MissingNo or Missing Number is a glitch appearing in the Pokemon franchise. First appearing in Pokemon Red & Blue in 1996. The glitch has become infamous for both its use in duplicating items in the game but also for corrupting data in the game.
The glitch occurs because the game is trying to access data that isn’t there in the buffer that would tell the game what wild pokemon to encounter and the edge of Cinnabar Island has no data for that buffer.
Its data classifies it as a “Bird” type pokemon, an unused type in the game.
Notes
- Bugs aren’t inherently characters and not made by humans therefore are not bound by copyright. The name Missingno is in the code but it’s just short for Missing Number.
- The UK and Hong Kong give some protection for computer generated imagery for 50 years after its creation, which in the case of MissingNo would be 2047 but that only applies to the image shown here to the right not the concept of MissingNo itself. Outside of those places it should be fine.
- Pokemon is obviously copyrighted and trademarked so Missingno can only be used if its association with the franchise is filed off such as its cry being that of a Nidoran male.