pokemon blue safari zone guide

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R/B/Y Safari Zone Mechanics

A staple of the Pokémon series since the originals is the Safari Zone: a special place with Pokémon that aren't found anywhere else (and some that are) where instead of getting to use your own Pokémon to weaken and capture them, you must employ more old-fashioned methods while the Pokémon may run at any moment. While they haven't been in every game, they shake up the usual routine of catching Pokémon and have had various interesting mechanics through the generations - however, the very most interesting has to be the original.

How It Works

In every Safari Zone, the player is unable to use their own Pokémon at all. Instead, when you encounter a Pokémon you have four options: throwing one of the limited number of Safari Balls you have; an aggressive action used to make the Pokémon easier to catch; an enticing action used to make it less likely to run away; or running away from the battle yourself.

In Red, Blue and Yellow, the aggressive action is called Rock , and the enticing action is called Bait . The basic idea is this: throwing a rock will double your chances of catching the Pokémon, but it will also make the Pokémon angry for 1-5 turns. Conversely, throwing bait will halve your chances of catching the Pokémon, but cause the Pokémon to be eating for 1-5 turns. While angry, a Pokémon is twice as likely to run on any given turn as if it were in its neutral state, while it is four times less likely to run while it is eating than in a neutral state.

However, there are several more interesting details and subtleties to how Safari Zone battles happen.

Throwing a Ball

Capturing in the Safari Zone follows the regular R/B/Y capture algorithm , though since neither the Pokémon's HP nor its status can be affected and the only balls available are Safari Balls (identical to Ultra Balls), a lot of things are abstracted out in the Safari Zone. Unfortunately, thanks to the game's flawed RNG , Safari Balls underperform against full-health Pokémon, making all capture chances in the Safari Zone lower than intended. The capture chance maxes out when the Pokémon has a catch rate of 150 or more, for which the chance will be about 27-30% depending on rounding errors; all other Pokémon are harder than that.

The catch rate C starts out being, as in regular captures, the intrinsic catch rate of the Pokémon species. However, unlike regular captures, your actions in the Safari Zone can directly modify C, as hinted above.

Throwing Rocks/Bait

Rocks and bait have two distinct effects. First, every time a rock is thrown, the catch rate C is doubled (though it is capped at 255, so if doubling would make the catch rate more than that, it is made 255 instead), and every time bait is thrown, C is halved and rounded down. This happens even if the Pokémon is already angry or eating, and it happens completely blindly - if the Pokémon has a catch rate of 235, and you throw a rock to give it a catch rate of 255, then throwing bait will take that catch rate down to 127, rather than "canceling out" to give it the same catch rate as before.

Since the capture chance maxes out when the catch rate is 150 as explained above, there is no point throwing rocks at any Pokémon with an intrinsic catch rate of 150 or more, or more than one rock at a Pokémon with a catch rate of 75 or more, or more than two rocks at one with a catch rate of 38 or more. As it happens that covers all Pokémon that can be found in the Safari Zone except for Chansey (catch rate 30) and Dragonair (catch rate 27 in Yellow), who would need three rocks to go over 150.

Secondly, while a battle in the Safari Zone is going on, the game also keeps track of two counters, the "angry counter" and the "eating counter", which stand for the number of angry or eating turns the Pokémon has left. They both start out at zero; however, when a rock or bait is thrown, a random number between 1 and 5 inclusive will be generated and added to the appropriate counter (i.e. the angry counter if it's a rock, or the eating counter if it's bait), while the other counter will be reset to zero regardless of its previous value. This means only one of the counters can be nonzero at any given time. Since the random number is added to whatever value the counter already has, throwing further rocks at a Pokémon that is already angry will prolong its angry state, and likewise with throwing bait at an eating Pokémon. The eating and angry counters are both capped at 255.

The Pokémon's Turn

You always get the first turn in the Safari Zone, but on the Pokémon's turn, two things happen.

First, the game will check if either of the angry and eating counters is nonzero. If so, then a message saying "Wild [Pokémon] is angry!" or "Wild [Pokémon] is eating!" as appropriate is shown and the counter is decreased by one. If the angry counter is decreased to zero this way, the Pokémon's catch rate will also be reset to its initial catch rate , regardless of how it has been modified in the battle before this point; note that this last bit does not happen when a Pokémon stops eating, nor when the angry counter is reset to zero because you threw a bait.

After this, the game will perform a calculation to determine whether the Pokémon will run away on this turn. The run chance depends only on which state the Pokémon is in - angry, eating or neutral - but not on how many times you've thrown rocks/bait in any way: a Pokémon that you've thrown five rocks at followed by one bait will be exactly as happy to stick around as one that you threw a bait at on the first turn. Note that the Pokémon's actual current state does not necessarily correspond to the state indicated by the message that was just shown, since the message indicates only that the counter in question was nonzero before it was subtracted from. This also means that if you throw a rock or bait and the random number generated is 1, you will see an angry/eating message, but the Pokémon will in fact be back in its neutral state before even the run check is performed.

The run calculation itself goes as follows:

• Make a variable X equal to the low byte (i.e. the remainder if you divide by 256) of the Pokémon's Speed ( not the base Speed of the species, but the individual's actual Speed).
• If the outcome is greater than 255 (i.e. if the Pokémon's Speed was 128 or more), the Pokémon automatically runs. Skip the rest of the procedure.
• If the Pokémon is angry, double X again (if it becomes greater than 255, make it 255 instead).
• If the Pokémon is eating, divide X by four.
• Generate a random number R between 0 and 255 inclusive.
• If R is less than X, the Pokémon runs away.

All in all, this means that so long as (the low byte of) the Pokémon's Speed is less than 128 (which it always will be in the actual game - the highest Speed any Pokémon actually found in the Safari Zone can have is 75), the chance that it will run is 2*Speed/256 if it's in a neutral state, min(255, 4*Speed)/256 if it's angry, or int(Speed/2)/256 if it's eating.

Crucially, since this is the actual individual Speed and not the base Speed of the species, lower-leveled individuals are less likely to run . While Scyther at level 25 or 28 have around or above a 50% chance of running every turn in a neutral state, for instance, Yellow's level 15 Scyther are considerably easier to catch, with only a 32% chance of running in a neutral state at the most. Thus, perhaps the best piece of strategic advice for the Safari Zone is to go for the lowest-leveled possible version of your desired Pokémon, given the lower-leveled version isn't unacceptably rare.

So, well, how should one go about trying to achieve success in the Safari Zone, other than trying to catch lower-leveled Pokémon? Four basic kinds of strategies come to mind:

• Balls only. This is the simplest way to go about the Safari Zone - just madly lob balls at everything you want to catch and pray that they don't run before you catch them.
• Rocks, then balls. Throw some sensible number of rocks, then lob balls and hope you catch it before it either runs or calms down and resets the catch rate. If you see it's not angry anymore, start again from scratch with the rocks.
• Bait, then balls. Throw some bait to put the Pokémon in the eating state and make it stick around, then throw balls and hope the reduced catch rate doesn't come back to bite you. Unlike with rocks, where once the Pokémon stops being angry you're back at square one, it's not quite as obvious here that you should throw more bait once the Pokémon stops eating - each bait you throw lowers the catch rate more, after all.
• Rocks to increase catch rate, then bait to get it to stay, then balls. Throw a rock or two (or three) and then immediately throw bait. Provided your first rock doesn't generate one as the number of angry turns (in which case the Pokémon will calm down immediately and reset the catch rate), you'll manage to increase the Pokémon's catch rate before the bait gets thrown, meaning you end up with a catch rate of the same, double or quadruple the original (depending on the number of rocks), but a 4x reduced chance of running and assurance that the catch rate won't reset when it returns to the neutral state.

There are other possible strategies, but they appear obviously flawed - if you were to throw bait and then a rock, for instance, you'd end up with a normal catch rate but a higher running chance after wasting two turns, which can't possibly be helpful. These are the main ones that at a glance appear to hold some kind of promise.

You may think, as I did when I was initially working this out, that the fourth strategy has the most potential. However, as it turns out, the R/B/Y Safari Zone is broken: the balls-only strategy nearly always wins by a considerable margin, at least in terms of your overall chance of catching the Pokémon per encounter. Wasting your time on bait and rocks is only worth it in a couple of very exceptional cases.

Wait, What?

Good question. If you don't care about getting an intuitive grasp on why this is true, feel free to skip to the Safari Zone calculator.

Here's the thing. The entire Safari Zone experience basically simplifies to a game where you and the Pokémon alternate turns, with each of you having a given chance of "winning" on each of your turns (you win if you catch the Pokémon, while the Pokémon wins if it runs). When you throw bait or a rock, however, you do that instead of throwing a ball on that turn, while the Pokémon will continue to have a chance of running on every single one of its turns; essentially, you are forgoing one of your turns (attempts to "win") in exchange for a later advantage.

What is that later advantage, then, and is it worth losing that turn? Well, in the case of a rock, you double your chances of winning (catching the Pokémon) for up to four subsequent turns - but you also double the Pokémon's chances of winning (running away), and because you used up your turn throwing the rock, it's the Pokémon that has the next move.

You can hopefully see how that's not really a recipe for success. However, it's not quite as bleak as it appears, thanks to the one place where the simplification breaks down: you have a limited number of Safari Balls. A rock, by doubling both yours and the Pokémon's chances of winning each turn, will shorten the average duration of the battle. Thus, if you have sufficiently few balls and the Pokémon has a sufficiently low catch rate and Speed, to the point that in an average battle against it you'd run out of balls before either catching it or it running, throwing a rock and shortening the battle so your balls will last can actually be worth it, even at the aforementioned cost. For instance, if you only have one Safari Ball left, then you can either throw that one ball with a regular catch rate or throw some rocks first, which will make your single ball much more likely to be effective once you do throw it; you'll only get one attempt to catch it either way. The risks will still outweigh the benefits if the Pokémon is pretty speedy, since then it will be likely to run before you can actually throw the ball at all, but for a sufficiently slow target (for a single Safari Ball, the highest Speed where a rock will be worth it is 25 or so), rocks can be a good idea when you don't have a lot of Safari Balls left.

Throwing multiple rocks can also help, at least in theory, since more rocks will continue to double your chances of catching the Pokémon without raising the running chance further. Primarily, in many of those situations where a lack of Safari Balls means one rock is a good idea, two (or possibly three) rocks improve your chances even further, though the range of situations where this works is even narrower than for one rock. Technically multiple rocks can also help in general for Pokémon with very low Speeds and low catch rates - however, that's low Speeds as in single digits, and no Pokémon that fit the bill are actually found in the Safari Zone, making that point kind of moot. Otherwise, if you have plenty of balls to spare, the free angry turns they usually get to run away before you even start trying to catch them just result in a disadvantage you can't make up for.

What about bait? Bait is immediately somewhat more promising than rocks, since it halves your chance of "winning" but quarters the Pokémon's. However, bait also differs from rocks in that the catch rate doesn't go back to normal after the Pokémon stops eating, and just like rocks shorten the duration of the battle, bait prolongs the battle - it makes both parties less likely to win on subsequent turns. And the longer the battle goes on, the more the up-to-four turns (remember, the counter is decreased before the run check) that the Pokémon is actually less likely to run diminish in significance compared to all the turns after the Pokémon stops eating, when it will still have a lowered catch rate but a regular chance of running. That's besides the fact that again you must forgo a turn to throw the bait in the first place. In fact, as it turns out this makes bait wholly useless: there is not even in theory a Speed/catch rate combination for which bait will do you any good.

Where does this leave that especially promising-looking "rocks, then bait" strategy? Ultimately, it's stuck in the same rut rocks are: it's normally only useful for Pokémon with such ludicrously low Speed that they don't actually exist in the Safari Zone, and unfortunately, while rocks at least have a niche when you're running low on balls, you're always going to be better off just throwing however many rocks you're going to throw and then throwing your ball than throwing the rocks and then wasting your time on bait if you only have a couple of balls left. This strategy requires wasting several turns without throwing any balls, during some of which the Pokémon will have an increased chance of running, and to make matters worse, if the number of angry turns generated is one, you're going to lose even the rock's advantage and end up with the bait's lowered catch rate after all that preparation. It just kills it.

So, again, in nearly every case the best strategy is to just throw balls and hope you get lucky. That is, however, assuming that what you want to maximize is your chance of success per encounter: since rocks shorten the battle and make for fewer Safari Balls required, rocks may actually save you time and money.

The Safari Zone calculator below includes a variety of strategies, despite their mostly limited usefulness; play around with it if you think you might go with a different one.

Safari Zone Calculator

Use this tool to calculate your chances of capturing a given Pokémon.

As it is, it only includes Pokémon that are actually found in the Safari Zone in either Red, Blue, Yellow, or the Japanese-exclusive Blue version. If there is demand for adding other Pokémon just for the hell of it, I can do that too, but in the meantime, I feel this makes more sense.

In addition to your chances of capturing the Pokémon with any or all of the provided strategies, the calculator will also provide you with the basic capture rate and run chance per turn. When you select a Pokémon and game, additionally, it will give you the locations, levels and rarities at which the Pokémon is found in the Safari Zone in that game, so that you can perhaps attempt to find your Pokémon at a lower level or in an area where it's more common.

The base percentages the calculator gives may not match exactly up with those given by my R/B/Y catch rate calculator , since this calculator makes the simplifying assumption that the Pokémon's HP and Speed are equal to the average HP/Speed a wild Pokémon of the given species/level would have, while the catch rate calculator does the entire calculation for each possible HP IV and takes the average of the actual outcomes. I chose not to do the more accurate calculation here because this calculation is both already relatively slow and involves two different stats - trying every possibility would mean doing that whole relatively slow calculation up to 256 times, which just seems like way more trouble than it's worth.

Pokémon: Chansey Cubone Doduo Dragonair Dratini Exeggcute Goldeen Kangaskhan Krabby Lickitung Magikarp Marowak Nidoran (f) Nidoran (m) Nidorina Nidorino Paras Parasect Pinsir Poliwag Psyduck Rhyhorn Scyther Slowpoke Tangela Tauros Venomoth Venonat

Game: Red Blue/JP Green JP Blue Yellow

Safari Balls remaining:

Strategy: Show all Balls only One rock Two rocks Three rocks Bait repeatedly One bait Two bait Three bait Rock, then bait Two rocks, then bait Three rocks, then bait

Page last modified August 9 2021 at 02:53 UTC

[Map of Center Area] The item in the middle of the island is a Nugget. Don't bother going into the house (or any other houses for that matter), there are only a few people who will rant about their Safari Zone experiences. Head for A .

[Map of Area 1] There is a Carbos, Max Potion, Full Restore and TM37 - Egg Bomb to grab here. Head for B .

[Map of Area 2] TM40 - Skull Bash and a Protein available here. Don't go into the empty area, it's a waste of time. Head for E .

[Map of Area 3] Make sure you pick up the item immediately to the south! It's the Gold Teeth, a Key Item that you'll need to trade for HM04 - Strength. Head west from the item ball and, if you hopefully haven't run out of time, talk to the man inside the house to claim HM03 - Surf. Examine one of the statues for a Revive as well. There's also TM32 - Double Team on the way. Surf south of the prize house to get a Max Potion, then head east on the ledge and down again to pick up a Max Revive.

At this stage, you'll be running out of time quite soon, so just try to walk around in the grass and see if you can get lucky, or station yourself at a pond edge and fish up some Dratini.

With the Gold Teeth, visit the Safari Warden in the left of the two houses in the south-east corner of Fuchsia City. He'll pop the teeth into his mouth (ugh) and you'll be able to understand him. He'll give you HM04 - Strength, which you can use to move boulders like the one to the right of his house; the item ball there holds a Rare Candy.

Now that you have all five HMs, you have the option of getting a few items and exploring some new places.

Firstly, fly to Celadon City and Surf on the pond there (its by the Rocket Game Corner). Talk to the man and he'll give you TM41 - Softboiled, which only Chansey and Mew can learn - it recovers half their HP.

Get TM16 - Pay Day by Surfing on Route 12 - it's a bit further south of the gatehouse where you got TM39 - Swift.

An optional area can be accessed near the Route 9 entrance to Rock Tunnel. Head for the Route 9 Pokemon Center and head north. You'll reach a strip of water where you can Surf. Follow the canal down and you'll reach the Power Plant. A guide to the Power Plant can be found [here]

Your next destination is Cinnabar Island; you have two methods of getting there. The first is to head south from Fuchsia City and use Sea Routes 19 and 20 to get there, but you'll have to go through Seafoam Islands. The easier way is to fly to Pallet Town and Surf south - not only is the route shorter, there are also less trainers.

These five Route 21 Pokemon are found in the wild grass immediately to the south of Pallet Town.

When you arrive, you'll notice that the Gym is locked - you'll need to find the key in the Cinnabar Mansion. Do some exploring first - head to the Pokemon Lab to the left of the Pokemon Center. In the first room, you can trade a Raichu for your Electrode, or a Tangela for your Venonat. In the second room, the scientist in the corner will give you TM35 - Metronome. Finally, in the third room, there is a scientist who will trade you a Seel for your Ponyta.

You can also ressurect the fossils by talking to the other scientist in the third room - Old Amber becomes Aerodactyl, Helix Fossil becomes Omanyte and Dome Fossil becomes Kabuto. Simply have the Fossil in your bag, talk to the scientist, and walk around for a while.

You'll need to find the Secret Key hidden somewhere in the depths of the abandoned Cinnabar Mansion in order to unlock the gym. First of all, head up and inspect the fifth pillar on the right to get your fifth and last Moon Stone in the game. A bit further north is an Escape Rope. There are several switch doors here, to trigger them, inspect the Pokemon Statues. When you activate the switch, one door will open and another will close. There's a switch in the far left room, but don't activate it. Climb up the stairs when you're ready.

Head up the stairs to the right. There's a Burglar wandering around here, and a diary excerpt of how scientists created Mewtwo from Mew. Here is the complete diary: July 5 - Guyana, Southern America. A new Pokemon was discovered deep in the jungle. July 10 - We christened the newly discovered Pokemon, Mew. February 6 - Mew gave birth. We named the newborn Mewtwo. Sept 1 - Mewtwo is far too powerful. We have failed to curb its vicious tendencies...

South of the table is a Max Potion. Immediately above the itemball, at the end of the narrow passage is a Max Revive. There's nothing else in this room, so return to the floor below. On the second floor, there's a Calcium to the far right, in the top corner room. On the way, you'll see another diary excerpt. You can activate the switch by the stairs if you want (There's no point unless you want to read the diary excerpt to the south), but to continue on, use the stairs in the top left room.

On the third floor, head right for an Iron, then activate the switch to the left. You'll see the doors change, and you'll be able to go in to the balcony room. After beating the scientist, head down the right ledge, and you'll end up on the ground floor, in a section you couldn't access before. There's a Carbos here, pick it up and head down the stairs to the basement.

Get the Full Restore on the far left side of the room, then go inside the lone room in the center. Pick up TM14 - Blizzard, and activate the switch. Head out the other door, and head north from the stairs. Go all the way down the passageway and pick up the Rare Candy first. Backtrack to the adjacent room and flip the switch. Go back down and you'll see the door has opened. Pick up TM22 - Solarbeam on the table, and then pick up the Secret Key directly south of it.

Blaine, the Cinnabar Island Gym Leader, is very fond of quizzes and puzzles. To unlock the doors in his gym, and hence proceed, you can either defeat the trainer guarding it, or you can correctly answer his quiz by examining the machine in the corner. If you get the question wrong, the trainer will automatically battle you. You still have the option of battling the trainer if you get the question right, however. The questions and correct answers are: 1. Caterpie evolves into Butterfree? (Yes) 2. There are 9 certified Pokemon League Badges? (No, there are 8) 3. Poliwag evolves 3 times? (No, only twice) 4. Are thunder moves effective against ground-element type Pokemon? (No, Ground Pokemon are immune to Electric attacks) 5. Pokemon of the same kind and level are not identical? (Yes) 6. TM28 contains Tombstoner? (No, it contains Dig)

You'll receive the Volcano Badge as your reward, which increases the Special of your Pokemon. You'll also receive TM38 - Fire Blast, which contains the most powerful Fire move in the game.

Pokémon Red and Blue/Safari Zone

The Safari Zone is a large area located north of Fuchsia City. It contains many Pokémon that cannot be found anywhere else.

You must pay a fee of •500 every time you enter the Safari Zone. You are given 30 Safari Balls, and are released into the Zone. When you throw your last Safari Ball, you are automatically teleported back to the entrance. Additionally, there is a time limit. Once you enter the Zone, the game will start counting “steps” (movements from one tile to another, triggered by pressing the + Control Pad). When you take your five hundredth step, you are teleported to the entrance.

Catching Pokémon

You do not (and cannot) use regular Poké Balls to capture Pokémon in the Safari Zone. You use the Safari Balls instead. When you encounter a wild Pokémon, you must start throwing Safari Balls immediately, hoping for a lucky break. You are not permitted to battle the Pokémon in any way before you throw the Safari Balls. Naturally, the more desirable Pokémon are encountered less, and the better a Pokémon is, the more often it will escape from your Poké Balls.

You are also given Pokémon Food and a supply of rocks. When you encounter a wild Pokémon, you have the choice of throwing either. (You never run out of these items.) Throwing food will make the Pokémon more or less likely to stay inside a Safari Ball. Throwing rocks causes most wild Pokémon to flee.

• Book:Pokémon Red and Blue

Navigation menu

Safari Zone

A Safari Zone (Japanese: サファリゾーン Safari Zone ) is a special Pokémon preserve where Trainers can enter and participate in the Safari Game (Japanese: サファリゲーム Safari Game ) to catch rare wild Pokémon .

Safari Zones can be found in the following regions :

• The Safari Zone in Kanto , located north of Fuchsia City .
• The Safari Zone in Johto , located north of Route 48 beyond the Safari Zone Gate in Pokémon HeartGold and SoulSilver .
• The Safari Zone in Hoenn , located north of Route 121 .
• The Great Marsh in Sinnoh , located north of Pastoria City .
• 1.1 Differences between games
• 1.2 Similar examples
• 3 In other languages

In the games

The mechanics of the Safari Zones are similar to each other. Most have a $ 500 entry fee, a step limit, a series of distinct areas with different wild Pokémon in each, and 30 Safari Balls , with which players may catch the Pokémon they come upon. The most important of their specific mechanics, however, is that Trainers do not initiate Pokémon battles with the wild Pokémon, but instead must catch them without battling them. The wild Pokémon within Safari Zones are capable of fleeing at any given time.

Differences between games

• The Johto Safari Zone has no step limit.
• In Pokémon Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire , the Hoenn Safari Zone does not use typical Safari Zone mechanics, instead functioning like normal routes .
• Pokémon: Let's Go, Pikachu! and Let's Go, Eevee! effectively do not have a Safari Zone; the area that used to be the Safari Zone is replaced with GO Park , while the zoo area in front is referred to as the "Safari Zone" instead.

Similar examples

• Johto 's National Park is somewhat similar to a Safari Zone, being a nature preserve for Pokémon and having a thrice-weekly Bug-Catching Contest which shares several aspects with a Safari Game.
• Kalos 's Friend Safari area, located in Kiloude City , also bears some similarities with Safari Zones, differing in the available wild Pokémon (which are dependent on the Nintendo 3DS Friend Codes of other players) as well as allowing Poké Balls of any variety as opposed to solely Safari Balls.
• The Pal Park in all Generation IV games bears some superficial similarities to a Safari Zone, being a special area where only a specific type of Poké Ball can be used, featuring possible Pokémon species that otherwise cannot be found, and where the player cannot battle the Pokémon found there. Additionally, in Pokémon HeartGold and SoulSilver , the Pal Park is placed in Fuchsia City where it replaces the Safari Zone.
• In Hisui , the Safari Zone was not yet established, but the main gameplay of Pokémon Legends: Arceus is similar to the Safari Zone.

Unova , Alola , Galar , Paldea , and Kitakami have neither a Safari Zone nor anything similar to or resembling a Safari Zone.

• In the Generation II games, there is some data for a beta Safari Zone in Fuchsia City , but it was ultimately unused.

In other languages

• Articles needing more information
• Safari Zones
• Pokémon world
• Locations by type
• Game mechanics
• Methods of obtaining Pokémon

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How to Catch Pokémon in Safari Zone

Last Updated: May 21, 2023 References

This article was reviewed by Ishrak . Ishrak is a Gaming & Video Expert specializing in sharing Pokémon and Minecraft videos. With over eight years of gaming and streaming experience, Ishrak has a follower base of over 35,000 YouTube subscribers and over 8 million views. He is also a Pokémon ROM-Hacker and some of his most popular videos highlight tips and advice for people learning how to play Pokémon games. This article has been viewed 115,225 times.

In the Pokémon series of games, Safari Zones are special unique areas in each game where rare Pokémon that don't appear anywhere else in the game can be caught. Safari Zones always operate with different rules than the rest of the game world - instead of battling Pokémon in the wild like you normally would, you'll need to carefully use baits and deterrents to get Pokémon to let down their guards so you can catch them. This can be quite challenging, so knowing the ins and outs of Safari Zone mechanics in each game is vital for success.

Navigating the Safari Zone

Fighting and capturing pokémon.

• Note that the "run away" option functions as normal, so we won't be discussing it.

• However, using bait will also make the Pokémon more difficult to catch in a safari ball. Thus, striking a balance here can be difficult — the longer you get the Pokémon to stick around for, the harder it will be to actually capture it.

• However, there's an important downside: using rocks will also make the Pokémon more likely to run away. In fact, after taking more than a few rocks, a Pokémon is virtually guaranteed to run away — some will exit the battle sooner. Thus, once again, using rocks means striking a delicate balance as you try to capture your Pokémon.

• Note that you only have a limited supply of safari balls (depending on the game, usually 30), so save them for Pokémon you want to catch. It's generally the best use of your time to use your safari balls for Pokémon that are only found in the safari zone.

• Note that safari balls are weak compared to the pokéballs you can use in the rest of the game. In addition to this, especially rare Safari Zone Pokémon are extra-difficult to catch. [2] X Research source This can lead to some very frustrating situations — for instance, it can easily take 20 or more tries to catch an exceptionally rare Pokémon like Clefairy.

General Tips

• Bulbapedia, an online user-supported Pokémon encyclopedia, has extensive information about each game's Safari Zone, including maps and guides covering where to look for the Pokémon in each zone. See the Bulbapedia Safari Zone article to get started. [3] X Research source
• Note that there is no step limit in the Safari Zone in Pokémon HeartGold and SoulSilver. [4] X Research source

• Across all of the games in the series, the entrance fee has stayed the same: 500 P . This includes the Great Marsh in Pokémon Diamond/Pearl/Platinum, which is not technically a Safari Zone but behaves very similarly.
• One smart strategy is to save your game before you enter the Safari Zone. This way, if you don't catch any Pokémon you want, you can re-load to avoid paying the entrance fee again.

• As an example of the sort of equation used in the games to determine whether certain Pokémon are captured, consider the equation from the Generation games (Gold and Silver): a = max((3 × HP max - 2 × HP current ) × rate modified / (3 × HP max ), 1) + bonus status where HP max is the Pokémon's maximum HP, HP current is the Pokémon's current HP, rate modified is the catch rate of the Pokémon modified by the ball used (every Pokémon and every ball modifies this in a certain way, and bonus status is the modifier for any status condition (sleep and freeze are 10, all others are 0). [5] X Research source When you throw a ball, a random number between 0 and 255 is generated. If this number is less than or equal to a, the Pokémon is caught.

Catching Pokémon in the Kanto Safari Zone

In the following sections, we'll highlight the rare Pokémon in each Safari zone and give specific advice where applicable. To keep these tables to a reasonable size, we've included only the rarest Pokémon in each area — for exhaustive information, consult the Safari Zone guides at Serebii.net and Bulbapedia.

Catching Pokémon in the Hoenn Safari Zone

Note that the Generation 4 Hoenn Safari Zone (Omega Ruby/Alpha Sapphire) won't be covered here as the player is allowed to engage in ordinary battles in this zone.

Catching Pokémon in the Sinnoh Great Marsh

Though Sinnoh's Pokémon preserve has a different name, it functions virtually identically to Safari Zones in other regions.

Catching Pokémon in the Johto Safari Zone

Note that the Safari Zone is not available in Generation 2 (Gold/Silver) but is available in the Generation IV games that visit Johto (HeartGold/SoulSilver). Note also that in this Safari Zone the player can arrange the six different areas in any arrangement desired. Finally, many of the areas in the Johto Safari Zones have Pokémon appearance rates that are not yet known — only data for the known areas has been included. See Bulbapedia for more information. [6] X Research source

Expert Q&A

• Once again, the data in the tables above only deals with the most noteworthy Pokémon in each area. In fact, many more Pokémon appear in each Safari Zone. Thanks Helpful 3 Not Helpful 3
• Remember — you have a limited number of steps inside the Safari Zone, not a limited amount of time. Thus, you can take as long as you like if you control your movement carefully. Thanks Helpful 1 Not Helpful 4

You Might Also Like

• ↑ http://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Kanto_Safari_Zone
• ↑ https://strategywiki.org/wiki/Pok%C3%A9mon_Red_and_Blue/Safari_Zone
• ↑ https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Safari_Zone
• ↑ https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Johto_Safari_Zone#Areas
• ↑ https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Catch_rate#Capture_method_.28Generation_II.29

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What is the best strategy in capturing a pokemon in "Safari Zone"?

Pokemon firered version, game boy advance, pokemon firered version (game boy advance).

• I just need a guide ^_^ jigz16 - 15 years ago - report
• Probably if you're using an emulator you should use save state, as the pokemon might flee and you can't encounter it again(probably.) amd if you're using the GBA itself, save before you enter the safari zone, who knows maybe you'd get a dratini or a chansey or a kangaskhan, i don't know.. Hope this helps SnorlaxGamer - 10 years ago - report 9   3
• I think the best strategy is something like this: -If you run in a common pokemon (something like nidoran or rhydon): Immediately throw a safari ball -When you see a pretty rare poke (like nidorino or paras): Throw a rock once and when the pokemon doesn't flee, throw a safari ball -When you see a SUPER rare pokemon (such as tauros): Hit it with 2 to 3 rocks and pray that it doesn't flee. When you have that luck, throw as much safari balls as you can until you run out of balls or the pokemon flees. This tactic helped me out a lot. Good luck with it! ;) the_luckyman - 10 years ago - report 9   3
• It pretty much comes down to luck. Using the Rock item pisses the Pokemon off and increases its chance of running away, but raises its capture rate. Bait does the opposite; it makes them less likely to run but harder to capture. I'm sure each individual Pokemon has its own capture rate and run away chance as well. I've always vehemently hated the Safari Zone and all of its counterparts throughout the Pokemon games. :( SmokeRulz (Expert) - 15 years ago - report 8   3
• I say just keep throwing the safari balls untill u cathc it or untill it runs away good luck hollar_boi93 - 14 years ago - report 2   2
• If you need more help than you should look up strawhat's Walkthrough FAQ in the bottom of the Hints and Cheats Section. It'll tell you what to do in detail and you only have to press ctrl + F and type in what you're looking for and it'll take you there. Hope this helps. MexicanWalrus - 14 years ago - report 0   2

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