In the game's code is evidence of an unused Event Pokémon. Event Pokémon are exclusive Pokémon throughout the franchise's history which usually have movesets or other unique properties that would not otherwise legitimately occur in normal gameplay.
A code string indicates that Diglett learns the move "Acid" at Lvl. 1, found at the end of Diglett's Generation 1 move pool, as this programming method was the manner in which the programmers ensured Event Pokémon transferred via the Game Pak to Stadium could function properly during gameplay.
To date, a Diglett with Acid being legitimately learned in it's moveset has never been released or distributed by an official Event by Nintendo nor Game Freak.
Within the game's data is an unused Mashup for the song "Istanbul" by They Might Be Giants. While it is unknown why the Mashup was removed, it is theorized that it was because of the low amount of dancers within the Mashup, as only 6 dancers are used.
In Wrecking Crew, Foreman Spike has unique tiles for his lower body, showing him with a belt. However, he uses the tiles for Mario and Luigi instead, leaving them unused. Interestingly, his redesign in Wrecking Crew '98 features a belt.
Street Fighter series director Takayuki Nakayama revealed some concept designs by Bengus meant to represent each of divine beasts in Japanese mythology. These designs depict Byakko (the white tiger), Suzaku (the vermillion bird), Genbu (the black tortoise), Seiryu (the azure dragon), and the less often seen Koryu (the yellow dragon). These designs were meant to be used for mascots of the annual Special RAGE Cup events, which were Street Fighter tournaments held in Japan. The winner would recieve an special costume made for them.
As the RAGE Cup event only lasted for three years (2016-2018), only three of the beasts were present. It is unknown what the final concept of the blue and yellow dragons might have looked like.
The game's data contains four unused weapons: a pistol, a minigun, a combat knife, and knuckledusters. While the only thing that remains of the first three are textures (indicating they didn't make it far into development), the knuckledusters are fully modeled.
The game's data contains an unused model for protagonist Tatsuya Ukyo wearing a baggy silver tracksuit. In the final game, he only wears a black-and-gold tracksuit and a pair of black boxing shorts depending on the story segment, with no option to manually change outfits. It is unknown how this outfit would have been obtained in-game.
The game's date contains unused forward and backward walk cycles for Bishamon where he can be seen bracing his sword in a defensive posture. They have no hitboxes or other properties assigned, implying they were eliminated early in development, and it is unknown what exactly they might have been used for.
Within the game files there's an unused alternate wakeup animation for Morrigan, which shows her temporarily becoming a dark figure while a cloud of bats lift her up. In the final game, her sprite doesn't change colors.
The game's data contains labels for player 3 up to player 8. It is possible that a mode reminiscent of the Tournament Battle variant of Super Street Fighter II (a special version that networked 4 cabinets together to allow for 8 player elimination tournaments) was considered at one point in development before being scrapped.
The SNES version is missing the Industrial Area stage and the Rolento boss fight, as well as the two-player cooperative mode, rendering the game as single player only.
Among the files included in the Gigaleak, a massive 2020 content leak of internal data from Nintendo, are assets associated with Super Mario 64 depicting a fully-coded enemy named Motos, which is absent from the final game. The enemy is programed to chase Mario, pick him up, and throw him similarly to Big Bob-omb and Chuckya. Like those characters, Motos can be picked up and thrown, but unlike them, it can only be defeated by being thrown into lava, similarly to the Bully and Big Bully. This weakness implies that Motos was originally intended to appear as an enemy in Lethal Lava Land and Bowser in the Fire Sea, which is corroborated by the fact that various other assets associated with the levels feature "motos" in their filenames.
Further analysis of the source code indicates that Motos were intended to be connected to Bullies, which are labeled "Otos" in the source code and use sound effects that are also associated with Motos. Additionally, the code contains a filename for an "icemotos" miniboss in Snowman's Land, and the "Bully the Bullies" star in Lethal Lava Land is internally named "bigmotos," implying that at least two variants of Motos were conceived as minibosses before being replaced with Big Bully and Chill Bully in the final game.
Additional data in the Gigaleak indicates that at some point in development, Motos was reconfigured into a boss version of the Chuckya enemy, labeled "Katsugikun" in the source code, before being scrapped altogether. Unlike Motos, no assets for Katsugikun exist other than a filename and behavior code.
Like Pokémon Diamond & Pearl, Pokémon Platinum contains the unused Azure Flute item, which triggers a battle with a level 80 Arceus in the otherwise inaccessible Hall of Origin atop Spear Pillar. The event is almost identical to how it appears in Diamond & Pearl, with the sole difference being a redesigned sprite for Arceus. The Azure Flute was intended to be given out to players as an event item, but was scrapped due to concerns that it would be too confusing for players. Instead, Arceus was directly given out as an event Pokémon.
The music for the Hall of Origin and the battle against Arceus, which are carried over from Diamond and Pearl, go unused here too, but the latter song would be reused for the Sinjoh Ruins event in Pokémon Heart Gold & Soul Silver, where players can obtain a Dialga, Palkia, or Giratina if they have an Arceus at the front of their party. This event additionally contains code allowing it to be triggered by an Arceus from the Hall of Origin, indicating that Game Freak still considered distributing the Azure Flute this late into Generation IV. Spoiler:The Azure Flute and Hall of Origin would eventually be implemented in Pokémon Brilliant Diamond & Shining Pearl, where players can access both if they import Pokémon Legends: Arceus save data after catching Arceus there.
An item called the Azure Flute is present in the game's data, but can't be legitimately accessed. Hacking the flute into one's inventory triggers a battle with a level 80 Arceus in the Hall of Origin, an otherwise unused area hidden above Spear Pillar. Both the Hall of Origin and the battle with Arceus feature unique themes, which also go unused in the normal course of play.
The Azure Flute was intended as an event item to be given out to players, much like the Event Card and Oak's Letter (which allow the player to fight Darkrai and Shaymin, respectively). However, Game Freak scrapped the idea upon concluding that it would be too confusing for players. Instead, Arceus was directly given out at events.
Arceus' battle theme would later be used for the Sinjoh Ruins event in Pokémon Heart Gold & Soul Silver where players can obtain a Dialga, Palkia, or Giratina if they have an Arceus as the first Pokémon in their party. This event additionally contains code allowing it to be triggered by an Arceus from the Hall of Origin, indicating that Game Freak still considered distributing the Azure Flute this late into Generation IV. Spoiler:The Azure Flute item and its corresponding event would eventually be implemented in Pokémon Brilliant Diamond & Shining Pearl, where players can access both by importing save data from Pokémon Legends: Arceus after catching Arceus there.
The game was originally planned to feature a "Heat Meter" that kept track of how many enemies the player was able to defeat in a row. More consecutive kills would build up the player's "heat," while getting hit and spending too much time without attacking enemies would lose heat. Higher heat levels would additionally make enemies more aggressive, increase the amount of points lost from taking damage, and grant Peppino new attacks. The development team compared this mechanic to a similar one found in God Hand.
The Heat Meter was fully implemented in a demo released to Patreon backers in April of 2021, but was simplified in later builds before ultimately being removed in October of 2022 due to mixed audience responses; several animations associated with it were also reconfigured for other purposes. Despite this, graphics for the Heat Meter and code for the more aggressive enemy behavior are still present in the final game. The Pizza Slug, Shrimp Thug, and Tribe Cheese enemies would also have their high-aggression modes enabled by default.
In a 2020 interview about Luigi's Mansion 3, the game's lead producer Kensuke Tanabe (who was also the scenario writer for A Link to the Past) compared a shift during the game's development to an early idea that was scrapped during A Link to the Past's development, revealing that the game originally had multiple parallel worlds but it had to be cut down to just two—those being the worlds of Light and Dark.
"When that happens, I try not to cling to that initial idea too much. For example, this is when I was working on The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past. At first, we were thinking about structuring the game with numerous parallel worlds. However, in order to establish the gameplay in the end, we decided that it would be better to narrow it down to two worlds: Light and Dark. I think game development involves much work where you never know unless you actually test it out."
The Wii U Virtual Console port of the game has the option to select both Multiplayer and Ghost Exchange. However, both options are locked out due to the physical game requiring the Game Boy Advance Game Link Cable, which unlocks those game modes on the actual Game Boy Advance hardware.
In Hyrule Town, three travelers in the lobby of the Happy Hearth Inn, named Din, Nayru, and Farore, are the same characters as the Oracles from The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Ages and The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons. They are each looking for new homes to move into, which is the basis of an optional side quest that can be started after completing the Fortress of Winds. Gorman will now be renting out a house to tenants, and Link can convince one of the travelers to move in and obtain a Charm from that traveler. Afterwards, if Link fuses Kinstones with Bremor, Mutoh will become motivated to build a second house for Gorman to rent out. Link can then convince one of the remaining two travelers to move in, and will obtain their respective Charm. Each of the two houses built have a red roof and a blue roof, reflecting the color schemes of Din and Nayru respectively. However no third house can be built in the game, leaving the third Oracle homeless and stuck in the inn's lobby. In the European version of the game, Gorman makes a comment about wanting to build a house just south of the Royal Hyrule Library, on a plot of land occupied by cats, but he never does. This comment was removed from the North American release of the game which came out two months later.
Although the choice of who will remain homeless is entirely up to the player, the most probable canonical traveler to remain homeless is Farore. This is based on the lack of a green-roofed house to reflect her color scheme, her figurine description noting that she is bothered by people who "take advantage of her kind nature" (unlike Din and Nayru's descriptions which only point out where they are from and are looking for a new home), and by the development history of Oracle of Ages and Seasons, which was originally planned to be three games with each focusing on a different piece of the Triforce represented by a different Oracle, although only two games centering on Din and Nayru would ultimately be developed.
It's unknown if this incomplete side quest was an oversight, or if it was an intentional in-joke by Capcom, who developed both The Minish Cap and Oracle of Ages and Seasons.
In the game's code is evidence of an unused Event Pokémon. Event Pokémon are exclusive Pokémon throughout the franchise's history which usually have movesets or other unique properties that would not otherwise legitimately occur in normal gameplay.
An early version of the legs for one of Gotchawrench's climbing sprites can be found in the game's data.
In Wrecking Crew, Foreman Spike has unique tiles for his lower body, showing him with a belt. However, he uses the tiles for Mario and Luigi instead, leaving them unused. Interestingly, his redesign in Wrecking Crew '98 features a belt.
In Street Fighter III: 2nd Impact there is an unused female voice that doesn't match either Elena or Ibuki. It's possible these voice lines belonged to an earlier version of Makoto, as she was originally meant to debut in this game but was moved to 3rd Strike due to time constrains.
Street Fighter series director Takayuki Nakayama revealed some concept designs by Bengus meant to represent each of divine beasts in Japanese mythology. These designs depict Byakko (the white tiger), Suzaku (the vermillion bird), Genbu (the black tortoise), Seiryu (the azure dragon), and the less often seen Koryu (the yellow dragon). These designs were meant to be used for mascots of the annual Special RAGE Cup events, which were Street Fighter tournaments held in Japan. The winner would recieve an special costume made for them.
The game's data contains four unused weapons: a pistol, a minigun, a combat knife, and knuckledusters. While the only thing that remains of the first three are textures (indicating they didn't make it far into development), the knuckledusters are fully modeled.
The game's data contains an unused model for protagonist Tatsuya Ukyo wearing a baggy silver tracksuit. In the final game, he only wears a black-and-gold tracksuit and a pair of black boxing shorts depending on the story segment, with no option to manually change outfits. It is unknown how this outfit would have been obtained in-game.
The game's date contains unused forward and backward walk cycles for Bishamon where he can be seen bracing his sword in a defensive posture. They have no hitboxes or other properties assigned, implying they were eliminated early in development, and it is unknown what exactly they might have been used for.
Within the game files there's an unused alternate wakeup animation for Morrigan, which shows her temporarily becoming a dark figure while a cloud of bats lift her up. In the final game, her sprite doesn't change colors.
The game's data contains labels for player 3 up to player 8. It is possible that a mode reminiscent of the Tournament Battle variant of Super Street Fighter II (a special version that networked 4 cabinets together to allow for 8 player elimination tournaments) was considered at one point in development before being scrapped.
Among the files included in the Gigaleak, a massive 2020 content leak of internal data from Nintendo, are assets associated with Super Mario 64 depicting a fully-coded enemy named Motos, which is absent from the final game. The enemy is programed to chase Mario, pick him up, and throw him similarly to Big Bob-omb and Chuckya. Like those characters, Motos can be picked up and thrown, but unlike them, it can only be defeated by being thrown into lava, similarly to the Bully and Big Bully. This weakness implies that Motos was originally intended to appear as an enemy in Lethal Lava Land and Bowser in the Fire Sea, which is corroborated by the fact that various other assets associated with the levels feature "motos" in their filenames.
Like Pokémon Diamond & Pearl, Pokémon Platinum contains the unused Azure Flute item, which triggers a battle with a level 80 Arceus in the otherwise inaccessible Hall of Origin atop Spear Pillar. The event is almost identical to how it appears in Diamond & Pearl, with the sole difference being a redesigned sprite for Arceus. The Azure Flute was intended to be given out to players as an event item, but was scrapped due to concerns that it would be too confusing for players. Instead, Arceus was directly given out as an event Pokémon.
An item called the Azure Flute is present in the game's data, but can't be legitimately accessed. Hacking the flute into one's inventory triggers a battle with a level 80 Arceus in the Hall of Origin, an otherwise unused area hidden above Spear Pillar. Both the Hall of Origin and the battle with Arceus feature unique themes, which also go unused in the normal course of play.
The game was originally planned to feature a "Heat Meter" that kept track of how many enemies the player was able to defeat in a row. More consecutive kills would build up the player's "heat," while getting hit and spending too much time without attacking enemies would lose heat. Higher heat levels would additionally make enemies more aggressive, increase the amount of points lost from taking damage, and grant Peppino new attacks. The development team compared this mechanic to a similar one found in God Hand.
