Surf glitch

The Surf glitch is a Generation I and Generation IV glitch. It is best known for enabling the capture of the promotional legendary Pokémon Darkrai and Shaymin. This is one of two glitches in Generation IV officially acknowledged by Nintendo, with the other being the broken escalator. The surf glitch occurs in Pokémon Red and Blue, Pokémon Yellow, and Pokémon Diamond and Pearl.

Performing The Glitch

In the Generation I games, when a player loads a saved file, the player starts facing down. This is because of the limited data in the game.

When standing next to a body of water that is facing up, left, or right, walk in that direction and press start without letting go of the D-Pad. Save the game, then reset it. When you load the saved data, the player will be facing in the direction you were walking. Press start and use Template:MlSurf. You will surf down even if the space below you is not surfable.

You can use this method to get to many areas, including back inside the S.S. Anne after it already set sail (also revealing the well hidden truck in the area), and the body of water next to Bill House.

Performing the glitch

Due to an error, the door in Aaron's room of the Pokémon League can be surfed through, by facing the door and selecting Surf from the party screen. This allows the player to step into the void around the indoors area and walk to other areas.

By counting steps using the Pokétch pedometer app, the player can travel to Newmoon Island and the Flower Paradise without the Member Card and Oak's Letter, respectively. The players can catch Darkrai and Shaymin at these locations, then Fly or Teleport back to a normally-accessible area and resume play normally.

Neither Shaymin nor Darkrai will regenerate if the player later acquires the Member Card or Oak's Letter and travels to the area normally. However, the Mystery Gift events for these items have only been made available to players of Pokémon Platinum, in which the glitch has been fixed.

The surf glitch cannot be used to obtain Arceus, since the Underground cannot be accessed from Spear Pillar or the Hall of Origin — which is where Arceus is found.

Danger

Venturing into the void provides for some interesting and potentially hazardous consequences to those who would exploit this glitch. As the area has not been programmed properly, since the player would normally not be able to access it, it runs the risk of causing the player to get stuck forever. Saving outside of the boundaries of a building or in the Mystery Zone may cause corruption of game data, including the loss of the save file completely, with the player required to start their game anew.

Remedy

Nintendo has acknowledged the glitch and offered workarounds and methods of recovery. The glitch was removed from international versions of the games; however, tweaking can lead to the same result in these games.

In the case where the player has saved the game while trapped, it is possible to repair the save state with a program that was distributed to DS Download Stations in Japan starting October 27. The player will be able to resume the game, reappearing outside their house in Twinleaf Town.

If one does not have access to a DS Station, one may mail their DS game card for repair to Nintendo of Japan at this address:

〒601-8501 京都市南区上鳥羽鉾立町11番地1 
任天堂株式会社　「お客様ご相談窓口　ポケモンＤ＆Ｐ係」

External links

• A video demonstrating how to perform the surf glitch
• Surf glitch officially acknowledged by Nintendo

Glitches in the Pokémon games Multiple generations Transform glitches • Glitch Trainers • Cloning glitches • Error messages • Arbitrary code execution Generation I Glitches • Battle glitches • Overworld glitches -- • 0 ERROR • Broken hidden items • Cable Club escape glitch • Dual-type damage misinformation Experience underflow glitch • Fight Safari Zone Pokémon trick • Glitch City • Item duplication glitch • Item underflow Mew glitch • Old man glitch • Pewter Gym skip glitch • Pokémon merge glitch • Rhydon glitch • Rival twins glitch Select glitches (dokokashira door glitch, second type glitch) • Super Glitch Time Capsule exploit • Walking through walls • ZZAZZ glitch Generation II Glitches • Battle glitches Bug-Catching Contest glitch • Celebi Egg glitch • Coin Case glitches • Experience underflow glitch Glitch dimension • Glitch Egg • Teru-sama • Time Capsule exploit • Trainer House glitches • GS Ball mail glitch Generation III Glitches • Battle glitches • Overworld glitches Berry glitch • Dive glitch • Pomeg glitch • Glitzer Popping Generation IV Glitches • Battle glitches • Overworld glitches Acid rain • GTS glitches • Pomeg glitch • Rage glitch Surf glitch • Tweaking • Pal Park Retire glitch Generation V Glitches • Battle glitches • Overworld glitches Charge Beam additional effect chance glitch • Charge move replacement glitch • Choice item lock glitch Frozen Zoroark glitch • Sky Drop glitch Generation VI Glitches • Battle glitches • Overworld glitches Charge Beam additional effect chance glitch • Charge move replacement glitch • Choice item lock glitch Lumiose City save glitch • Symbiosis Eject Button glitch • Toxic sure-hit glitch Generation VII Glitches • Battle glitches Charge Beam additional effect chance glitch • Charge move replacement glitch • Choice item lock glitch Toxic sure-hit glitch • Rollout storage glitch Generation VIII Glitches Charge Beam additional effect chance glitch • Charge move replacement glitch • Choice item lock glitch Toxic sure-hit glitch • Rollout storage glitch • Party item offset glitch Generation IX Glitches Glitch effects Game freeze • Glitch battle • Glitch song Gen I only: Glitch screen • TMTRAINER effect • Inverted sprite Gen II only: Glitch dimension Lists Glitches (GO • Mystery Dungeon • TCG GB • Spin-off) Glitch Pokémon (Gen I • Gen II • Gen III • Gen IV • Gen V • Gen VI • Gen VII • Gen VIII) Glitch moves (Gen I) • Glitch types (Gen I • Gen II)

This glitch Pokémon article is part of Project GlitchDex, a Bulbapedia project that aims to write comprehensive articles on glitches in the Pokémon games.