Man, What A Bunch of Filler!

So ROM Hacks. They are pretty, popular, and takes advantage of the engine, that it uses(at least most of time). Of course, there are times when the developer(s) will implement some filler, which is unnesscary padding, in order to lengthen the game's play time. So have you ever ran into points of the hack, that were filler? And how are your thoughts on the matter.

I can't remember any times I ran into filler off the top of my head, but as long as it has at least some impact or significance to the story, or helps me out later on, I won't mind it. Now, if it's just completely unnecessary, like Bleach/Naruto-level filler, it most likely will break my immersion in the game. I will give points back, however, if it's humorous. xD

I haven't run into this "filler" in hacks, but I haven't been playing them much lately anyway.

I always enjoy a good, even if pointless, side story. It'd be better if it eventually turns out that it's related to the main story, but especially in the beginning of a hack, small filler events could work nicely.

I feel like optional filler is essential to any game, as it increases the time the player can spend immersed in the world and marveling at its lore and environment. Sure, that is dev time that could be spent in the main story, but we're hackers, and we're not being rushed by external deadlines and such. Sidequests, revisiting towns to find hidden corners with HMs, etc. Even putting some continuity in by having certain NPCs in different towns know each other can help flesh everything out, even though many would consider it filler.

You're not just telling a story and handing the player powerful Pokemon to beat it up with, you're crafting a world that people live in. Filler is an essential part of that.

Now, I'm not saying that there should be mandatory filler everywhere, because that's awful, but (optional) filler should definitely be there for the player if they want to explore it. If the player is the type to check every nook and cranny? Boom. You've just lengthened their playing time and upped their enjoyment. If the player is the type to blaze through the story like a speedrunner? Boom. You've just given them postgame to do that's separate from any actual postgame you have planned.

Seriously, filler is awesome, and it makes me sad when I play through a hack and literally the ONLY thing you can do is follow the story and nothing else.

By all means hackers, when doing your hacks, focus on the story first. But don't forget to go back and flesh out some areas so players have a reason to go back to the towns and routes you no doubt spent hours creating. You owe your work, and your time, at least that. It's obviously difficult to plan ahead when creating areas and crafting your story. But it's not difficult to set a goalpost for yourself (like when releasing betas) for the main story, and then taking a day or two after that's done to take a step back and flesh out earlier areas now that the story and region is more solid.

Deokishisu nailed it, I love to explore the lore and side-quests just to sink into the environment. That is why in the game I am working on there is barely a vague main story but planned dozens of side-quests to help the player immerse themselves in the world, it is really just a different approach to story telling. In my opinion there doesn't always have to be an epic climax for it to be satisfying the journey along is the experience.

Dark violet was made of filler

Life of Guardians had that thing where you needed to obtain nearly every badge a second time (a third for the first badge), so you basically did your entire quest again minus some events because you can't use HMs. If that's not the definition of filler I don't know what is.