Link play

Some Pokémon only evolve when traded, and each version has Pokémon the other doesn't. On a real Game Boy Advance that takes two consoles and a cable. LINK PLAY runs two to four GBA games side by side on your device and joins them as if by a link cable, so you can trade with yourself, battle your other save or mix records, all through the games' own Pokémon Centers.

#Start a link

1. In the library, open a GBA game's menu (long-press it) and pick LINK PLAY. Or tap TOOLS in the library, then LINK PLAY, and add your games there.

2. That game is GAME 1. Tap ADD A GAME to add the next one, up to four. Tap a game to swap it for another, or pick REMOVE.

3. Tap START LINK.

Every game starts from its own save, the one it plays normally, and PokeDaisy backs each save up first, as it does when you open a game. You can pick the same game twice: the second copy then plays on a save of its own, kept next to the first and named after it with (link 2). It starts empty, so start a new game in it, or put a save there with your file manager.

#Playing

The games run at the same time. One has the buttons and the sound, framed in orange; the others keep running behind a dim. Tap a game to play it, or press L2 / R2 (or click a stick) on a controller to move to the previous or next one. On a two-screen device the games are split between the screens.

The FF button in the bottom right corner fast-forwards every game at once, up to four times the normal speed, with the sound off while it's on. Tap it again to go back to normal.

Then play as you would with a cable: go up to the second floor of any Pokémon Center and talk to the cable club counter in each game. The first game is the one the others wait for, so when it asks you to confirm the link, do that in GAME 1.

#What works

• Trades, between any pair the games themselves allow: two copies of a game, the two versions of a pair, or a Kanto game with a Hoenn one. A Pokémon that evolves when traded evolves on arrival, as with a cable.

• Battles in the Colosseum, with two or four players.

• Record mixing in Ruby, Sapphire and Emerald, up to four games at once, including what the games share that way.

The games keep their own rules. FireRed and LeafGreen link with Ruby, Sapphire and Emerald only after the island part of their story, and Emerald trades with FireRed and LeafGreen only once you've entered its Hall of Fame. A game that says it can't link is telling you about one of these.

What doesn't work:

• The wireless rooms: the Union Room and the wireless minigames need the Wireless Adapter, which isn't emulated. The cable club does trades and battles.

• Game Boy and DS games: link play is for GBA games.

• Many ROM hacks removed their link features. A hack that kept them links with another copy of the same hack and version; don't link a hack with a different game, since the two may read each other's Pokémon differently.

Link play is only the games: no companion, EXPAND, HUD or save states while it runs.

#Leaving

Save in each game first, then press BACK and pick LEAVE. A game that's in the middle of saving finishes before it closes. Anything you did since a game's last save is lost, as when you turn a console off.

If you'd rather evolve a Pokémon without trading it at all, see Trade evolutions.