BettyNewbie

I'll PM you a link to the version for testing.


You hit the nail on the head, there. I see those people on Reddit too. "Looking for a hack that doesn't bother with any story crap and just lets me do the postgame" and I literally want to find them and set their computers and 3DSs on fire, then put on sunglasses and walk away while it explodes behind me and I give a cheesy one-liner. I don't understand why those people bother playing the games at all. Clearly all they want is a battle simulator run by Smogon, and those already exist. Why can't they just get the hell out of the fandom and let us enjoy the games for what they are?


I know that Johto technically doesn't have its own Elite Four, but I have literally always called it the Johto Elite Four for as long as its existed, so it is extremely hard for me to call it anything else at this point, because that's still what I think of it as. So while you're technicallly right, and I accept that, it doesn't change what I've called it and thought of it as for the past 16 years :p Sorry about that.


I think I will improve the one in Christmas for the full version. The battles will still work the same way, but there will be a bit more variety in the opponents you can face, so it isn't just the same few random people and that's it. Well, I might actually make that a separate facility. It would probably be easier to keep the standard Battle Tower once it moves to Crystal, but keep a facility that works the same way in Johto as well, for the same purpose.


That's what I'm saying. A lot of people act like the hand-holding in later gens is something new. I just remind them "FireRed had a sign in your bedroom telling you how stairs and doors work, wouldn't let you leave Pallet Town until you'd read how to open the Start menu, and Prof Oak held your hand and showed you how to battle. Then the Old Man forced you to watch him show you how to catch a Pokemon. Don't act like this is something new."

Ok :) I'm not at my computer right now, hanging out with my brother while he's in town, but I'll send you a copy (and a real reply) when I'm back home.

Calling people a "Genwunner" is such a cop out. It's everyone's goto response nowadays. Then again, you also have a few people who proudly declare themselves to be those, too. I don't think it applies to Cerberus though. Like you say, he's an older fan like we are, but he's never struck me as a Genwunner from what I've seen of him. What it comes down to is, nobody wants to hear someone else's opinion. They want to hear their own opinion in a different voice. :rolleyes2:

As for the Red++ comment, thanks :) It still blows my mind how far it's come already!


Psh, technicality. You know what I mean :p

But yeah, I guess it could work like the battle in Christmas. I was planning to have some battle facilities that work like the normal ones, and some that work like normal battles. I figure it would be something like....

"Typical" battle facilities:
- Battle Tower
- Battle Factory

"Normal Battle" facilities:
- PWT
- Battle Tent

That way it's pretty evenly spread between the two categories. Not sure the best place for PWT yet. Olivine is where the Battle Tower (or probably a "mini-battle-frontier" with the Battle Tower and Battle Factory and some prize exchanges) will be, so it probably shouldn't be in Olivine. My original thought was to have it be in Goldenrod, although there isn't a very good spot for it. Perhaps access it from the same area that HGSS let you access the "Pokéathlon Dome", to indicate that it is some sort of multi-use complex that hosts different events at different times. How does that sound?


Well, yeah :p It's the same thing Gamefreak does, though. I figure tossing in little non-intrusive mentions to my own regions and characters adds continuity. I also do it with Gamefreak's regions as well. For example, I "clarified" Oak's at-the-time-confusing comment about "This is the custom Pokéball I ordered" when you deliver the Parcel to have him say "These are the custom Pokéballs I ordered from Kurt in Johto." In Gen 1, there was no such thing as a custom Pokéball of course, but now that there are, it just mentions where he got them from. Just little things here and there.



By the way, I've been sending a copy of Red++ out to testers tonight. Would you be interested in helping test v2.4? I can PM you a copy.

Now that I think about it, I might actually be able to make it to where Natures are optional. In that case, Natures would technically always be included in the code, but if you chose to not use Natures, then it would just not display them in the stats screen, and only use a blank Nature that has no effect on stats. That way I don't have to have 4 separate patches, and everyone wins. I could do the same thing with Abilities, too. If people chose not to use them, it just wouldn't display an Ability, and they would always use a blank Ability that has no effects. Those options would just be chosen when you start a new game, the same way I let you choose whether traded Pokemon will be special or act like normal Pokemon. How does that sound?


Haha, I saw that thread the other day. Didn't take the time to read the whole thing, but he's right. And the people in the thread are sooo butthurt lol. Oh well. Even if they decide to ruin the franchise, we can still just keep playing the ones that were good like we've already been doing.


I was already sort of leaning toward making it so the Johto E4 were included in some way or another, so he can mention it then. I was thinking of including something similar to the PWT (since the trainer format in Red++ is much more flexible than Gen 1 or even Gen 2 in some ways), and so they could be included in the list of trainers you can battle. Will could therefore be included as an NPC in the general area, who mentions that Lorelei gave him a Jynx?


Could probably make it so you need the Silver Wing for him to appear, like in GSC, BUT you get the Silver Wing from the NPC who gives the Mystic Ticket now, so that you still have to have found the other legendary birds in order to find Lugia.


Similar to the Jack issue, I should probably change this one woman's text in Vermillion City to avoid confusing people. She mentions the Latio region, which is the region from that GBA hack that Pyro and I are making on the side. Since there isn't even a thread for people to know about it, there is no reason for people to know wtf the Latio region is xD

WARNING: Might accidentally get too technical in this response. Sorry in advance!

I am planning to switch to IVs and EVs, although I haven't given any thought to the cap yet. The reasons for this are:
- IVs are better than DVs, since every stat has its own value, independent of others. DVs make Spc Atk and Spc Def share a value, and HP is calculated based on the other values. Not a good system.
- EVs take up less space in the Pokemon Data Structure, freeing up more memory for useful things. Plus, EVs are a system that people are more familiar with.

The space concern is a major one, since I'm going to need to be redoing the data structure anyway. The plan is to use 2 bytes for the Pokemon ID instead of 1, so that we can have more than 255 Pokemon slots. I'm not planning to like make it so you can catch alll 721 in Kanto or something like that. However, given the fact that I still see this as a rombase, I do want to see if I can include the data for all 721. That way future hacks based on this can include any Pokémon relevant to the region(s), and they can all still trade and battle with each other without having problems. And even if I didn't have all 721, I'd still need all the Kanto and Johto Pokemon plus their later-gen evolutions and baby forms if I'm going to properly include Johto, and that would require more than 255 Pokemon IDs. So this change to the data structure is a must regardless of how many actually end up being included.

Other things the data structure will need to include are things like Spc Def and its values, Held Item and Happiness values. I think what I'm going to do is look into using the data structure that GSC use as a starting point (since it already includes Held Items, Happiness, and Spc Atk/Def split into two stats, and is actually more compact that the vanilla Gen 1 data structure if I remember, due to a lack of some redundant entries). Then I can compress it slightly by switching to IVs and EVs, which will free up room for expanding Pokemon IDs, and using a couple of extra bytes for a Personality ID (so that Shininess and Gender and Unown Form and how Wurmple evolves and whatnot aren't tied to stats anymore. It was never fair that female Pokemon had to be inherently weaker than Males in terms of Attack in Gen 2).


I'm honestly not too surprised that a lot of people are jumping on the hype train over this. A lot of the nonsense they are adding are things that Fan Games have already done. Alternate forms of real Pokemon, OP Fakemon you can't catch, replacing Gyms, changing or replacing the original storyline, an evil team that looks like an Emo middleschooler named them, Ash Greninja, etc. And people already flocked to those Fan Games for no apparent reason. Some of the most popular hacks of the past few years have been utter trash. I often hear Dark Rising and Snakewood heralded as "the greatest hacks of all time", despite the fact that anyone over the age of 18 usually looks at them and says "wow, wtf is this shit?" -_-

I can see where GameFreak is getting it from. I just don't understand why people like this stuff, no matter who is doing it.


Maybe we should come up with an in-universe reference to that timeline (aka the original universe of RGBY instead of the Mateo universe where all this stuff is going on) and have like someone mention that they got a Jynx from Lorelei or something. To acknowledge that she used to have one, but she doesn't now, because she has better Pokemon. Not sure if that would be cool or just silly.


That's true. Navel Rock was originally included in FrLg and Red++ due to a lack of Johto. Once Johto is in, Ho-oh can just be at the Tin Tower and Lugia can be in the Whirl Islands. In the case of Lugia, you would probably need to use Dive and find him underwater between the islands in a cave, instead of at the bottom of a cave that needs waterfall. Just to change it up a bit. Could come up with another event for Ho-oh too, maybe. Roaming in Kanto would be a cool way to reference the anime, you're right.


Yeah, they've never been very good at that. They tried it with GSC, but even it had some strange discrepancies. This reminds me, I should probably clarify some of the references to Spirits and Legends that show up in Christmas. People in LPs tend to be confused by Jack's house and meeting Jack in his secret base, which is understandable, since they are never explained and the game he was in isn't out yet. Should be able to clarify with some dialogue additions. Instead of Jack's Mom simply saying "Hi, [PLAYER], Jack isn't here right now. I'll tell him you stopped by.", maybe she could say something like, "My son is off traveling. He left on a Pokémon journey during the autumn a few years ago. Maybe you've met him before? His name is Jack." That way instead of assuming the player knows who he is, it sort of implies he's the player from another game but doesn't assume you've played it. I haven't worked out a way to include a cameo from Jael yet, but I'm planning to (she's the female PC from Spirits and Legends, although at the time the last version of Christmas was released, there was only a male PC because I didn't think I'd be able to add Gender Selection yet, so Jael was going to be a second rival). I need to get a good sprite made for Jack, I haven't really been happy with the ones I've tried or had people send so far. In Christmas 2014 he just used the standard Ace Trainer sprite, but since the disassembly would make it easier, I figure I'll give him and Jael their proper sprites in the full version.


So far there are a few new areas. Some are from Crystal and/or HGSS like the Battle Tower, Dragon Shrine (Gold only had the exterior, you couldn't go inside), the new routes leading to the Johto Safari Zone, etc. Others are new, like the shrine in Ecruteak. If I have time, I'll probably include some that are planned for Spirits and Legends, just with different events. For example, the haunted cemetery near Ecruteak will only have storyline events in Spirits and Legends, but it could show up in Christmas as another area to catch Ghost types and have an item near the end of it to reward exploration. Also figure I'll do what Polished Crystal and Liquid Crystal did, and expand/add ocean areas to allow surfing between places that really should be connected. Surfing West from Goldenrod to get to Whirl Islands and Cianwood, for example. Or more ocean areas around Cinnabar so you can see the mentioned-but-not-shown volcano that erupted between Gen 1 and Gen 2, etc. Might also add Faraway Island, since Red++ and Polished Crystal have it, and there needs to be a way to get Mew without cheating. Alternately I could put him under the truck in Vermillion, as a reference to Pokemon Forever/Secrets and Rumours.

Hey, just wanted to let you know I've seen this, but I'll reply in the morning when I'm more awake :)

Isn't there one nature that doesn't actually do anything positive or negative, and is just sort of there? I'm probably imagining that because I don't pay much attention to natures. But yeah, I guess you're right.


Pretty much! We want to thank you guys for sticking around for 20 years by... telling you to go fuck yourselves! #GamefreakLogic That's an exaggeration of course, but yeah, it doesn't make a lot of sense to celebrate the anniversary by doing a hard reboot that alienates older fans, and fans of the actual, established gameplay formula. Nothing about Sun & Moon make sense.


It never really struck me as odd for her to have a Jynx, but that was because it was one of the few Ice Types around in Gen 1, and it was also part Psychic, for flavor. That said, I've never especially liked Jynx anyway, so I have no problems with getting rid of her Jynx. When you stop to analyze it, her team really does make more sense without Jynx, so I agree with you there :)


When it comes to Navel Rock/Navel Island, I do agree it's something I'll need to be careful about. Same goes for the fact that South Isle and Southern Island exist in this universe, since South Isle (based on Shamouti) is in Christmas, and Southern Island (from RSE) is in Red++. I guess the way around that is to have them on separate Town Maps, which would avoid some of the confusion. That would probably involve putting Navel Rock on the Kanto map, and just not having it be an area the Town Map will scroll to on its own to avoid spoilers. Then Navel Island can be part of the Orange Islands. OR, "Navel Island" could be mentioned as the name of the island itself, but the Town and Routes on the island would have different names. Kind of like the Sevii Islands already did. It will take some planning to do it properly, but I think it can work.


Yep, I was thinking that it might be a good thing to introduce in the post-game of Red++, then have Christmas mention it as well. Since Christmas will almost certainly be done before Red++ has Johto and stuff, that would basically translate into Christmas teasing events that would be elaborated on in Red++'s postgame, which would be cool.


Could work. Maybe by a combination of new areas, events that prevent you from battling the gyms right away, changed order you receive HMs (to allow for Ocean exploration) and various other things, it could come out feeling like a natural progression that is still not the same order from vanilla Gen 2.

I know in the future, Polished Crystal is planning to change the way Natures and such work. IVs will separate (yes, IVs, not DVs) and they will have a 2byte personality value that determines gender, shininess, and natures and whatnot. That's the way I was planning to go with in Red++ eventually, too. That way you can have a Pokemon that is shiny and any gender, any form, etc, but it could still have perfect stats. I feel like that would at least make Natures less problematic in Polished Crystal, since it would be more like the way Gen 3 does it. But I can also understand wanting to avoid them. As I've said before, I don't even think about Natures, so it wasn't a big deal to me that they were added and I generally don't pay them any attention when playing (but I don't play competitively either). I've thought about adding them simply because they are a newer gen feature, and would therefore be part of the goal of "updating the game" as much as possible. But they aren't like something I want, either. When I play Polished Crystal, I just ignore natures like I do in Gen 3+.


Yeah, the player characters actually do look younger. Combine that with all of the hand-holding people are complaining about the games seeming to do, it really does seem like they are trying to attract younger players again instead of only catering to older fans.


If I was going to give her one, it would be Froslass, certainly not Glalie, but I wasn't really planning to do that either. So no worries there! I'd say those teams you suggested look good. I'll try not to lose those suggestions when the time comes to set them up :)


The Sevii Islands exist they just don't really show up. Technically, some of the areas in Red++ are part of the Sevii Islands, since Navel Rock is there. What I was sort of leaning toward doing was to include the Orange Islands, which consisted partially of anime Islands like Shamouti, and partially of Sevii Islands like Navel Rock. And have an NPC mention that the Orange Islands and Sevii Islands were all part of the same archipelago, and that there is a lot of dispute over which islands belong to which region, especially with the uninhabited ones. That way it sticks with the implication that the canon regions all exist, and still manages to ignore the areas nobody cares about while still including useful ones. Also, before Red++ was a thing, older version of Christmas considered Secrets and Rumours/Pokemon Forever to be their canon for Gen 1. As such, there were NPCs in Kanto who mentioned things like "I hear a kid caught a really rare Pokemon on the docks a few years ago" or Leaf appearing outside the gate to Brick Town, which was inaccessible.


As for the Lance/Lorelei suggestion, that sounds reasonable. It still doesn't cover what Lorelei did between Gen 1 and Gen 2, but it would explain why Will was there in the first place, and that's the important part for the canon to be consistent. What she was doing in the past 3 years could be revealed at various times through other events and NPCs once we decide on it.


In the past, trying to change the order you visit towns in a game where you still start in the original town just confused people. Admittedly, I wasn't very good at scripting yet, so I probably didn't do enough to slap them in the face and make them stop using the speedup button and notice things, but still. I also feel like it's difficult to change the way you go through Johto with the way it's laid out, unless you start somewhere else. Red++ is going to have you start in Olivine when you get to Johto, so that will make it obvious to people that you're going a different way around. But I feel like it would be trickier to come up with a new order if you're starting from New Bark.

Maybe if it went like...

New Bark Town
Blackthorn City
Mahogany Town
Ecruteak City
Olivine City
Cianwood City
Goldenrod City (via the Ocean)
Azalea Town
Violet City
Cherrygrove City
---> To Elite Four

That doesn't keep Blackthorn as the last gym, though. And Dragon as the first gym would be insane, not to mention the gym's puzzle would need replacing. I guess it could be possible in other ways, since the Open Ocean idea would connect more areas via water, and some new caves or forests could connect towns that originally weren't. What sort of a route did you have in mind when you suggested it?

I don't mind May wearing a bikini to swim, it wasn't even an especially revealing bikini anyway, but Dawn's skirt is obnoxious even if she was an adult.


Yeah, once I get the hang of how things are organized in Pokecrystal, it should be a lot easier to work with for sure. My main problem so far has been that it isn't organized the way Pokered is, and in some cases doesn't feel very intuitive in the way it's organized either. Once I find something, it's dead simple to edit it, but I often have to look through a handful of folders to find the file I'm looking for. But then again, I was that way with Pokered at first, and I got the hang of it pretty quickly, so I'm sure Pokecrystal will be the same once I actually start importing my changes and redoing things as necessary.

On the natures thing, I still don't fully understand why you would refuse to play a hack just because it has natures in it, but I know you have your reasons.


Oh, they could've made Phoebe's outfit skimpier. I've seen some pretty scandalous bikinis irl that they could've gone with for inspiration, but thankfully didn't.

And the Gen 5+ protagonists have always felt like they were at least 17+ IMO. The ones in earlier games were often referred to as children in-game, but it still seems rather unrealistic for an 11 year old kid to move out of the house and live on their own without anything being weird about it. I know people chalk it up to the Pokemon universe being different, but it's always been a strange concept, and even the official designs tend to depict the player characters, especially the females, as looking more mature than a 10 year old would.


Since Obamasnow is found near Mahogany Town in Christmas, that would be a perfect addition to Pryce's team. I want to say he still has a Glaceon at the moment, but that would suit Lorelei better anyway. I think right now Pryce has a Glaceon, a Glalie, and a Mamoswine, but Glalie isn't really suited to him. It's been a bit since I worked on or played Christmas so I might be conflating his team with other trainers in his gym. Either way, Pryce and Lorelei clearly have very different backstories and personalities, and their teams will be made to reflect that in the future releases.


It really is easy to miss. Most Rock types, especially in the early games, were Rock/Ground, and Brock's gym even used stuff like Diglett and Sandshrew for the Campers in his gym despite them not even being part Rock type.


He was around in GSC, sure, but it doesn't say he was around the whole time. We know he was there for the Rocket event, and he was there for the Elite Four. He could've been in Johto while Lorelei was still in the Sevii Islands (since they acted like she would be there a while, although the timeline would still be sketchy), then they both left for Unova after Team Rocket was cleared out of Johto, having recently returned for Christmas. Hmm, maybe not. The more I think about it the more the timeline falls apart with that theory. The Unova part is fine, but the problem is in the Lorelei part, since she doesn't need to spend 3 years fighting Rockets, and FrLg make that event happen the same year as the Kanto story.


Yeah, I think triggering it either after a certain number of badges, or after a Rocket event (that would be triggered by a number of badges) is a better way to do it. The way it was before, it was super easy to miss. If you didn't randomly wander into the Cafe in Fuchsia City and talk to Flannery, you would miss it. Guess I just assumed the natural reaction to seeing Flannery in a cafe is to go and talk to her. Haha.

Sorry for the delayed reply, I was distracted by a combination of working on Red++ and taking care of stuff around the house earlier.

Yeah, with people like that in charge, it doesn't seem too promising. It would probably take a new showrunner and replacing a few of the other writers to have any real progress in that area. Like you say, the ones in charge made it pretty clear how they feel about female characters. -_-


Well, even by the 2014 version it was pretty easy to write new scripts, since I was able to use PKSV instead of a hex editor to change scripts. But the rom had gotten pretty disorganized at that point due to repointing and re-repointing stuff time and again due to the fact that I kept rebooting it on the same rom, which was a bad call. And even doing it the old-fashioned way, I still ended up making Christmas the first GBC hack to have offline Wonder Trade (but of course, the disassemblies made it possible for Red++ and Polished Crystal to end up with much nicer implementations of WT than Christmas had). Having everything readable, organized, and easy to edit will make things a lot better in terms of fleshing out the original half of the game, restoring Kanto, and just generally getting things done that I want to. It will be a lot easier to add new areas and location names, for example. That way I can do some of the added areas a bit more justice, and fully restore Kanto's missing areas as well. Should be a lot nicer all around :)


Yeah, very good points. While honestly none of the player characters act or look believably 10, it's still pretty sketch to obviously attempt to sexualize a character while swearing up and down that she's a kid. And as for Flannery, I'm sure they would've taken advantage of Lavaridge Town's hotsprings for lots of fanservicey scenes with her.


And I don't even want to think what they'd've done with Phoebe, given her official design as a starting point.



Especially since Pryce was all about Piloswine anyway, it seems like a stretch to say that he was the reason Lorelei was removed. Sure they both use Ice types, but their rosters are still really different, and their main Pokemon have different secondary typings as well. Morty I can see, since there really aren't that many Ghost types in the first few generations, and it was already feeling redundant by the time you were halfway through his gym. But I'm definitely with you on the Chuck/Bruno thing. If redundancy was really the issue, those two shouldn't exist in the same game, but here we are.

I hadn't really thought about the fact that Gen 2 was missing a Ground-Type boss. You're right, though. I guess since Ground types get thrown around a lot in generic battles, what with Hikers and whatnot, and since Brock has always been associated with Rock/Ground dual-types, it still shows up a lot even without a dedicated boss I guess. A ground-type Elite Four member could be interesting to keep in mind for the future.


Yeah, I was planning to add E4 and Gym Leader rematches in both Red++ and Christmas in the future, so those are things to keep in mind. I was thinking that in Red++, the new teams would kick in for the E4 after you collect the Johto badges, and in Christmas the same would happen after the Kanto badges.

As for where Lorelei was, the 2014 version already says that Lance is in Unova if I remember (I know one version did, think I kept that in the 2014 version) so that could put them over there together, and the reason could be anything at that point.


Yeah, I think the Lugia plot makes the most sense for her. Especially considering that she was in the Orange Islands in the anime and the Sevii Islands in FrLg, her involvement in events on what is basically Shamouti Island wouldn't be too out of place, even if she wasn't in that movie. She probably makes more sense to be there than Flannery does, and she still shows up there during the Festival. As of the 2012 version, meeting Flannery in Kanto was the way you triggered the Festival -- it started when she claimed she was leaving because "Mateo is taking me to the Legend Festival on South Isle" or something along those lines. I figure I'll come up with a better trigger event in the new version, but she should still be there anyway. I'd leave the Rocket event part for Lorelei and Lance though.

I was running late for work, and didn't get a chance on my lunch break. But I'll reply now! I promise I'm not ignoring you!


Maybe one day we'll get a Pokémon anime that actually follows the games properly, doesn't ignore the female characters, and has good animation. Maybe. But yeah, clearly Generations isn't going to be it :/


Definitely true! I've been trying to look at Spirits and Legends as a story already, trying to come up with an outline of basic plotpoints that I want to happen and trying to get it mapped out across the regions, so that I can flesh it out when the time comes and it (hopefully) won't come across as something I made up as I went. I know Christmas might feel that way at times -- and for good reason, since a lot of it was just made up as I went originally, and even though I tried to put more thought and effort into it in the latest releases, it's been soft rebooted so many times on the same base that there are still plenty of leftover NPC dialogues that are random or pointless, and things that don't really fit in as well as they should. That's another reason for wanting to port it all to Pokecrystal -- makes me have to go back over everything so I can catch stuff I missed, and make it better overall.

By actually writing it out as a story first, like with the Orange Islands idea, I'm sure that would help a lot if/when the time came to make it into a hack. Even if it never became a hack, if it was written to feel like the sort of things that a game would have you do, it would probably be more enjoyable to a broader and less-cringe audience than a lot of fanfics tend to cater to. I will try to get around to that eventually, because it would be a fun thing to explore. I'd be open to suggestions when the time comes as well!


I can totally believe that it was drawn by a hentai artist. I'm sure if it followed Brendan and May's journey through Hoenn instead of the Kanto games, Wally's Gardevoir would be drawn just as inappropriately too. But yeah, if the English versions cleaned it up like you say, maybe I won't feel like it makes me a perv if I go back and read it.


Will's room, and a little bit of his OW sprite are reminiscent of Lorelei's. The obvious Ice connotations of the room, and the red hair with what looks like glasses on the sprite, it all points back to Lorelei. I do wonder if he was a last-minute change, and Lorelei was originally planned to stay there. But regardless of what they intended, they certainly made a forgettable character to replace her with. I feel like if Karen had been the first E4 member instead of Will, and they had done like... Karen -> Koga -> Bruno -> Agatha -> Lance, I wouldn't have minded so much that she was gone. I mean, it would feel weird, sure, but since they would be keeping things about the same as far as the gender ratios went and replacing her with an awesome new female E4, it would've been ok. But something about replacing her with Will always bothered me.

As for the suggested changes to Lorelei's team, those could work. I know a lot of people think of Jynx as being one of her signature Pokemon, but I've never really cared about Jynx, and wouldn't mind seeing her go in favor of something else. Maybe Weavile, since it is part Ice, could show up as well? Also, another thing to consider would be changes to her team between Red++ and Christmas. They could reflect whatever she's been doing in the meantime, and the greater variety of Ice types to choose from in Christmas.

As for what she's been doing, I know it should start with her taking out the Rockets as mentioned by the canon games, but it will need to go further than that. I'll still need to give it a lot more thought. Any suggestions?


I do have some Rocket events planned for Kanto. The 2014 version sort of ended on a cliffhanger, since it actually felt like it stopped halfway through instead of feeling like the story was wrapped up after Johto. Team Rocket was seen in a few random places looking for rare and powerful Pokemon (Lugia, Dragons, etc) but you never actually see them doing anything, just hinting that they are up to something and telling the player "Just wait and see" essentially. So there are certainly going to be Rocket events in Kanto, and Lorelei (and Lance) should probably get involved in that.

I check it pretty often during the day on my phone, but it's really frustrating to try and copy/paste individual selections and type out decent replies on my phone (I hate touchscreens). Then when I get home from work I end up doing various other things, and then I usually get around to replying later at night on my computer.

Got distracted tonight, will reply when I get the chance tomorrow (maybe before work if I get up early enough, if not, probably on my lunch break or in the afternoon).

Do you think Pokémania could return?

I honestly think the writers have a personal hatred for Ash, and they're probably trying to ruin him in every aspect. I don't know why they would hate Ash to begin with, seeing as how he was likable at the start. Maybe it's related to Shudo, but I ultimately don't know what's going through their arrogant heads.

As for the male PCs, I'm including them in my fanseries mainly as rivals of sorts to the main characters, which are their female counterparts. The only part of my fanseries where the male PC doesn't fill that role will be Kris's story, in which Ethan will, along with "Ms. Mario", serve as a traveling companion of sorts to Kris on her journey. See, though my fanseries will feature the female player characters as the main protagonist of each story therein, I intend to include all player characters as characters in at least some sort of role. Red's role in Leaf's story is basically comparable to the role of the player character you don't choose beginning in Gen III. Also, Kris's story will be based loosely on the OS, with Kris as Ash's counterpart, Ethan as Misty's counterpart, and Lyra as Brock/Tracey's counterpart, and the OS will be mentioned as being based loosely on Leaf's adventures three years before, with characters mentioning the series in-universe at various points. In fact, I already have the first paragraph of Kris's story right there in my head:


Course, I'm still only on the start of the second season of Leaf's story (which covers the period from the S.S. Anne party to Team Rocket's defeat at Silph Co.), but I wanted to write down the beginning of Kris's story before I forgot. Oh, at the point in Kris's story depicted in the above paragraph, Kris doesn't yet know that her favorite program was based loosely on actual events that had happened in Kanto three years before (key word: "loosely").

Also, the general timeframe of my fanseries, as far as I know, spans from around 1995 to the turn of the millennium. None of this timey-wimey business that Game Freak likes to fool around with in the core series by making them look like they're set definitively in the present day.

That's fine :)

I noticed something else from those pictures of Ash. Rather lazily, it appears they're still using general character designs from earlier generations, costumes be damned, after all these years. I could tell because his eyes are looking less and less like those of a protagonist who could easily blend in with characters of the current generation, with each passing generation.

Yeah, and we definitely don't want that. Ugg. :/


Yeah, doing the fanfic first would work. I've been meaning to start writing again anyway. I haven't really done very much with this English Lit degree (with a focus in Creative Writing) since I graduated. Heck, I barely even proofread my forum posts until later. But getting back into writing would be fun. Maybe I should do that even if it doesn't become a hack eventually.


Ah yeah, I do remember some of the sketchy designs in that manga. You have to wonder if some of the artists have ever actually seen a woman, given the shapes and proportions they toss around like they were normal. But that aside, at least by having an ending point it was able to do things better in some ways. I never read all of it, but I did read a couple of volumes back in the day. Might want to look it up again at some point just to see how it compares.


Will was always lame. I remember the first time I got to the E4 in Silver, I looked at my Gameboy funny and said "...you're not Lorelei. Where'd she go?" So I figured when it came time to work on Christmas, it was the perfect time for him to say "My job here is done!" and leave. You had your fun being weird, but it's time for the real trainers to come back to work.

Also, I always wanted to give Lorelei more of a recurring role, I just hadn't worked out how to go about it yet. I was wanting to do something with Ice Patch originally but scrapped it. I'll probably include a story element involving her in the Kanto half, as well as the other appearance with Lance at the festival.

I'm living proof that "boys don't like female protagonists" would be categorized by Politifact as a "pants on fire" opinion--I proudly admit to playing as the female player character whenever the Pokémon games have that option, going all the way back to Crystal.

Also, I've noticed something about the official guidebooks: the screenshots that appear within usually, if not always, depict the game as if it's being played using the male PC. Yes, even the guidebooks are in on the marketing misogyny.