

I hit the “Yes” option and the Poke Ball caught Gengar, the usual animation of a Pokémon being caught was shown, but after that the screen faded to black and it went straight back to my character without showing Gengar’s data being added to the Pokédex. I didn’t give it much importance since I thought that due to being caught via glitch, the Pokédex wouldn’t accept this Gengar as an official catch.

After leaving Viridian Forest and going to Pewter City, things started to get uglier. The guy that usually stops you from going to the next route out of the city didn’t stop me, in fact he completely ignored me like any other NPC. That got my curiosity, so I decided to talk with him. A text appeared, but instead of his usual dialogue, he said, ''“Get away from me! Go away from this city and never return!”''

I didn’t even manage to think of what he was saying because as soon as the text disappeared a battle sequence started, which was even weirder because I didn’t remember ever battling this guy. His sprite was that of a Channeler and he only had one Pokémon, an Abra.

Gengar was sent out, which surprised me even more because I had Pikachu at the front of my party. I battled him anyways. Abra used Teleport and failed predictably. Gengar used Night Shade and defeated Abra with only one hit, which was even more incredible because Night Shade only takes as many HP as the user’s level, and my Gengar was only level 8.

After Abra fainted, the Channeler’s sprite appeared again and his text dialogue read, “Release that monster out of your team now, before you regret it!”

I didn’t get what he was trying to tell me, however another text appeared which read, “Gengar used Night Shade!” followed by the attack’s animation. The Channeler fainted like any battling Pokémon would, only without any cry. The next text that appeared made my skin bristle, “Gengar has killed Channeler!”

What happened next scared me even more: as the screen faded to black and returned to my character in the overworld, the Pikachu that follows you around was gone and replaced by, you guessed, Gengar. I had to suppress my desire to scream. I started walking around and everywhere I went the Gengar followed me, like Pikachu did in the normal game, only that Gengar looked more like a shadow behind my character.

This had to be some kind of twisted joke, right? Someone had to have replaced my game with one of those weird hacks, right? No, it was impossible. This was my original Pokémon Yellow cartridge, but how could any of this happen? Normally, the consequences of using a glitch on your game are that the graphics get disturbed or that the game suddenly crashes, but this… this was different.

I went into the Pokémon Center and decided to deposit Gengar on the PC, since sometimes your game got fix if you left the glitch Pokémon out of your party. However after I stored him a text appeared reading “Gengar went back into his Poke Ball”. I try and selected ‘release’ since that was the other option to get rid of a glitch Pokémon, but the text of “Gengar refuses to leave you” appeared, which was strange because I had more Pokémon on my party and Gengar didn’t know any HM.

I decided to stop playing the game. I went to shut down the console, without even saving as I didn’t want any of this to continue, but I stopped when a sudden text appeared on the screen. “Finish the game or Gengar will take your body.”

My heart froze. Was this some kind of twisted prank someone was pulling one me? This was just a game, there was no way of what it was saying… but I was too scared and decided to finish the game to see what would happen.

I continued with the adventure and defeated every gym leader and trainer I would come across, and every time I defeated anyone the same thing that happened with the Channeler would happen, the sprite of the trainer I defeated would appear and Gengar would kill them. However, there were two trainers absent throughout the game: my rival and Giovanni were nowhere to be seen.

I made my way to the Pokémon League and battled the Elite Four. I easily defeated the first two, but by the time to face Agatha came, the usual text on display was something entirely different. ''“It’s not the first time something like this happens, it’s not the first time someone catches a cursed Gengar. I can help you get rid of him. Ghost types are weak against themselves. If I beat him, he will disappear forever.” ''she said.

This got my attention. Would all of this end if I just threw the battle against Agatha? Would I finally get rid of this cursed Gengar? The battle animation started as usual, my Pikachu came out first, which was weird because during the rest of the game Gengar had come out first no matter what Pokémon I put at the front of the party. A Gengar of Agatha’s own came out. I tried to switch to Gengar but the text said, “Gengar doesn’t want to come out of its Poke Ball!”

I decided to use none damaging moves until I fainted. Pikachu used Thunder Wave to paralyze the opposite Gengar, who retaliated with Hypnosis, making Pikachu fell asleep. I selected Thunder Wave again but Pikachu was asleep, the opposite Gengar used Dream Eater until Pikachu finally fainted.

At that moment I decided to try and get Gengar out again, but the same text would pop out until I selected my Fearow instead. I repeated the same thing I did with Pikachu until all of my Pokémon fainted. Gengar finally had to come out. I selected Confuse Ray, the opposite Gengar hurt itself in its confusion. I selected Confuse Ray again, but this time Gengar did an attack of its own and the opposite Gengar fainted.

Agatha then sent out her Arbok, which used Glare to paralyze Gengar and he couldn’t attack due to paralysis. Arbok then used Screech and Gengar again couldn’t attack. The same thing happened for a few turns until it read ‘Gengar defenses can’t get any lower’ at which point she switches to Golbat and uses Supersonic. Gengar, much to my surprise, was able to hit Hypnosis this time and used Dream Eater to faint Golbat, however the text read “Golbat died!” instead.

Haunter came out next and used Night Shade, taking out 40% of Gengar’s HP. Then something weird happened, I selected ‘Fight’ but it didn’t let me chose an attack, Gengar took control again and used Shadow Ball, killing Haunter with one hit. I was astounded since he didn’t know that attack, and also because it was a Gen II attack, so it shouldn’t be on this game.

Agatha sent out another Gengar of her own and used Confuse Ray. Gengar hurt himself in its confusion and fell to the ground, fainted. A distorted screech sounded at that moment, it was so loud I had to take my hands of the console and cover my ears. Then the screen went to black and didn’t return, much to my surprise the battery of the console had died.

I went for an entire week without even touching the game, then one day decided to see if the file had been corrupted. The intro flashed as usual and the title was normal. I went to the file option and there was only the option to start a new game. So, my previous game had been deleted. Everything went back to normal. I decide to play the game again, without catching Gengar this time.

I enjoyed beating the game one more time, this time the classic way. I got all the way up to battling Agatha again without nothing weird or strange happening. The text when I talked with her was the usual dialogue, however after I defeated her she gave me the option to give me back my old Gengar from my previous game. I froze once again. I selected ‘No’ and nothing else happened, much to my relief.

I went on to battle Lance and defeated my rival, becoming the new champion. The usual ending with Oak coming out happened, but then when the title of the Hall of Fame flashed, there it was: Gengar appeared behind me as my seventh Pokémon. I screamed in terror. Then a battle sequence started. The text read, “Gengar wants to battle!” as Gengar appeared on the other side of the screen. He was at level 100. None of my Pokémon came out as the text read “Your Pokémon are too scared to fight!”

I tried to select ‘Run’ but it wouldn’t allow me to escape. I tried catching Gengar, even using the Master Ball, but it wouldn’t allow me to catch it, like with the Marowak of the Pokémon Tower. I couldn’t even use any of the items I had. I tried turning off the console but it wouldn’t work. Naturally, I had to select ‘Fight’. My character used ‘Struggle’ but it didn’t affect Gengar, however it did hurt my character. Gengar then attacked me and killed my character. The text read “Gengar has killed you! Gengar will now take your body!” before the screen cut to black and the console suddenly shut off.

I was crying at that moment when something caught my eye in the mirror on my room:  a pair of glowing red eyes and a wide grin... behind me! I screamed in terror and everything went dark, I think I fainted. I don’t remember what happened next, all I remember is that I woke up in the mental hospital I am now. They told me I had a breakdown due to schizophrenia, however I know what really happened, I know what Gengar did to me and what he might do to others if they catch him. I wrote this on a piece of paper and gave it to a nurse so he could put it on the internet, if you come across this and read it till the end remember: never do the Gengar glitch in Pokémon Yellow.