Add a new party menu icon

This tutorial is for how to add a new party menu icon (the same icons are used outside the Day-Care). As an example, we'll add one for Celebi.

Contents

1. Define an icon constant
2. Design its graphics
3. Include and point to the graphics
4. Use the icon for a Pokémon
5. How to add a unique icon for each Pokémon

1. Define an icon constant

Edit constants/icon_constants.asm:

 ; IconPointers indexes (see data/icon_pointers.asm)
 	const_def
 	const ICON_NULL
 	const ICON_POLIWAG
 	...
 	const ICON_BIGMON
+	const ICON_CELEBI

2. Design its graphics

Create gfx/icons/celebi.png:

It needs to have two frames stacked vertically, each 16x16 pixels, and use four colors: black, white, light gray (#AAAAAA), and dark gray (#555555).

The example graphics are based on gfx/overworld/celebi, which are used for the Japanese- and Virtual Console–exclusive GS Ball event.

3. Include and point to the graphics

Edit data/icon_pointers.asm:

 IconPointers:
 ; entries correspond to ICON_* constants
 	dw NullIcon
 	dw PoliwagIcon
 	...
 	dw BigmonIcon
+	dw CelebiIcon

And edit gfx/icons.asm:

 Icons:
 NullIcon:
 PoliwagIcon:      INCBIN "gfx/icons/poliwag.2bpp"
 ...
 BigmonIcon:       INCBIN "gfx/icons/bigmon.2bpp"
+CelebiIcon:       INCBIN "gfx/icons/celebi.2bpp"

4. Use the icon for a Pokémon

Edit data/pokemon/menu_icons.asm:

 MonMenuIcons:
 	...
-	db ICON_HUMANSHAPE  ; CELEBI
+	db ICON_CELEBI      ; CELEBI

That's all!

5. How to add a unique icon for each Pokémon

It's common to want a unique icon for each Pokémon, like the ones from this set (here are its still frames):

But when you add all 251 icons at once, make gives an error:

ERROR: main.asm(315) -> engine/gfx/mon_icons.asm(471) -> gfx/icons.asm(42):
    Section 'bank23' is too big (max size = 0x4000 bytes).

That many icons won't fit in one ROM bank. We'll have to split them into multiple sections.

How many icons can fit in a bank? Well, a bank is $4000 = 16,384 bytes. An icon has two frames, each 16x16 pixels, encoded with two bits per pixel (hence "2bpp"), and eight bits are in a byte. So each icon uses 128 bytes, and 16,384 / 128 = 128 icons can fit in a bank. That means two banks will be enough for the 252 icons we need (251 Pokémon plus Egg).

Edit gfx/icons.asm:

-Icons:
-NullIcon:
-BulbasaurIcon:  INCBIN "gfx/icons/bulbasaur.2bpp"
-...
-CelebiIcon:     INCBIN "gfx/icons/celebi.2bpp"
+SECTION "Mon Icons 1", ROMX
+
+NullIcon:
+BulbasaurIcon:  INCBIN "gfx/icons/bulbasaur.2bpp"
+...
+TaurosIcon:     INCBIN "gfx/icons/tauros.2bpp"
+
+SECTION "Mon Icons 2", ROMX
+
+MagikarpIcon:   INCBIN "gfx/icons/magikarp.2bpp"
+...
+CelebiIcon:     INCBIN "gfx/icons/celebi.2bpp"

One section, "Mon Icons 1", contains icons #1 to #128. The next, "Mon Icons 2", contains #129 to #251 and Egg. When you run make they'll automatically be placed in banks that fit. Make sure the species are separated in order, so that we can tell which section a Pokémon's icon belongs in just by whether its species is greater than 128.

Now edit engine/gfx/mon_icons.asm:

 LoadOverworldMonIcon:
 	ld a, e
+	push af
+	ld [wCurIcon], a
- 	call ReadMonMenuIcon
 	ld l, a
 	ld h, 0
 	add hl, hl
 	ld de, IconPointers
 	add hl, de
 	ld a, [hli]
 	ld e, a
 	ld d, [hl]
-	ld b, BANK(Icons)
-	ld c, 8
+	pop af
+	call GetIconBank
 	ret

 ...

 GetIcon:
 ; Load icon graphics into VRAM starting from tile hl.

 	...

-	lb bc, BANK(Icons), 8
+	call GetIconBank
 	call GetGFXUnlessMobile

 	pop hl
 	ret
+
+GetIconBank:
+	ld a, [wCurIcon]
+	cp TAUROS ; last mon in Icons1
+	lb bc, BANK("Mon Icons 1"), 8
+	ret c
+	ld b, BANK("Mon Icons 2")
+	ret

Now all the icons will load correctly, in the party menu and in the overworld: