Character encoding (Generation III): Difference between revisions

The Generation III games use a proprietary character encoding to store text data. The Generation III encoding is greatly different from the encodings used in previous generations, with characters corresponding to different bytes. Versions of the games in different languages may use different encodings, some more different than others.

Some text strings are stored in fixed-length structures while others are stored in a block of text with separate strings simply terminated by 0xFF. In the large, variable-length blocks, usually another structure will have pointers to the appropriate string(s) within that block of text. In the fixed-length structures, strings are still terminated by 0xFF, but any remainder of the allotted space is padded out with 0x00.

Character sets

International (English, French, Italian, German, and Spanish) games in Generation III contain two character sets: their own, and Japanese. The international games' character sets are nearly identical, with only a select few regional differences. For most text, the game's own character set is used, but a Pokémon's nickname and its Original Trainer's name use the Japanese character set if the Pokémon's language value is set to Japanese. In the Japanese versions, since there is no international character set, the Japanese character set is always used.

Note that 0x00 in the following tables is a space (" "), not empty.

International

The main character sets in international versions contain the characters below. However, only the characters on a white background can legitimately be entered into nicknames and OT names. Those on a light gray background cannot be entered into name fields, although they are specially defined in at least one version. Characters on a dark gray background are, in all versions, unused holdovers from the Japanese encoding. They are displayed differently across versions.

As is, the following table contains the glyphs as they appear in version 1.1 and 1.2 of Pokémon Ruby and Sapphire Versions. Some revisional and regional differences do exist.

	-0	-1	-2	-3	-4	-5	-6	-7	-8	-9	-A	-B	-C	-D	-E	-F
0-		À	Á	Â	Ç	È	É	Ê	Ë	Ì	こ	Î	Ï	Ò	Ó	Ô
1-	Œ	Ù	Ú	Û	Ñ	ß	à	á	ね	ç	è	é	ê	ë	ì	ま
2-	î	ï	ò	ó	ô	œ	ù	ú	û	ñ	º	ª	ᵉʳ	&	+	あ
3-	ぃ	ぅ	ぇ	ぉ	Lv	=	;	が	ぎ	ぐ	げ	ご	ざ	じ	ず	ぜ
4-	ぞ	だ	ぢ	づ	で	ど	ば	び	ぶ	べ	ぼ	ぱ	ぴ	ぷ	ぺ	ぽ
5-	っ	¿	¡	PK	MN	PO	Ké				Í	%	(	)	セ	ソ
6-	タ	チ	ツ	テ	ト	ナ	ニ	ヌ	â	ノ	ハ	ヒ	フ	ヘ	ホ	í
7-	ミ	ム	メ	モ	ヤ	ユ	ヨ	ラ	リ	⬆	⬇	⬅	➡	ヲ	ン	ァ
8-	ィ	ゥ	ェ	ォ	ᵉ	<	>	ガ	ギ	グ	ゲ	ゴ	ザ	ジ	ズ	ゼ
9-	ゾ	ダ	ヂ	ヅ	デ	ド	バ	ビ	ブ	ベ	ボ	パ	ピ	プ	ペ	ポ
A-	ʳᵉ	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	!	?	.	-	・
B-	‥	“	”	‘	’	♂	♀	$	,	×	/	A	B	C	D	E
C-	F	G	H	I	J	K	L	M	N	O	P	Q	R	S	T	U
D-	V	W	X	Y	Z	a	b	c	d	e	f	g	h	i	j	k
E-	l	m	n	o	p	q	r	s	t	u	v	w	x	y	z	▶
F-	:	Ä	Ö	Ü	ä	ö	ü	⬆	⬇	⬅	Control characters

Revisional differences

In Pokémon Emerald, FireRed, and LeafGreen, the characters a dark gray background in the table above appear as spaces, with the exception of 0xAF (・). In addition, version 1.0 of the English Ruby and Sapphire Versions are missing a few characters. The following table details the differences between revisions.

	RS English 1.0	RS English 1.1 RS English 1.2 RS Non-English	FRLG	E
0x36	ょ	;
0x50	っ			▯
0x7D-0x83	ヲンァィゥェォ			Spaces 1-7 pixels wide in ascending order
0x84	ャ	ᵉ
0x85	ュ	<
0x86	ョ	>
0xA0	ッ	ʳᵉ
0xB0	‥		… / ‥

Regional differences

Although the international character set is largely the same across all localizations, some differences do exist. Because quotation marks (which can be entered into names) differ between regions, Pokémon with nicknames and OT names containing those will display differently if traded to games of other regions. The following table details the differences between regions.

	English	Spanish	Italian	German	French
0x34	Lv	NvRS / Nv.EFRLG	L.	Lv.	N.
0x57-0x59			,  , MRS /  EFRLG
0x64	Japanese / nothing				PcoE
0x7D-0x83	Japanese / nothing			Japanese / nothing
0xB1	“			„	«
0xB2	”			“	»

Japanese

As in the international table, only the characters on a white background can be used legitimately in nicknames and OT names, while the characters on a dark gray background are printed as spaces in Pokémon Emerald, FireRed, and LeafGreen. Beyond those, the Japanese character set has no differences between revisions or regions.

	-0	-1	-2	-3	-4	-5	-6	-7	-8	-9	-A	-B	-C	-D	-E	-F
0-		あ	い	う	え	お	か	き	く	け	こ	さ	し	す	せ	そ
1-	た	ち	つ	て	と	な	に	ぬ	ね	の	は	ひ	ふ	へ	ほ	ま
2-	み	む	め	も	や	ゆ	よ	ら	り	る	れ	ろ	わ	を	ん	ぁ
3-	ぃ	ぅ	ぇ	ぉ	ゃ	ゅ	ょ	が	ぎ	ぐ	げ	ご	ざ	じ	ず	ぜ
4-	ぞ	だ	ぢ	づ	で	ど	ば	び	ぶ	べ	ぼ	ぱ	ぴ	ぷ	ぺ	ぽ
5-	っ	ア	イ	ウ	エ	オ	カ	キ	ク	ケ	コ	サ	シ	ス	セ	ソ
6-	タ	チ	ツ	テ	ト	ナ	ニ	ヌ	ネ	ノ	ハ	ヒ	フ	ヘ	ホ	マ
7-	ミ	ム	メ	モ	ヤ	ユ	ヨ	ラ	リ	ル	レ	ロ	ワ	ヲ	ン	ァ
8-	ィ	ゥ	ェ	ォ	ャ	ュ	ョ	ガ	ギ	グ	ゲ	ゴ	ザ	ジ	ズ	ゼ
9-	ゾ	ダ	ヂ	ヅ	デ	ド	バ	ビ	ブ	ベ	ボ	パ	ピ	プ	ペ	ポ
A-	ッ	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	！	？	。	ー	・
B-	・・	『	』	「	」	♂	♀	円	.	×	/	A	B	C	D	E
C-	F	G	H	I	J	K	L	M	N	O	P	Q	R	S	T	U
D-	V	W	X	Y	Z	a	b	c	d	e	f	g	h	i	j	k
E-	l	m	n	o	p	q	r	s	t	u	v	w	x	y	z	▶
F-	:	Ä	Ö	Ü	ä	ö	ü	⬆	⬇	⬅	Control characters

Control characters

• 0xFA and 0xFB both mark a prompt for the player to press a button to continue the dialogue. However, they will print the new line of dialogue differently: 0xFA will scroll the previous dialogue up one line before printing the next line, while 0xFB will clear the dialogue box entirely.
• 0xFC is an escape character that leads to several different functions (see below).
• 0xFD is an escape character for variables, such as the player's name or a Pokémon's name (see below).
• 0xFE is a line break.
• 0xFF is a terminator, marking the ends of strings.

0xFC functions

When 0xFC is followed by...

• 0x01, it will change the color of the text, depending on the byte following. The available colors are listed below.
• 0x02, the text will be highlighted, depending on the byte following. The available colors are listed below.
• 0x03, the text's shadow will have its color changed, depending on the byte following. The available colors are listed below.
• 0x04, the text will be colored and highlighted. The byte immediately following determines the text's color, while a second byte afterward will determine the highlight color. The available colors are listed below.
• 0x06, the text will change size, depending on the byte following. 0x00 will make the font smaller, while anything else will make the font the default size.
• 0x08 and another byte, it produces a pause in the text. The byte after 0x08 determines the length of the pause.
• 0x09, the game will pause text display, and resume upon pressing a button.
• 0x0C, it will escape the byte that follows 0x0C if it is a control character and print a new character. If the second byte after 0xFC is not a control character byte, that byte prints normally.
  • When the third byte is 0xFA, "➡" is produced.
  • When the third byte is 0xFB, "+" is produced (though in the Japanese games, within the Options screen, it produces "=").
  • The other control characters do not produce any characters. In the English games, nothing is printed, while in the Japanese games, miscellaneous data appears to be printed.
• 0x0D, the text will be shifted by a certain amount of pixels, depending on the byte following this one. The effect wears off upon entering a new line.
• 0x10, music will begin to play. Music is specified by the two bytes following, in little endian format.
• 0x15, text will be rendered slightly larger and more spread out.
• 0x16, text will be rendered at the default size and spread.
• 0x17, music will be paused.
• 0x18, music will resume playing.

Color values

A table of available text, highlight, and shadow colors is shown below.

0xFD variables

When 0xFD is followed by the bytes below, the following variables are printed.

• 0x01: the player's name
• 0x02, 0x03, or 0x04: whatever text has been assigned to one of three buffers using a variety of script commands
• 0x06: the rival's name
• 0x07: the game's name^RSE
• 0x08: the name of the villainous team^RSE
• 0x09: the name of the non-villainous team^RSE
• 0x0A: the name of the villainous team's leader^RSE
• 0x0B: the name of the non-villainous team's leader^RSE
• 0x0C: the name of the villainous team's legendary Pokémon^RSE
• 0x0D: the name of the opposing legendary Pokémon^RSE

Trivia

• In the name field for Eggs, the game places the bytes 0x60 0x6F 0x8B corresponding to タマゴ (tamago, the Japanese word for egg). This remains in the English version even though the characters have been replaced.

This data structure article is part of Project Games, a Bulbapedia project that aims to write comprehensive articles on the Pokémon games.