Welcome

Shoddy Battle (later known as Pokémon Lab) is a free and open source Pokémon simulator created by Cathy J. Fitzpatrick and Benjamin Gwin and first released in July 2007. It allows users to play Pokémon matches against other people online.

Shoddy Battle simulates the 4th generation of Pokémon games, which began with the release of Pokémon Diamond and Pearl in September 2006 in Japan and April 2007 in North America. During the 4th generation (roughly 2007–2010), Shoddy Battle was the main Pokémon simulator used by the competitive Pokémon community.

On this website, you can learn about Shoddy Battle and its contributions to competitive Pokémon. You can also read about the history of Shoddy Battle. The program itself is also still available to play.

Advances

Shoddy Battle ushered in a number of significant advances to the Pokémon community.
You can read the full details here. A summary appears below.

Later Pokémon simulators have followed the path set by Shoddy Battle and continue to expand on the above advances. You can read the full details here.

You can also learn about the history of Shoddy Battle here.

Status

With the conclusion of the 4th generation, Shoddy Battle has been superseded by other simulators such as Pokémon Showdown. Shoddy Battle remains notable for the changes it effected in the Pokémon community.

If you enjoyed using Shoddy Battle or have questions or comments, please feel free to email Cathy and bearzly at developers@pokemonlab.com and let them know. They appreciate hearing from you. After Pokémon, Cathy went on to litigate and win a landmark judgment for transgender equality rights. You can read about that at cathyjf.com.