Pokémon Mini emulators

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Pokémon Mini
Pokémon mini.png
Developer Nintendo
Type Handheld game console
Generation Sixth generation
Release date 2001
Discontinued 2002
Predecessor Game Boy Advance
Successor DS(i)
Emulated

The Pokémon Mini is a handheld game console designed and manufactured by Nintendo and themed around the Pokémon media franchise. Released during the sixth generation of consoles, it is the smallest game system with interchangeable cartridges ever produced by Nintendo, weighing just under two and a half ounces (70 grams) and featuring a monochrome LCD of impressive 96×64 pixels. It was first released in North America on November 16, 2001. The systems were released in three colors: Wooper Blue, Chikorita Green, and Smoochum Purple. Over the course of its short life, ten games were released for the system, five of which were Japan-exclusive. Only four games were ever released in North America.

Features of the Pokémon Mini include an internal real-time clock, an infrared port used to facilitate multiplayer gaming, a reed switch to detect shakes and a motor used to implement force feedback. It runs on a Seiko S1C88 8-bit CPU clocked at 4 MHz and 4 kB of memory, powered by a single AAA battery, with 60 hours of autonomy.

Emulators[edit]

Name Platform(s) Latest version Retro
Achievements
libretro License Active Recommended
PC / x86
GBE+ Windows Linux 1.8 GPLv2 (Copyleft)
PokeMini
pokemini_libretro
Windows Linux libretro core
0.61
0.60
GPLv3 (Copyleft)
minimon Windows 2005/01/20 GPLv2 (Copyleft)
MAME Windows Linux macOS FreeBSD git artifacts[N 1]
0.272
GPLv3
BSD-3-Clause
PokeKaMini Windows 0.7.0 ?
Mobile / ARM
PokeMini[N 2] Android GP2X Wiz Dingoo 0.6.0 (Wiz, Dingux)
0.5.30.5.40.5.4 r2 (Android)
GPLv3 (Copyleft)
PokeMini TI-Nspire 0.6.0 rel 3 GPLv3 (Copyleft)
Console
PokeMini[N 3] Dreamcast Nintendo DS
PSP GameCube Wii GCWZero
0.60
git
GPLv3 (Copyleft)
PokeMini 3DS Nintendo 3DS git GPLv3 (Copyleft)
Pokémon Channel GameCube N/A Proprietary
PokemonMiniX Xbox V3 Proprietary ~
  1. CI-Windows CI-Linux CI-Macos
  2. Also available on mobile as a libretro core in the latest version (0.6.0). Wiz and Dingux ports available only as uncompiled source code starting with version 0.5.4.
  3. Also available on other consoles as a libretro core. GameCube and Wii ports available only from Libretro (RetroArch).

Comparisons[edit]

GBE+
Game Boy Color emulator famed for its IR capabilities; added Pokémon Mini support in May 2021. Compatibility is said to be 100% with commercial games and it’s the only emulator to provide IR support.
PokeMini
The emulator of choice for Pokémon Mini, it has 100% of compatibility with commercial games. If the BIOS isn’t present, it uses a fallback FOSS substitute, FreeBIOS, which is said to also be 100% compatible with the software library. A backup of the last released binaries for Android, Wiz and Dingux (version 0.5.3) can be found at The Internet Archive.
Pokémon Channel
A sequel to the equally boring N64 game Hey You, Pikachu!, Pokémon Channel is a 2003 simulator game for the GameCube developed by Ambrella for The Pokémon Company. Hidden under the bed in the game is a Pokémon Mini, which can actually be played in-game through what is de facto an emulator. Boringly, some minigames that constitute Pokémon Party Mini were separated into individual tiny ROMs, forming the library of Pokémon Mini games playable in Pokémon Channel together with stripped-down versions of Pokémon Pinball Mini and Pokémon Puzzle Collection (less boring is the inclusion of Snorlax’s Lunch Time, a previously unreleased minigame that was apparently scrapped from Pokémon Party Mini). It didn’t take long for enthusiasts to crack the ISO wide open and develop a ROM injector for the emulator, which can be downloaded here. The emulator is 100% compatible with commercially released games, with one caveat: the shake-detecting reed switch isn’t emulated, rendering some games such as Pokémon Shock Tetris nigh unplayable.
Minimon
The first emulator to achieve good compatibility. It runs mostly fine, but Pokémon Shock Tetris saves may be corrupted. Sound emulation is a little iffy. Does not require a BIOS dump.
PokemonMiniX
A well-documented port of minimon for the OG Xbox. It has support for skins.
MAME
The Pokémon Mini module has preliminary sound emulation and no support for savestates. Avoid.
PokeKaMini
The precursor of PokeMini is more of a debugger than an emulator. Despite being very inaccurate, some developers still use it for its awesome UI and debugging functionalities.

Infrared[edit]

The Pokémon Mini has an infrared port, used in some games for peer-to-peer multiplayer functionalities. Only GBE+ supports it.

BIOS[edit]

Most Pokémon Mini emulators require a BIOS file, bios.min. It can be found here.