? in a circle
AKA: ?
Pokemon #000
Type: Normal
Hex Value: unknown
Starting Moves: Struggle

Learned Moves: Tackle (Lv. 1)

? in a circle (called ?) is the placeholder Pokemon in R/S/E/FR/LG. If you look in the Pokedex for Pokemon you haven't seen yet, you will see this as the image. Although this was not meant to be accessed during normal gameplay, it is a required placeholder Pokemon and not a true glitch.

? is usually found at level 0, and is usually male (although a female version can be seen on a Japanese Fire Red screenshot). High-level ?s may start off knowing Struggle and Thunder Punch.

? can be found by using the Walk Through Walls GameShark code. ? appears as your own Pokemon if you try to bypass Prof. Birch at the start of the the game. This can be done by either walking past him, or by exiting the moving van at the start of the game. If you go into battle without any Pokemon, ? becomes your default Pokemon. It has an actual back sprite, and is not represented as a glitchy block. Surprisingly, ? has a normal form as well as a shiny form - the normal form has a white quesion mark, but the "shiny" version has a slightly gray question mark.

If you use the Walk Through Walls code to enter the Link Battle area, ? will appear as a wild Pokemon. If caught, a non-glitched Pokedex screen will appear, and the game will freeze.

Additionally, using GameShark code 83007CEE0xxx (replacing the xxx with three numbers that don't make a real Pokemon) will produce either ? or ??.

Encountering wild ?s may cause your game data to become corrupted. There are reports of carried items and mail becoming glitched and/or deleted after seeing ?. There are also cases of the HM/TM folder becoming unusable after ? was left in the Day Care. This glitch has the icon of a golden Bulbsaur, but catching it freezes the game after the Pokedex data displays.

Screenshots:

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