Many people love Pokemon fan-made games and also Pokemon ROM hacks, since Nintendo can’t pump out a lot of Pokemon games every year.
As we already witnessed during the release of Pokemon Scarlet & Violet, creating these games within just a year isn’t a good idea. Thankfully, some dedicated game creators from the community came up with these fan-made games and ROM hacks to help quench the thirst of people that love playing Pokemon.
There are plenty of equivalent Pokemon games out there, but the listed games are what we recommend the most. Though this is not the official list of all Pokemon fan-made games, we always welcome recommendations from our dear readers.
Feel free to suggest a good fan-made Pokemon game and drop your message in the comment form below.
Editor’s Update (April 2025): The term “fan-made Pokemon games” is now considered an umbrella term not only for games from RPG Maker and Pokemon Essentials but also for the newly emerging browser-based games as well. We also added more entries to this list so you can have more options if you’re looking for more fan-made games to play.
Table of Contents
Popular Fan Made Pokemon Games Created Using RPG Maker and Pokemon Essentials
| Game | Description | |
|---|---|---|
| Pokemon Uranium | Explore the whole place of Tandor with your chosen Fakemon and collect all 8 Gym badges to complete the game. | |
| Pokemon Spectrum | More updates and improvements are coming to Pokemon Spectrum, the game has an amazing story and gameplay with over 80 Fakemons to catch. | |
| Pokemon Insurgence | Experience Pokemon in a different way with Pokemon Insurgence. Plenty of species to catch and have a chance to collect Mega stones for Mega evolution. | |
| Pokemon Apex | Prevent dark forces in their plans to infiltrate the world. Keep the balance of both worlds to maintain peace. Experience the epic and unique story of Pokemon Apex with its new story, maps, items, and a lot more cool features of the game. | Link | Reddit |
| Pokemon Island | Explore Pokemon Island, the meeting for Pokemon trainers who aim to seek Mew, the rarest Pokemon on the island. the party and battle with fellow Pokemon trainers. | Link |
| Pokemon Sage | Battle cute Fakemon or capture them and add them to your team. Level up your species, make them stronger, and beat up your opponents. | |
| Pokemon Infinite Fusion (Completed) | There are 22 801 and counting unique Pokemon fusion sprites with fairy type. The game is based on pokemon.alexonsager.net Pokemon fusion generator. | Information |
| Pokemon Phoenix Rising | Phoenix Rising is a unique fan-made game focusing on the Legendary Pokemon Ho-oh. It has been around for quite some time and is still under development. Fans could expect occasional updates and improvements on this game. | |
| Pokemon Reborn | Pokemon Reborn features 21 starters and 807 Pokemon with brand-new effects, music, and unique battle scenes. Pokemon Reborn also has customized Shiny Pokemon, online battling, and trading, which makes the game even more interesting. | |
| Pokemon Solar Light & Lunar Dark | Enter a unique Pokemon gaming adventure and become a trainer of adorable Fakemons. Explore the Rikoto region, obtain all eight badges, and go to Pokemon League to defeat Elite Four and the Champion. | |
| Pokemon Empyrean | Fight against mutant Pokemon, encounter fakemons and new eeveelution, and choose from 21 starters in Pokemon Empyrean. More information about this game is found. | | Patch |
| Pokemon Godra | No need to complete the Pokedex. It’s a part of the old story. Experience a real adventure with Pokemon Godra. Do you want to become a Safari Zone Warden, a military, or lead the Elite Four? The choice is yours. | |
| Pokemon Fire Ash | The game follows the adventures of Ash Ketchum anime with several awesome features like over 50 gym battles, Mega Evolution, Alola Forms, Ash-Greninja and more.. | End of Kalos | Alola Episodes |
| Pokemon Mega Adventure | Encounter all the 721 Pokemon, Mystery Gifts, Mega bracelet, and Mega evolution are some of the features of the game. Definitely worth checking. | |
| Pokemon Rejuvenation | Aevium region was once full of abundance region until the catastrophic Storm-9 came and tore the region apart. Defend the region from the evil team Xen and bring back Aevium to where it should be. | |
| Pokemon Black Cinder | Strange situations are happening in Artenia and the peace of the country is currently at stake. You are sent on a mission to bring back peace to the country. | |
| Pokemon Floral Tempus | You reside in Rialtra Region, you are finally leaving the Greenleaf Orphanage and starting your journey in the region. The crime rate is rapidly increasing, and even the police cannot solve the problem. | (Episode 3) | (3.0.3) |
| S | The largest of the Dark Rising series has now arrived and is now made by RPG Maker XP and Pokemon Essentials. With Pokemon Dark Rising 3, players can now play the game in four different modes, Normal, Hard, Extreme, and Nuzlocke. | Source | |
| Pokemon Spork | You and your big sister, Emily, are on vacation in the Ceolis region. Although both of you already have a Pokemon, they have just been pets for you up until now, and so neither you nor Emily has ever battled before. | |
| Pokemon Zeta & Omicron | Pokemon Zeta and Pokemon Omicron is a unique Fan made pokemon game made with RPG Maker XP and Pokemon essentials. Features 649 Pokemon, fakemon, and some Pokemon from Generation 6. Lots of interesting content with impressive gameplay. | |
| Pokemon Clockwork | Explore Rosari Region and enjoy the amazing landscapes of the game. Encounter Team Epsilon and uncover their secrets. The goal is to save the region from bad guys; hurry up! | Official site | |
| Pokemon Wack (Completed) | A completed Pokemon game with over 4,000 Pokemon, including the official and fakemons. The game was first released around six years ago and is now being updated, expanded, and now it is completed. | |
| Pokemon Metal (Completed) | Takes place in Arala region, and the game features a completely new and huge region. All Pokemon are obtainable and now with Mega Evolution. Plenty of areas to explore and events after the Pokemon League. All we can say is wow to this game. Grab em’ now! | Source | |
| Pokemon Sunday (Completed) | A completed fan made Pokemon game and now includes Gen. 8, including Crown Tundra Pokemon. Pokemon Sunday is packed with cool and new features that are not available in other games. A must-play for everyone. | Source | |
| Pokemon DayBreak | Explore many unique locations while encountering some new uniquely designed Pokemon in the wild. Pokemon DayBreak features the enigmatic region ‘Armira’, and there are 600 Pokemon you can find. | Click here | |
| Pokemon Desolation | Welcome to the Ayrith Region, a large land mass split into several islands. Ayrith is clouded in mystery, with strange, inexpiable events happening in every corner. | | Mirror |
| Stygian Snakewood | A remake of the hit Pokemon ROM hack of 2010, Pokemon Snakewood. This fan-made game adapted various features from the original one, but with some additional tweaks like higher difficulty and a new type called Plague-type Pokemon. | Official site | |
| Pokemon Realidea System | Explore around the Esoteria region and encounter a group of people who are aiming to create artificial bonds between Trainers and Pokemon using a thing called the Realidea System. | Official site | |
| Pokemon: Everlasting Orchard | A Stardew Valley-inspired fan-made Pokemon game where you get to own a farm in the Tilius region with your trusty Tauros. You can do lots of things in this game, including managing a farm and marrying someone to keep yourself company. | Official site | |
| Pokemon Electrum Version | Johto region is on the verge of breaking away from the Kanto region, and a new Johto League is formed for you to conquer. But before you fulfill your goals, you have to stop Team Rocket with their evil schemes. | Official site | |
| Pokemon Academy Life: Forever! | This fan-made Pokemon game has a visual novel-oriented gameplay where, instead of getting thrown into a dangerous and unfamiliar region, you will experience life as a student and learn lessons about the Pokemon world. | Official site | |
| Pokemon Pathways | Unlike your regular Pokemon games, Pokemon Pathways added a whole new gameplay mechanic where you also get to manage your own set of stats. Its story isn’t linear, as all the decisions and choices you make will affect the events that you’ll experience. | Official site | |
| Pokemon Shinju Adventures | Enter the Shinju region, a place where Shiny Pokemon are more common, and you play as an exchange student that aims to participate in the Pokemon League. There’s also a nefarious organization trying to cause chaos called Team Sunset, and it’s your chance to foil their plans and become the region’s hero. | Official site | |
| Pokemon: Giovanni Origins | Learn more about a fan-made version of young Giovanni by playing as his friend in Pokemon: Giovanni Origins. As the one closest to the future Team Rocket leader, you and Giovanni will travel around Johto and Kanto and see more of the big boss’ perspective as a Trainer. | Official site | |
| Pokemon Soulstones 2: Time Wardens | Meet a mysterious person from an alternate universe as she seeks your help to investigate the Ethereal Guild, a group of mercenaries, profiteers, and pirates who want to bring instability to the Orion region. | Official site | |
Important Note: With the removal of JoiPlay on Google Play, fan-made Pokemon games created from RPG Maker XP aren’t playable on Android devices anymore.
Browser-Based Fan-Made Pokemon Games
| Game | Description | |
|---|---|---|
| PokeRogue | A fan-made Pokemon game with rogue-like mechanics. Play your way through procedurally generated worlds and use your management skills to keep your resources accessible for each level. | Play PokeRogue |
| Pokemon Showdown | Play other Trainers online with this browser-based Pokemon battle simulator. You can choose from a wide variety of battle modes, and you can either use a random Pokemon team or build your own roster. | Play Pokemon Showdown |
The Difference Between Fan Made Pokemon Games and Pokemon ROM Hacks
Fan Made Pokemon Games
Pokemon fan made games, as the name suggests, are created by fans. This uses the concept of Pokemon, but the game could be entirely different with plenty of twists.
The game may not be like the traditional Pokemon games, but they have Pokemon in there. They use various programs like RPG Maker XP and Pokemon Essentials to create the game.
Pokemon ROM Hacks
Pokemon ROM hacks use the data from an actual Pokemon game. Let’s take Pokemon Emerald, for example. The person making the ROM hack can use the data from that game.
This allows them to make an entirely new game using the character sprites, Pokemon sprites, Pokemon moves, music, locations, and more.
You could say that it cuts the creator’s job in half because all they need to do now is come up with a different story to hash out a fresh game. The more skilled creator can edit the sprites and data to make a wholesome new-looking game.
There are even those that use sprites and HUDs from other Pokemon games. You can have a Pokemon Emerald ROM hack, but it can incorporate sprites from Pokemon Diamond, which is a game from a different system.
Finally, these ROM hacks can be played on different emulators like My Boy, John GBA, Visual Boy Advance, mGBA, VBA-M, OpenEmu, and GBA4iOS. They can’t be played on their own because they are ROMs and not stand-alone games.
Yeah, that’s it! I hope this clears out the misconception. Just , fan-made and rom hacks are two different things. In this post, you will find a list of popular fan made Pokemon games.
Conclusion
Pokemon fan games are great. Some of these Pokemon fan games are better than the official ones, as some people say!
We have listed some of the best fan made Pokemon games to give you a quick look at what else is out there. Check them out and see if anything catches your fancy.
No doubt, the above list of games is amazing! There are plenty of them, but I listed only the best. Have you played any of these fan-made games? And did I explain the difference between fan made and rom hacks correctly? I would love to hear your comments.
On the other hand, if you know a good fan made Pokemon game that you think should be added to the listing above, leave your message in the comment form below.
Pokemon pathways is there and works fine with joiplay. The player’s choices can alterstorylines which is awesome.
Hey, a lot of these games have been updated, so you might need to update the links, for both source and
Hi there, Billy. We’ve just made an update the to this page with updated link and source. Thanks for the heads up.
Pokemon Insurgence is pretty buggy on joiplay, I don’t think it works smoothly anymore
RPG Maker XP games aren’t fully ed on Android devices, so while it’s possible to play them, you may experience some lagging and performance issues.
Another 2 game sthat works fine on joiplay are pokemon xenoverse as well as pokemon infinity
Hi Kobg, thank you for that information. I have added those games in the list.
Thanks for this awesome list. You could consider adding Pokemon Infinity’s description to your list too. So more people can get the game (it has online functions too so it never hurts to get more people 🙂 )
Pokemon Opalo works all be it with frame drops and spikes happening often in grass patches
How do I pokemon uncensored game for GBA rom emulator on android tablet
Sorry Kyle, but we don’t share information about ROM files.
I can’t joiplay, the appstore say it only runes of older Android versions. I searched for an alternative, but didn’t find any
There is one thing wrong! The new games made with Essentials can’t be played with Joiplay. But the bright side is the games can be played on Linux and Mac using MKXP-Z v2.3.1.
Are there any Pokémon multi realm versions?
hello sorry to interrupt the time. when I play Pokemon Fire Ash V.3.1.0 an error occurs in the PluginManager line script 468 NoMethodError occured. undefined method “delta” for system: module. it happened when i played in joiplay and in v.3.0.0 also the same error, namely script v.19.1Hotfixes misc bug fixes.rb, line 686. undefined method “width” for #
i would like to recommend pokemon sors
Hey, thanks for this informative list! I recently just played Pokémon Terra Nova– which is a completed fan game released dec.27th 2021! Over 880 original Pokémon(fakemon). I think should be added to the list! It also works on Joiplay!
Hi, thanks for sharing this with us. I just added the game to our to do list.
Pokemon Godra dosent work on joiplay when ever I load it up I hear the music but the screen dosent load and when I press enter it says something about Image platforms isn’t ed
It loads and the music works on mine but the inside of all buildings are black except for the people.
For pokemon uranium you shiukd update the link the one online redirect to an old removed reddit post this one is the New dl link
Reply
Thanks for the heads up, I updated the link.
I tried playing pokemon sage and it worked but at some point ( when i enter quaker town if i well ) the game stops and joiplay just crash and close itself so idk if this game really work on joiplay or if it is my device that is not powerfull enough or something else
It is good it was just à huge lag that Last minutes
Hey, I was wondering if you could raise up the level of the ”pokemon” because I am having some TROUBLE with the rock type Gym leader Brock in radical red please!!!!
P.S The game is really good 🙂
Which Pokemon game are you referring?
I tried Pokemon Sage on Joiplay and it’s working perfectly, with some occasional graphic bugs and lag whenever I run(prolly cuz of my phone tho)
Thanks for sharing that information with us Sakusei. But could possibly be that the game is still not yet fully ed in Joiplay.
How to fix when i play a games on joiplay?
Dialogue when i start up
” mkxp
Error initializing SDL_sound: Already Initizialized “.
I have a problem when i play a rom on android Joiplay and open the cheat menu at cheat items then it will appeared
Script ‘(eval)’ line 321: NoMethod occured.
undefined method ‘[]’ for nil:NilClass if i press ok “IT WILL CRASH” could you help me?
Hi there, as far as I know, you can’t play rom files on joiplay. The emulator is created only for RPG Maker games like those games listed in this page. Another thing is that not all RPG maker xp games are compatible with Joiplay. These are the pokemon games that we believe working with Reply
Sorry anyway Pokemon Villain Jam i started to play with the joiplay and a plugin and I try to cheat using cheat items at cheat menu then it will appeared
the Script eval line”
I think i understand what the problem i experience it when auhm playing Pokemon Villain Jam on JoiPlay i also open cheat then cheat items then it will appeared this error:
Script ‘(eval)’ line 321: NoMethod occured.
undefined method ‘[]’ for nil:NilClass if i press ok “IT WILL CRASH”understand? you can help me how to fix ?
Hey games like uranium spectrum fire ash pages are opening and we can see the screenshots and features but the games like pokemon wake pokemon mega andventures pages are not opening and we can’t just without seeing the screenshots and features
The pokemon insurgence web offers various links. Which one should I use?
Yeah I’m playing Pokemon fire ash. It runs smoothly. I’ve ed it from your website
Thanks for your Harish.
Pokémon fire ash galar region update is der
I have played Pokemon sage and spectrum on Android. It works smoothly but stops after 15 minutes
Hey there Harish, thanks for visiting Pokemoncoders. So you’re using Joiplay to play those games on Android? Probably those games aren’t compatible yet with Joiplay. I heard Reply
Will Pokemon spectrum, sage work completely in laptop
uhh
Pokemon Uranium the reddit page has been taken down
What do you mean? It’s still working well for me.
Pokemon uranium is taken down on reddit
Hey there Cap, thanks for coming here. Unfortunately that isn’t new when a game turns too popular.
can i have rockman games
Where is Pokemon Wack? It has almost 4,000 pokemon, 49 types, and some truly crazy designs.
Thanks for letting us know about this game Jeremy. It’s definitely a good game and we highly recommend Pokemon Wack. I’ve just added it in the list.
i cant :[
is there any sword and shield ones made yet.
None for now. But hopefully in the future. In the meantime, I recommend trying any of the listed games above.
Can it for Vivo y12
You can now play fan made roms on mobile🤩🤩🤩
U just need the application joiplay
U can get it easily from play store
Thanks for the information Kai, but how reliable is the joiplay app? Have you tried it with other fan made games?
The only games I cannot run on joiplay are pokemon empyrean and mega adventure. I have tested the following; pokemon sunday, pokemon wack, pokemon godra, pokemon zeta, pokemon reborn, pokemon fire ash, pokemon Metal, pokemon rejuvenation, pokemon insurgence and pokemon uranium
Thanks for letting us know about your findings Jason. I hope it’s okay with you if I add this information you just shared in the article above.
I get a black screen when I play wack on joi play
Can I play infinite fusion in android????
Bitcross
Is pokemon insurgence there? Its an amazing game.
Hey there Seth, yes Insurgence is 3rd in the list.
Hi
What pokemon games hacks and fan made can i play on a modded Nintendo ds?
You can’t play fan made pokemon games on DS, these are for Windows PC only. Though I haven’t tried playing DS rom hacks on a modded Nintendo DS console before, but I guess it’s worth checking some of our list of Reply
Actually, you can now play fangames on android. I have Reborn fully working on mobile, using the latest Patreon builds of the Joiplay app and it’s RPGMaker plugin. 30 megabytes, no internet required, and depends on your phones RAM and Processor. Running an Essential-PH1 with almost nil lag, no battery drainage or overheating.
It is no longer a dream, people.
For sure? Never heard such information before. If you can give me a guide about it, I would appreciate it so much.
insurgence cant be played on joiplay the file isnt executable
I think that you should also add Pokemon Dusk, because in this fan game
Interesting game, I will check on that.
I think that you should also add Pokemon FireAsh, because in this fan game, you can explore all the regions of the core series pokemon games.
Thanks for the suggestion, I already added the game.
I think all the games listed are awesome. But I think Pokemon Gaia should be added. I didn’t see it up there,
Hey there IoeMCA, Pokemon Gaia is a Pokemon GBA rom hack (you can find it listed Reply
One problem, just one.
Where is Reborn? Just wondering why it’s not on this list, want to hear your opinion.
Hey Cameron, thanks for the heads up. Just checked Reborn and I can say that it is truly an amazing game. I added Pokemon Reborn in the list and if there’s more game you think worth to be added in the list, just post it here.
I really enjoy Pokemon survival island
I never heard that game before, care to share its official source?
It would be awesome if someone could make the Pokemon Sun & Moon into a GBA platform and would base on Pokemon Emerald.
Hey Vash101, thanks for dropping your comment. Rom hack such as Reply
Pokemon mega adventure
Pokemon Moon emerald. exact gameplay as pokemon emerald but with sun and moon starters and pokemon