HOME | DD

Description

[FILES ARE HERE, you can check the screenshots I used as reference in the "refs" folder]

A while ago I did a few recreations of Pokémon Ruby/Sapphire beta sprites based on old artifacted screenshots. This time I gathered every old screenshot of Beta RS me and others could find (thank you Farore for your beta images archive ). I did my best to find and restore every asset different from final I could find.
This is a more complete collection than what was showcased in the 3rd RHH Showcase at the beginning of June.

As you'd expect, everything got various tweaks from beta to final. A lot of it is minor or hard to quantify for me to all list, but here are a bunch of notes I wrote about what sticks out when compared to the finished sprites. (Apologies for the massive wall of text):

Pokémons: (all shinies were made by me, based on the final version's shinies)

I want to preface this section by mentioning the artstyle change RS has gotten from beta to final.

Pokémon sprites initially had a pretty washed out, even watercolor-esque look. While this was mostly phased out, the final game's artsyle still carries hints of it. In particular, there is a small handful of Pokémon whose sprites in the final game carry this beta artsyle far more than the rest, to various extents. If you want to see the most obvious examples, Claydol , Lombre , Surskit and Seedot stick out a lot. They give us a first-hand idea of what RS sprites could have looked like, and you'll notice the artstyle does look quite similar to the sprites in this collection.

All of this to also say that I won't point out this style difference in each of my individual notes.

Wynaut: Back sprite is significantly bigger than the final version .
Azurill: The shape of the front sprite is almost identical to the final sprite, besides shading edits.

It also has a sad expression, as opposed to the smile the final version has, which is something that is only ever seen in its official artwork , curiously enough (and the Gen 5 sprite that is based on said artwork).

Backsprite is bigger than final too, akin to Wynaut, and the proportions received some changes (notably, the tail is noticeably smaller in beta).

Kecleon: The shading/coloring differences the beta has particularly stick out on this sprite, it looks very washed out.

Design-wise, the eyes don't have the inner white from the final design and the red stripe is wavy rather than sharp.
The quality of my ref screenshot for the front sprite was pretty low, the shading was hard to make out, I can't guarantee high accuracy.
Duskull: Nothing particularly noteworthy here, it's really just a rougher version of the final sprite .

Eye is less bright in beta, but that could because of the aforementioned artsyle difference rather than a design change.

Sharpedo: Some pretty interesting design divergences from final can be noted.

It's overall sharper looking, the eyes are darker and narrower, the star on the forehead looks somewhat like a cross-shaped scar, there's a blue indent into the white part under the nose, its rear has an inward curve instead of being rounded - which I assume is meant to look like a torpedo exhaust.
I did a beta Sharpedo recreation before, but found better screenshots to improve it. Sharpedo had the most and overall cleanest reference pictures, which makes sense as it was one of the playable Pokémon in the Pokémon Festa 2002 demo , they really liked to push it forward in promotions.
Wailmer: The beta sprites has subtle differences from the final design . Its shape is less round, the upper lip juts forward a little, similarly to a real-life Blue Whale.

My reference screenshots weren't the best to work with. I sadly wasn't even able to find a back sprite reference but I also had to work with a magazine scan to redraw its bottom half, so the beige colors could be a bit inaccurate.

Shroomish: Front sprite looks notably different, with the different pose from final .

The back sprite is noteworthy as it shows the body in its entirety, unlike the final one . It might look a bit janky, but that's genuinely what it looks like, look at the references for yourself.
I also did this one before (post now deleted), but since then I found more references, including some for the back sprite.
Pelipper: The design itself didn't change, the sprite received only polish leading to the final one .
Reference pics for this one were of notably good quality.
Volbeat: Sadly, no front sprite this time. Its body was thinner/smaller compared to final judging by the back sprite. Nothing particularly noteworthy besides that.
Poochyena: The reference on this one looked weird, like a badly compressed bitmap image with colors blown up (just have a look ).

I genuinely don't know what to make of it. At first I took the liberty to nudge the colors and add back the ones that were missing because I assumed the compression completely ate them, but after coming back to it much later, I thought this could not have been the case because Sharpedo still had its yellow markings and the HUD still had its reds/oranges. So there was no way the compression would've removed them from Poochyena instead of using these other colors to mimic them in spite of the compression.

Which means it simply didn't have a red nose and yellow sclera in beta and its design was completely monochrome, quite interesting as this makes it the only design in this collection with substantial design changes from its final design!

If I am correct with my assessment about the reference image that is. After all, this is my only reference to work with, meaning there also was no back sprite found.

Otherwise, the sprite itself is just a rougher looking version of the final sprite .

Overworld NPCs:

In beta, the highlighting of the hair was done differently. I believe it is safe to assume that every NPC was affected by this difference. I however only restricted myself to the sprites I could see in pre-release screenshots.

Also, please note that, at best, I was working with 2 reference frames for each NPC, so most of the frames were reconstructed by intuition.

Nurse: Did you know, the PokéCenter Nurse does NOT have a hat in RS , it's only in Emerald . Although the one seen in beta RS looks a bit different than the one in Emerald.
Contest Receptionist: The hat is exclusive to beta screenshots, it was removed for the final version . Unlike the Nurse, it didn't come back in Emerald.
Gentleman: Seemingly identical to the final version , sprite-wise. However, it uses a different palette (Palette #6 in beta, Palette #5 in final) making the outfit black/blue in beta instead of brown in final.
COM Center Receptionist: This character was used as the receptionists of the 2nd floor of Pokémon Centers in beta images. In the final version, the receptionists are a completely different NPC.

This character wasn't completely scraped however, it seems to have been recycled as a generic NPC in the final game, with slight changes: The hair was changed slightly, with the addition of a ponytail, and the palette was changed too (the dress is green and gray in final).

Hiker: This one is quite different than the one seen in the final version .

The body shape is different and unlike any other NPC, he has no mustache, the hat is different and the palette changed (In final, the blue is lighter and the black is replaced by brown).
Be mindful that the reference I had to work with was really meager (here's the whole thing ). The rest was improvised using loose reference to the final OW. Considering how unlike any other NPC he looks, the reference was very loose so the accuracy is probably off to what he actually looked like in beta.
Tuber♂: Thick hair here, but he has short hair in final .
Archie Placeholder: This is the sprite Archie uses in beta screenshots. It's clearly a placeholder, exactly the Aqua Grunt sprite but with different colors (the purples exist in the same internal palette that the Aqua Grunt OW uses too).
Lady: Beta has a side ponytail/hair bun instead of the long fluffy hair the final version has.

Hair highlighting is different too, but that's every beta NPC.
Woman: Only the hair highlight is different from final, which, as said before, is the case with all NPCs.
Ponytail Girl: In the final version, the dress was traded for pants and is used for various NPCs, like the Battle Girl trainers.
Contest Judge: Same case as the Gentleman, sprite is identical to final except for a different palette. (Palette #6 in beta, Palette #5 in final) giving it a purple suit with gray hair instead of a green suit and brown hair in final.

Trainer sprites: (Very few were shown)

Hiker: Same sprite as final except for the colors being more saturated. (The quality of the screenshots might have affected this though, so take it with a grain of salt)
Lady: The pose is different, more simple, than the one seen in final . Linework is completely different except for the head part IIRC. Design is exactly the same.

Tiles:

Flower Shop Tiles: Differences are all mostly minor, mainly shading stuff. I'm not going to list them.
The general tileset in earlier beta screenshots had different colors, but I didn't bother with them because picking colors from compressed JPEGs would not have been accurate anyway and not worth it, so I used the colors from the final versions instead. Just go look at the screenshots if you want a preview of the colors.
Pokémon Contest Reception: Minor changes, the counter is a different color, the entrance carpet is unique and not seen in final.
Pokémon Contest Platforms: Those tiles are completely unique and absent in final, I figured it'd be interesting to restore. Those platforms were used for where the contest takes place. See the reference pic .
Red Mart Roof + Signs: This one is a relatively known RS beta thing, the PokéMart roof used to be red, I think it's because it's present in the final game's files? There are also the PC and Shop sign tiles that are different, in beta they are higher up on the wall. And yes, it's still "Shop" in final technically, "Mart" is a localization change.
Hedge Fences: Completely unique hedge fences found in beta screenshots of Petalburg City. In final, they look quite different, being thicker to take up a whole tile rather than half of one like the beta ones do.
Note that I could only find a single reference picture with 2 hedge tiles on it (look here ), so it was mostly reconstructed from intuition.
PokéCenter Interior: The escalators are slightly different, missing a bit at the top/bottom of the stairs. The seats are different, notably one of them is green instead of yellow. The glass table also looks different, having less texture.
Fallarbor Cliffs: Different style, they look quite different visually.
Sadly, the reference pic was not of the best quality, and the amount of cliffs you could see was limited so I couldn't do the whole thing.
Fortree House Roof: Same as final except it's lacking 1 shade of shading. Included it because why not.
Log Bridge: The reference pic is not very good so I don't guarantee accuracy on this one. I left white bits because these logs can are placed on a number of other tiles.

Battle HUD: (Colors most likely aren't 100% accurate)

Pokéball Count: Much simpler and flat looking than the final.
Standard Battle HUD: The interesting part is the arrow pointing to your active Pokémon, it was seen in early screenshots, but was already removed for most of them.
Double Battle HUD: Just a slimmed down version of the normal battle HUD. The pointy bits are taken straight from the pre-battle Pokéball count, interestingly.

_

And that's all of it. I'm sure there are a few screenshots with unique sprites hidden in some obscure corner of the internet that I didn't find. Or some that are, sadly, straight up lost media.

If I come across more, I'll see if I can add them to the this collage and have an update history under here.

(July 30 2023): Rewrote description, took out all external links (most were broken). Put forward my reference images in my Google Drive link at the top, linked to some screenshots from the Drive where needed in the description.

(April 6 2024): Rewrote some stuff, added a paragraph about Beta RS's artstyle. Updated Poochyena's sprite to remove some colors I had taken the liberty to add despite not being in the ref pic. Added Bubapedia links to compare to some final sprites.

Description

[FILES ARE HERE, you can check the screenshots I used as reference in the "refs" folder]

A while ago I did a few recreations of Pokémon Ruby/Sapphire beta sprites based on old artifacted screenshots. This time I gathered every old screenshot of Beta RS me and others could find (thank you Farore for your beta images archive ). I did my best to find and restore every asset different from final I could find.
This is a more complete collection than what was showcased in the 3rd RHH Showcase at the beginning of June.

As you'd expect, everything got various tweaks from beta to final. A lot of it is minor or hard to quantify for me to all list, but here are a bunch of notes I wrote about what sticks out when compared to the finished sprites. (Apologies for the massive wall of text):

Pokémons: (all shinies were made by me, based on the final version's shinies)

I want to preface this section by mentioning the artstyle change RS has gotten from beta to final.

Pokémon sprites initially had a pretty washed out, even watercolor-esque look. While this was mostly phased out, the final game's artsyle still carries hints of it. In particular, there is a small handful of Pokémon whose sprites in the final game carry this beta artsyle far more than the rest, to various extents. If you want to see the most obvious examples, Claydol , Lombre , Surskit and Seedot stick out a lot. They give us a first-hand idea of what RS sprites could have looked like, and you'll notice the artstyle does look quite similar to the sprites in this collection.

All of this to also say that I won't point out this style difference in each of my individual notes.

Wynaut: Back sprite is significantly bigger than the final version .
Azurill: The shape of the front sprite is almost identical to the final sprite, besides shading edits.

It also has a sad expression, as opposed to the smile the final version has, which is something that is only ever seen in its official artwork , curiously enough (and the Gen 5 sprite that is based on said artwork).

Backsprite is bigger than final too, akin to Wynaut, and the proportions received some changes (notably, the tail is noticeably smaller in beta).

Kecleon: The shading/coloring differences the beta has particularly stick out on this sprite, it looks very washed out.

Design-wise, the eyes don't have the inner white from the final design and the red stripe is wavy rather than sharp.
The quality of my ref screenshot for the front sprite was pretty low, the shading was hard to make out, I can't guarantee high accuracy.
Duskull: Nothing particularly noteworthy here, it's really just a rougher version of the final sprite .

Eye is less bright in beta, but that could because of the aforementioned artsyle difference rather than a design change.

Sharpedo: Some pretty interesting design divergences from final can be noted.

It's overall sharper looking, the eyes are darker and narrower, the star on the forehead looks somewhat like a cross-shaped scar, there's a blue indent into the white part under the nose, its rear has an inward curve instead of being rounded - which I assume is meant to look like a torpedo exhaust.
I did a beta Sharpedo recreation before, but found better screenshots to improve it. Sharpedo had the most and overall cleanest reference pictures, which makes sense as it was one of the playable Pokémon in the Pokémon Festa 2002 demo , they really liked to push it forward in promotions.
Wailmer: The beta sprites has subtle differences from the final design . Its shape is less round, the upper lip juts forward a little, similarly to a real-life Blue Whale.

My reference screenshots weren't the best to work with. I sadly wasn't even able to find a back sprite reference but I also had to work with a magazine scan to redraw its bottom half, so the beige colors could be a bit inaccurate.

Shroomish: Front sprite looks notably different, with the different pose from final .

The back sprite is noteworthy as it shows the body in its entirety, unlike the final one . It might look a bit janky, but that's genuinely what it looks like, look at the references for yourself.
I also did this one before (post now deleted), but since then I found more references, including some for the back sprite.
Pelipper: The design itself didn't change, the sprite received only polish leading to the final one .
Reference pics for this one were of notably good quality.
Volbeat: Sadly, no front sprite this time. Its body was thinner/smaller compared to final judging by the back sprite. Nothing particularly noteworthy besides that.
Poochyena: The reference on this one looked weird, like a badly compressed bitmap image with colors blown up (just have a look ).

I genuinely don't know what to make of it. At first I took the liberty to nudge the colors and add back the ones that were missing because I assumed the compression completely ate them, but after coming back to it much later, I thought this could not have been the case because Sharpedo still had its yellow markings and the HUD still had its reds/oranges. So there was no way the compression would've removed them from Poochyena instead of using these other colors to mimic them in spite of the compression.

Which means it simply didn't have a red nose and yellow sclera in beta and its design was completely monochrome, quite interesting as this makes it the only design in this collection with substantial design changes from its final design!

If I am correct with my assessment about the reference image that is. After all, this is my only reference to work with, meaning there also was no back sprite found.

Otherwise, the sprite itself is just a rougher looking version of the final sprite .

Overworld NPCs:

In beta, the highlighting of the hair was done differently. I believe it is safe to assume that every NPC was affected by this difference. I however only restricted myself to the sprites I could see in pre-release screenshots.

Also, please note that, at best, I was working with 2 reference frames for each NPC, so most of the frames were reconstructed by intuition.

Nurse: Did you know, the PokéCenter Nurse does NOT have a hat in RS , it's only in Emerald . Although the one seen in beta RS looks a bit different than the one in Emerald.
Contest Receptionist: The hat is exclusive to beta screenshots, it was removed for the final version . Unlike the Nurse, it didn't come back in Emerald.
Gentleman: Seemingly identical to the final version , sprite-wise. However, it uses a different palette (Palette #6 in beta, Palette #5 in final) making the outfit black/blue in beta instead of brown in final.
COM Center Receptionist: This character was used as the receptionists of the 2nd floor of Pokémon Centers in beta images. In the final version, the receptionists are a completely different NPC.

This character wasn't completely scraped however, it seems to have been recycled as a generic NPC in the final game, with slight changes: The hair was changed slightly, with the addition of a ponytail, and the palette was changed too (the dress is green and gray in final).

Hiker: This one is quite different than the one seen in the final version .

The body shape is different and unlike any other NPC, he has no mustache, the hat is different and the palette changed (In final, the blue is lighter and the black is replaced by brown).
Be mindful that the reference I had to work with was really meager (here's the whole thing ). The rest was improvised using loose reference to the final OW. Considering how unlike any other NPC he looks, the reference was very loose so the accuracy is probably off to what he actually looked like in beta.
Tuber♂: Thick hair here, but he has short hair in final .
Archie Placeholder: This is the sprite Archie uses in beta screenshots. It's clearly a placeholder, exactly the Aqua Grunt sprite but with different colors (the purples exist in the same internal palette that the Aqua Grunt OW uses too).
Lady: Beta has a side ponytail/hair bun instead of the long fluffy hair the final version has.

Hair highlighting is different too, but that's every beta NPC.
Woman: Only the hair highlight is different from final, which, as said before, is the case with all NPCs.
Ponytail Girl: In the final version, the dress was traded for pants and is used for various NPCs, like the Battle Girl trainers.
Contest Judge: Same case as the Gentleman, sprite is identical to final except for a different palette. (Palette #6 in beta, Palette #5 in final) giving it a purple suit with gray hair instead of a green suit and brown hair in final.

Trainer sprites: (Very few were shown)

Hiker: Same sprite as final except for the colors being more saturated. (The quality of the screenshots might have affected this though, so take it with a grain of salt)
Lady: The pose is different, more simple, than the one seen in final . Linework is completely different except for the head part IIRC. Design is exactly the same.

Tiles:

Flower Shop Tiles: Differences are all mostly minor, mainly shading stuff. I'm not going to list them.
The general tileset in earlier beta screenshots had different colors, but I didn't bother with them because picking colors from compressed JPEGs would not have been accurate anyway and not worth it, so I used the colors from the final versions instead. Just go look at the screenshots if you want a preview of the colors.
Pokémon Contest Reception: Minor changes, the counter is a different color, the entrance carpet is unique and not seen in final.
Pokémon Contest Platforms: Those tiles are completely unique and absent in final, I figured it'd be interesting to restore. Those platforms were used for where the contest takes place. See the reference pic .
Red Mart Roof + Signs: This one is a relatively known RS beta thing, the PokéMart roof used to be red, I think it's because it's present in the final game's files? There are also the PC and Shop sign tiles that are different, in beta they are higher up on the wall. And yes, it's still "Shop" in final technically, "Mart" is a localization change.
Hedge Fences: Completely unique hedge fences found in beta screenshots of Petalburg City. In final, they look quite different, being thicker to take up a whole tile rather than half of one like the beta ones do.
Note that I could only find a single reference picture with 2 hedge tiles on it (look here ), so it was mostly reconstructed from intuition.
PokéCenter Interior: The escalators are slightly different, missing a bit at the top/bottom of the stairs. The seats are different, notably one of them is green instead of yellow. The glass table also looks different, having less texture.
Fallarbor Cliffs: Different style, they look quite different visually.
Sadly, the reference pic was not of the best quality, and the amount of cliffs you could see was limited so I couldn't do the whole thing.
Fortree House Roof: Same as final except it's lacking 1 shade of shading. Included it because why not.
Log Bridge: The reference pic is not very good so I don't guarantee accuracy on this one. I left white bits because these logs can are placed on a number of other tiles.

Battle HUD: (Colors most likely aren't 100% accurate)

Pokéball Count: Much simpler and flat looking than the final.
Standard Battle HUD: The interesting part is the arrow pointing to your active Pokémon, it was seen in early screenshots, but was already removed for most of them.
Double Battle HUD: Just a slimmed down version of the normal battle HUD. The pointy bits are taken straight from the pre-battle Pokéball count, interestingly.

_

And that's all of it. I'm sure there are a few screenshots with unique sprites hidden in some obscure corner of the internet that I didn't find. Or some that are, sadly, straight up lost media.

If I come across more, I'll see if I can add them to the this collage and have an update history under here.

(July 30 2023): Rewrote description, took out all external links (most were broken). Put forward my reference images in my Google Drive link at the top, linked to some screenshots from the Drive where needed in the description.

(April 6 2024): Rewrote some stuff, added a paragraph about Beta RS's artstyle. Updated Poochyena's sprite to remove some colors I had taken the liberty to add despite not being in the ref pic. Added Bubapedia links to compare to some final sprites.