I don't really "expect" anything but creativity and imagination. I like unique. I can understand how you feel, but remember, everybody does things differently, and also, it's natural to feel a bit...shall we say, selfconscious...of your hack. Everyone does. Just do what you want, and don't worry about what the community is going to think. They'll (for the most part) give you constructive criticism on how to improve, but they'll never be against unique ideas. You can't compare hacks, it just doesn't work, they're all so different.
If you like several scripting events that force you to stay in a city, then go for it. If you like custom tiles, go for it. Make your hack however you want, it's yours, you have complete control over it.
Well, thank you, I'm glad to know there are certain ways to feel about it! For mine, I was changing the maps, somewhat, and giving myself a complete storyline, but after seeing a few demos, I do want to try and make my own tilesets, like just different colors of green for grass, and those see through water tiles make things look so much better. Also, I've thought about making my game a bit more "crowded", because the seems a bit nicer when you're just surrounded by all kinds of different things. My maps have been a bit too clean.
You probably know it, but DEFINITELY 100% QUALITY OVER QUANTITY. Any hack is fine in terms of storyline and tiles etc, but if it is rushed (has terrible scripts and mapping), then it's not going to cut it in my opinion.
Also, spelling/grammar errors make bubbles form in the corner of my mouth, they take all attention away from the hack itself and make me think: "Is this going to be fixed?" and kind of ruin gameplay for me. Simple things like: "it's" used when it should be "its" are fine, and understandable :P
Finally, commitment. Wesley's Light Platinum and Manipulation's Sienna must have taken a good couple of years to make. If people work on a hack for several months and cancel it for reasons like: "cant be bothered anymore" it disappoints me because most of the time they were so good!
Yeah, I try to make sure there aren't any spelling mistakes in my game, because it drives me crazy too, haha.
See, I made a demo for my game in about a month, after actually learning how to use everything, and I feel like I'm rushing, but I'm actually getting done what I planned, so it's not rushed, but what that is making me realize is that since I am getting it done so fast, there may not be enough in it to keep the player interested, because in my game, the REAL story doesn't start until after the Pokemon League, so I have to keep the player interested by using mini stories until then.
I'm afraid I'll give up on it, which is why I work on it every day, because this is something I've wanted to be able to do since I was a little kid (not hack, but make my own Pokemon game, same difference) so I'm excited to see it completed!