Emerald hack: Pokemon: Collapse of Time

[Teh Blazer]

The storyline is well thought out and actually pretty interesting. I like the idea of being able to travel through different passages of time, although I wished some of the areas would overlap so the player could see that specific area change over time (you know, like seeing a certain route change throughout the ages or watch as a beloved town warps from a primitive ice land to a futuristic post-apocalyptic society).

I do have to agree with DaleH771 though, the Passages of Time look far too bland and, to me, too noticeable. When I read it (and maybe it's just me) I envisioned going into a secluded area and down some hidden stairs to find a grand hall with the portal to the next time zone, not some giant doorway that everyone can see. I guess I saw the portals to be something more majestic and hidden and hard-to-find, not a port-a-potty that Joey could accidentally walk in and be chased by a dinosaur.

 

[Platinum Lucario]

Hm now that's interesting... a ROM Hack where you can travel through time, something which I was also planning in my ROM Hack which I have put on hold because of my planning of Pokémon Lava Ruby (a ROM hack of Black 2). What I can say about it is that it has a great plot to it, especially how there are tiles like the red water which you can walk on and stuff. It makes it sound like an interesting ROM Hack.

I have a question, do you plan on changing the tile designs in the ROM hack to different tiles? Or do you plan on leaving the tile design as they are?

 

[Cabe]

If I may... if you do decide to go with that futuristic walkable water (even though I really really really really really really despite that red choice) you should also change the falls tiles because... BECAUSE. Water can not simply change its color from a tile to another. Still, if you choose other colour (I would suggest one slightly different from the original), it's a nice idea.

On another topic... Is there going to be great map changes from an age to another? I mean, nowadays there are cities in places that a century ago where virgin forests, imagine how much a place would change from Ice/Stone Age to WW2! Forests would be towns and towns would be ruins (if they manage to survive) so... I believe every age should have pretty much an own world map. What do you think on this?

 

[Flaaffy]

This sounds really cool, I like the concept.
WOO,TIME TRAVEL.

 

[F1refly]

This sounds really cool, especially the war parts. I've been wanting to make a Hack with a war in it, so if you want, I can help with the story and maybe ideas for sprites?

 

[Al3x]

This is really interesting, looking forward to more progress! And if you had a banner, that'd be freakin' epic, I would so put it in my signature.

 

[Ultra - Retro Reviver!]

A new and amazing idea to implement into a Pokemon Game! (Even though I've seen time get almost erased in DestinedJagold's Hacks, but this Akers the cake. :3 ) This is gonna look awesome! I can't wait! :D

 

[Slike]

Oh boy, replies!

Spoiler:

Pokemonmasters: ...Oh. Okay, yeah that's feasible. I've found how to bend pallets and tilesets to (almost) whatever will I desire, so I can probably touch that up later. Maybe not by the first demo though, because I'm completely burn out on mapping.

Kevin: Good, because I decided I'll probably put some of the obvious Pokemon in. Cofagrigus, for example, will probably be in the ancient civilization era. (There are more of course, but that's the first to come to mind.)

Pinkish Purple: I like the way you think! But alas, I'm really not going to change my tiles. Half of them are fudged from the tiles of the original game anyways. (That doesn't make them BAD, though. I still make sure they look nice.)

PokemonGiratinaX: Except I changed my mind (read: found out how to find a color other than red), so the color is purple now. Gives the future a sort of polluted look without actually being a "bad" future. I'm not big on that cliche.

Kebbles: No new tiles, just tons of new overlaps that make new things possible.

Tman109ner: This is a good idea and you should feel good. I'll see what I can do. (Though there is no Team Plasma in this hack... might fudge that one a bit.)

Ash493: After some arab discovered the way to walk on water, it took scientists only 5000 years to replicate it!

DaleH771: Yeah, the passage of time is pretty awful. I don't have much in mind as far as portals go, though. The tileset for the inside of the battle palace might work to give it the serene feel you're thinking of. The passage of time might not be fixed by the first demo (I have made a lot of maps in the past two weeks and the very sight of a tile editor may throw me into a state of panic!), but it'll definitely be fixed eventually.

Critx: Well um... You probably should have made it! Honestly, time travel ideas are extremely easy to set up. Just choose some time periods and run along! I'm missing some neat time periods (Dark Ages, Colonial, and Industrial Revolution, probably others), and most of my time periods have tons of ideas I'm not exploring. The world of time travel plots as bright as ever!

Teh Blazer: Areas will overlap, though. Each time period is over the same area consisting of a mountain, an island, an ocean, a forest, and a... well the top left corner is whatever it wants to be, but you get the point.

Cabe: Good thing I changed the color to purple, then! It looks much nicer now, and looks nicer with the waterfalls. And yes, areas change over time. It'd be boring if everything was the same, but it'd defeat the purpose if everything changed completely.

Flaaffy: It has been written that time travel plots are adored until people find a plothole. Then they're hated.

Al3X: Oh, a banner! I'll do that eventually, but I'm a busy person today.

UltraNerdtendo64: Thanks! But... what does "Akers the cake" mean exactly?

Anyways, I've got all maps set up for the first demo. (You go to each area once, then the beta ends.) I can't take screenshots yet, because movement permissions and map connections haven't all been taken care of (though maps still flow without border problems, so there's that). I still have absolutely no sprites though, so if you want to sprite for this project, I'd love for you to contact me about it. Otherwise, I have scripting, trainers, and wild Pokemon to take care of.

So don't take this as a "We're close to the first beta!" post, but moreso as a "We're slightly less incomprehensibly far from the first beta than we were a week ago!" post.

Also take it as another nudge for spriters because those make me happy.

More screenshots will be up some time in the next week, when I clean the maps up a bit. All of the starting areas for time periods have been revamped almost completely, so you have that to look forward to.

 

[Slike]

Got some new screenshots in. Most areas have been pretty much redone, it turns out, and then there are some new areas too. I've also completed a couple of scripts

Spoiler:

Present:

I made the present into an area that's recently had a town thrown together just for the time warp. It also has a few things to bring you back to it, like all the fishing rods and the daycare.

Passage of Time:

This is just what it looks like now. The place will have plenty of NPCs, but since I don't have the kind of sprites I want for this (have I mentioned I need spriters), the people are not there yet.

Stone Age:

Just east of your starting area for the stone age is a volcano. At the base of said volcano, you'll find a swamp. (Yes, I see the tile errors. I fixed them after looking at this screenshot.)

Ice Age:

The ice age works as a whole, but isn't very screenshottable. Snow will yield wild Pokemon, but not very often to account for the fact that it's kind of everywhere. The upper half of the ocean is coated in ice, and will be tuned up later not to be bland. At this point, it transports you from the far west to the far east of the map without giving you freedom to explore areas that you shouldn't see yet. I'll try to stop it from being an insufferable maze of ice puzzles.

Ancient Civilization:

I'm not sure why I made the Dam so dark, but I'll fix that. You've got your Incas there, and when you head south, you'll find the Egypt based area. There's also a tomb in the middle of the desert. How spooky!

Renaissance:

I didn't take nearly as many screenshots of this as I could have, for some reason. I generally made the renaissance look better, added a few routes, and set up the island. The island and its surroundings mark the "Feudal Japan" chunk of the renaissance.

War:

Nothing much done here, since this area is mostly about scripting. You start outside the prison, get caught, and then escape with the soldiers you're rescuing.

Future:

Look at how purple that water is! Doesn't it look like you could just walk on it? Well, you can! There's also a factory that makes the purple water, but it isn't accessible until much later. Instead, in the future, you spend most of your time in this place:

Whatever that is. What could it possibly be?

The general problem here is that I don't have sprites. I'll be posting this on some other forums now that I have more progress to show, and if all else fails, I'll just learn how to sprite for myself. But seriously, if you're a spriter and a good person who likes credit for helping people, you should definitely contact me and make me a happy person.

 

[chen12]

Great idea for a Pokemon hack. Looking forward to the progression of the plot and mapping. Would definitely play this when it comes out.

 

[Vestra]

Your region map is just, beautiful. Really looking forward to playing this it sounds like oracle of time on crack.

Now tell me again, how do traded pokemon evolve?

 

[Jaypz]

looks promising. surely ya'll have to include 4th and 5th Gens pokemon for this^^

 

[miksy91]

I saw nothing special in this hack at first but now with the new screenshots up, it's starting to look more interesting. But just like some others (like hinkage here) pointed out before, this hack requires re-done scripts including quests or proper storyline; something you have to accomplish by time-traveling. If you're just going from time to another doing nothing special, it won't stand out from other hacks really.

NO.
NO.
NO.
This hack does NOT need new tiles to "make it perfect."

It doesn't look like you've really begun scripting the story yet. That should definitely come before custom tiles. In fact, it's the most important thing in the game. It is the game.

PLEASE don't listen to those who say "oh just add new tiles it'll be great," unless you want to work for EA Sports making Madden '34 when you grow up. Really. New tiles are good, but shouldn't at all be a priority, especially this early on.

What can I say, this hack has potential to go far. It just has to be focused on the right issues.

 

[arjiegodz]

please change the bike into a car. or a floating car so that it looks futuristic

add the 4th-6th generation pokemon.. and please lots of legendary but we should finish their quest in order to catch them

 

[godlesplay]

arjiegodz 6th generation ? oO

 

[PokemonGiratinaX]

add the 4th-6th generation pokemon.. and please lots of legendary but we should finish their quest in order to catch them

Well, 6th-Gen Pokemon are have not created yet.;)

 

[Correspondence]

Wow!Sounds like its going to be a promising hack.Hope you get to complete it or atleast get a Beta out.:)

 

[arjiegodz]

Well, 6th-Gen Pokemon are have not created yet.;)

im just kidding about the 6th gen pokemon... but seriously its really nice.. to add some twist in this hack.

 

[Slike]

Just going to reply to questions because replying to "this looks like a great hack!" a bunch of times is hard. Not that there's anything wrong with those comments.

Vestra:

(I am true to my word.)

Milksy: This isn't a question but it deserves to be replied to for being insightful. The plot will generally involve the player doing something important in each time period. It'd be silly if you just went into a battlefield, fought some Pokemon battles, and left.

arjiegodz: I'm probably going to have the bike be a hoverboard if I change it at all. A car is just too big for the way the game's grid works.

Thanksgiving Break is coming up, so I'll hopefully get some fancy scripts done then. Not like I have any particularly fancy scripts set up for the first chunk of the game, but there are slightly less fancy ones.

 

[miksy91]

Milksy: This isn't a question but it deserves to be replied to for being insightful. The plot will generally involve the player doing something important in each time period. It'd be silly if you just went into a battlefield, fought some Pokemon battles, and left.

That sounds pretty good. If you're going to make most issues the player has to do/solve, in different time periods, relate to each other, even better.

Anyway, scripting doesn't have to be excellent but having realistic-looking, and a bit "complicated" scripts every now and then would make the hack better. Not gonna say I'm looking forward to playing it but I'll give it a shot later on which I can't say for every other hack out here :)