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I never thought I was going to see a GBA rom hack of a Pokemon game that serves as a sequel to Pokemon Ranger: Shadows of Almia for DS... but, here we are.

This is Pokemon Saiph.

Created primarily by user Vytron, Saiph is a fully original Pokemon game hacked on top of Pokemon FireRed.

It originally dropped in November of 2019 and has since had a few updates here and there, with user Vytron even suggesting that it will eventually get remade.

It's actually part of a larger rom hack series of games, dubbed as The Vytroverse.

It takes place in an original region, the Colen region... which uh... like the organ? The colen? Interesting name choice, for sure.

There's even parts of Hoenn to explore too in the post-game. Fun details there, since the Colen region is supposed to be directly beside it.

You might also notice the use of generation 5 sprites in a GBA romhack, which is really cool. Really makes it stand out even more from the original generation 3 Pokemon games.

So what's going on Pokemon Saiph?

Well, you play as Micah, or whatever you name the protagonist, as they explore the Colen region in a story framework that isn't dissimilar from the mainline Pokemon games.

Except you're dealing with a pretty different overall world design and series of events than you might be used to, aside from the traditional, “go collect the gym badges” formula.

It starts off on a pretty dark note, with Micah and his family being forced to move away from his home of Littleroot Town in Hoenn, due to a massive explosion and leak of radiation.

This is because the shadow crystal from Pokemon Ranger was moved to Hoenn from Almia, but didn't stay stored for very long before... well... kaboom.

A decade after all this happens, the Shadow Crystal is now in Colen, and Micah has his first pokemon, and is off the explore the region and conquer the Pokemon League.

The evil team to defeat, Team Void is trying to use the Shadow Crystal and the connected power of Darkrai to control the world, and it's up to you and your mysterious glitchy rival, Darlo, to stop them.

You'll ultimately learn more about Darlo and game's main antagonist Shenow as you progress through the game, and it's awesome that there's a lot of interesting Pokemon universe lore that went into the game itself. A lot of great attention to detail for Pokemon fans.

Really, the game's plot becomes much more about defeating Shenow and Team Void rather than becoming Pokemon League Champion.

Many of the game's bigger moments are exclusively tied to being the one to defeat Team Void.

And of course, if you're wondering why Darlo is so glitchy, you'll find out about that, too. And it doesn't disappoint.

The characters are great, too. Everyone gets development, and you're even introduced to the champion of the region early on, and work with her frequently.

While it's ultimately a standard Pokemon campaign, there's still quite a bit to set it out from the herd.

Not only are many sprites from Black and White, but the music is as well, and it sounds surprisingly awesome coming from DS to GBA.

It has many updated gameplay mechanics; Repel re-usage, Fairy typing, re-usable TMs, experience points from Pokemon capture, and Physical and Special move split, and moves and abilities from games past FireRed.

It has Pokemon all the way up to Generation 6 as well. I mean, with Fairy typing, that much should be obvious.

It really feels like a modern Pokemon title. With nicer UI for the Pokemon summaries, bag pockets, and everything else. It even has a day/night system.

The gyms in each town are actually very creatively made, with not just story sequences to complete before they can be accessed, but also just overall neat looks to them. They aren't just looking like similar gym buildings

There are some visual bugs that one will see regularly, but they don't interrupt the overall experience at all, so it really doesn't matter.