Pokémon Crystal Dust FAQ

Pokémon CrystalDust FAQ

Q: What is this game?
A: This game is called Pokémon CrystalDust, it is a rom hack of Pokémon Crystal with Gen 3 mechanics (Emerald base) created by Sierraffinity.

Q: Is this on emulator?
A: Yep, playing on Bizhawk which runs the same as mGBA. This emulator is allowed for Pokémon rom hack speedruns, provided you do not use any of the extra tools.

Q: What is WR?
A: My current splits, which is a 2:24:15

Q: This looks pretty fast for getting through Johto and Kanto!
A: This version of this hack is only complete to the end of the Elite 4 (Lance). A later version is in the works, I'm told by Diego, which will include Kanto. Apparently she's also streaming her work on it too!

Q: What Pokémon will you be using?
A: I'll be running with the Totodile line. For HMs, I will put Surf and Strength on Feraligatr, catch a Sentret on Route 29 or a Sandshrew in Union Cave for Cut, catch a Poliwag on Route 44 for Whirlpool and Waterfall, and pick up the free Spearow (Kenya) for Fly.

Q: Why not Chikorita or Cyndaquil?
A: We all know that while Chikorita is the cutest Johto starter, it's not feasible for a speedrun like Gen 2 and 4. Cyndaquil is an interesting case especially given Sprout Tower is mandatory - it's as fast as Toto for almost the entire run other than the Chuck split.

Since Croconaw evolves 6 levels earlier, you can handle Chuck's Poliwrath pretty easily. Quilava gets OHKO'd by Poliwrath, so you have to do the Mahogany hideout earlier to get Typhlosion (which can learn Thunderpunch) for Chuck. There is a double battle in the hideout which is very fast with Gatr since you have Surf. Finally, since you can't get Fly until after Chuck, it's a lot of backtracking on foot/bike. This loses around 5 minutes.

Q: Are there any manipulations?
A: Yes, just the one. I manipulate a Totodile at the start. Since this game is based on Emerald, the manips operate the same as in Emerald. Hence, every time you save and hard reset in front of the Toto ball and select it on the same frame, you'll get the same Toto. This game runs at 60 FPS so it's not an easy manipulation to pull off consistently. Since it costs about 30 seconds to fail the manip, I usually restart the run if I fail it twice in a row.

Coincidentally, I'll be running with the same frame (1026) as in Emerald. It has a Naughty nature and IVs of 21 HP, 23 Attack, 28 Defense, 30 Special Attack, 29 Special Defense and 29 Speed.

Q: Could you do more manipulations?
A: I could in theory manip no encounters and the Sentret (with yolo ball), but it's a lot of work to figure these out and adds complexity to a fun speedrun. I'm happy just doing the Toto manip.

Q: I see you're forced to release the beasts. Why don't you manip one of them, like Raikou?
A: Thanks to CasualPokePlayer, we found out that the beasts aren't actually released at all, it's just a cutscene and you cannot catch them in this game (Suicune is a bit different as it's not a roamer so it might actually be catchable, but there's a massive sidequest and Suicune isn't great anyway). This might be fixed in the next version though (TBD).

Q: Any other notable differences between this and vanilla Crystal?
A: There are quite a few. I fight Benny (spinner in Azalea gym) to get Croconaw for Bugsy. The Bugsy fight doesn't use Rage as a result. Rival 2 is also different, we do not teach Fury Cutter and set up X Attacks instead (shoutout to CasualPokePlayer for this routing change). Whitney is very different as well since Clefairy has Cute Charm, so we set up X Attacks (3) and an X Speed. This fight would be a lot worse if we skipped Benny as we'd need another X Attack and another X Speed.

There are a lot of other differences, mainly use of Torrent in this game is nice to make some fights faster (especially in the Radio Tower).

Q: What is your goal time?
A: I'd like to get a high 2:22 I think.