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The "MissingNo." legend is an urban legend revolving around the 1996 role-playing games Pokémon Red and Blue.

Description

MissingNo. (pronounced "Missing Number") is a dual-type Bird/Normal Pokémon that can be encountered as a glitch. Most commonly seen as a deformed block of random symbols and glitched pixels, MissingNo. can also take the form of a ghost, a skeletal Aerodactyl, a skeletal Kabutops, and an orange wall of symbols (in Pokémon Yellow only).

To catch MissingNo., players must talk to the old man NPC in Viridian City, who teaches you how to catch Pokémon earlier in the game. After watching his quick tutorial, use a Pokémon with the Fly ability and fly to Cinnabar Island. Once you reach the island, use a Pokémon with the Surf ability and surf along the tiles that mark the border between the land and the water. Doing so will allow the player to potentially encounter MissingNo.

The reasoning behind MissingNo.'s appearance is fascinating. The name you bestow upon your trainer determines which Pokémon you tend to encounter more often. When watching the old man's tutorial, the name "OLD MAN" is temporarily saved to space in the memory where the player's name is stored, while the player's name is stored in the area reserved for wild Pokémon data. While the player's name is usually restored to its rightful spot when the player leaves the area with the old man and enters tall grass, it does not do so if the player moves to a city environment, like Cinnabar Island. Because the player's name is still registered as "OLD MAN" while surfing off the coast, the game doesn't know which Pokémon to summon and thus summons MissingNo.. MissingNo.'s form depends on the placement of letters in the player's name.

Trivia

  • Encountering MissingNo. will cause the number of the item in the sixth slot of the player's inventory to increase dramatically; the maximum number is 128. This allows players to exploit this glitch to mass-duplicate rare items like Rare Candies or Master Balls.
  • It is hypothesized that MissingNo. is the data left over by Pokémon that were deleted from the game. There are 39 MissingNo. in the game. This is proven because there were, according to developer Shigeki Morimoto, originally supposed to be 190 Pokémon in the game, making it possible that MissingNo. is the data left behind by these missing 39 Pokémon.
  • MissingNo.'s sprite is a compressed sprite of another Pokémon.
  • Another Glitch Pokémon named ▄█ 'M ▓▒ (shortly 'M) is sometimes confused with MissingNo.
  • In Pokémon Scarlet and Violet's trailer, MissingNo. Makes a cameo.
  • MissingNo. appeared in the Henry Stickmin franchise as an easter egg and in the original Henry Stickmin games he's known as Missingno-oshi (in mobile version he's known as missingno instead of that name)

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