Next on my list of projects is unique surfing overworlds, using the pokeemerald disassembly.
Features:
- Individual surfing overworlds for the 102 pokémon that can learn surf (up to and including Gen III).
- Support for shiny pokémon.
- Any pokémon that has been taught surf but does not have an overworld sprite will display the standard surf blob instead.
- Dynamic palette system included.
Known issues:
- Placeholder graphics are currently used.
- The shiny palettes are not necessarily synchronised with the standard palettes so some of the shiny pokémon may appear incorrectly.
Contributing:
- Help is needed to create high quality surfing overworlds. There are 102 pokémon that can learn surf which is a substantial amount of work for one person. I have dabbled in pixel art but it is not my forté and I know there are many talented artists around who could do a better job than me.
- I have left the data in for (but not implemented) different surfing poses for the player as I don't think the standard pose will suit all the pokémon. However I would like other people's opinion on whether this is necessary and if it is then multiple poses will need to be made for each playable character.
- The video shows Gen IV style player sprites, however this base only includes the pokémon sprites.
I personally prefer and am more invested in Gen IV style but I think it would be beneficial to the pokémon modding community as a whole to support both styles.
The pokémon graphics are located in
"graphics/event_objects/pics/pokemon/surfable".
The list of pokémon that can learn surf is located in
"src/data/field_event_obj/surfable_pokemon.h".
Here are some Gen IV surfing sprites to use as reference for anyone who wants to contribute:
How it works:
I wanted to make it compatible with my costume menu implementation so it works by creating a sprite beneath the player, like the standard surf blob does, and then a sprite above the player.
So taking the Lapras sprite in the video as an example, the formatting for the graphic becomes:
Where the top row is shown underneath the player and the bottom row is displayed above.
Completed sprites:
At present pokeemerald is 87% decompiled, meaning that there are still limitations on what can be done with it and it is not in a user friendly state, but I would still recommend playing around with it as it allows for much more complex changes than a binary ROM hack.
I will periodically be merging with the master branch until it is completely decompiled.
FAQ:
Is this compatible with existing hacks?
If the hack is using the pokeemerald disassembly then yes, it should also be fairly simple to port to pokeruby. You will need to understand how to use github though.
If you're doing a traditional binary ROM hack then no, but the benefits of learning how to use the disassemblies are significant.
Will a patch be made?
It could but that would defeat the point of using the disassemblies.
