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Pokémon HeartGold on PC

Nintendo DS Pokémon HeartGold running on PC through native. Supply your own copy of the game.

About the game

A remake of the second generation, with Johto and Kanto in one game. The lead team member walks behind the player, and the Pokéwalker counts real-world steps.

Developer
Game Freak
Publisher
Nintendo
Genre
RPG
Original game
12 Sep 2009

How this port works

This is a native port: the game was rebuilt to run as a real PC program with no emulator in the loop. That usually means better performance, arbitrary resolution and mod support — and it is why these run well on modest hardware.

Decompilation of Pokemon HeartGold/SoulSilver

How to install

  1. 01First things first: this is a work-in-progress disassembly of Pokémon HeartGold and SoulSilver, not a PC port. What comes out are Nintendo DS ROMs.
  2. 02The repository itself warns that it is in an unstable state: symbol names and code structure change drastically and without warning. If you use this as a base for your own mods, you accept the risk.
  3. 03Because the ROM is not fully decompiled, any modification that affects the size or layout of a function or data structure can crash the game. That is the concrete problem that comes up most here.
  4. 04Building it yields pokeheartgold.us.nds (SHA-1 4fcded0e2713dc03929845de631d0932ea2b5a37) and pokesoulsilver.us.nds (SHA-1 f8dc38ea20c17541a43b58c5e6d18c1732c7e582).
  5. 05The setup steps live in the repository INSTALL.md.
  6. 06For contacts and the other pret projects, the reference is pret.github.io.

These projects ship no game data. Supply your own copy.

Frequently asked

Do I need the original game to play Pokémon HeartGold on PC?

Yes. The project distributes no game data — you supply your own copy or dump. Every project in this scene works this way, and it is what lets them stay publicly hosted on GitHub.

What does "native" mean?

This is a native port: the game was rebuilt to run as a real PC program with no emulator in the loop. That usually means better performance, arbitrary resolution and mod support — and it is why these run well on modest hardware.

Will Pokémon HeartGold run on a low-end PC?

Native ports and recompilations skip CPU emulation entirely, so they are usually far lighter than an emulator for the same console. With no published measurement for this project, though, any estimate would be guesswork — test it on your own machine.

When was Pokémon HeartGold released?

The original game shipped in 2009, developed by Game Freak and published by Nintendo. This PC port is from 2026.

Which systems does it support?

The current release ships builds for Windows. The game originally shipped on Nintendo DS.

Is it legal to use?

The project is public and open source, maintained by pret, and contains nothing from the commercial game. Responsibility for the game copy you use is yours — which is why the developers require you to supply your own.

More Nintendo DS ports