Project Start - Map, Features, Storyline Discussion

[Spacetauren]

Hi there to everyone reading this thread, I'm starting a fan game project on essentials but before getting into any of the technical stuff I've begun to investigate more trivial stuff such as : What features will be in my game ? What will the map look like ? What is the region name ? What's the storyline ? ... And for now I already have a few ideas I'd want to share, so experienced users &/or developpers may point me in the right directions or share their own ideas.

If you don't want to discuss all of my ideas, I've separated them in three categories, so feel free to read at your leisure and maybe skip what you're not interested in.

First off, the Region.

Spoiler:

Right now, I have a temporary name (Libra) and a first draft Region map with an early idea of how the player will run around as the game progresses :

- Stoneburg : Starting village, home of the player

- Southbreeze : Local Professor lab, first encounter with the villain team

- Libra Port : Biggest city in the region, 1st Gym (Normal type)

- Highdam : Poor city since the nearby dam was bought by a business in Libra Port, 2nd Gym (Ground or Rock type), second encouter with the villain team (with its first admin battle) nearby as well as first battle with a mysterious man

- Middleford : Village on the edge of a forest, home to many pokémon breeders

- Eastcay : 2nd biggest city, PokéMall, 3rd Gym (Flying type)

- Lowshore : Accessible via bicicle or swimming

- Redibalt : third encounter with the villain team (second admin battle)

- Cliffside : A cliff town washed by the seaspray, 4rth Gym (Water type)

- Horntown : A forest village with a strong culture around berries and flowers, 5th Gym (you guessed it, Grass type)

- On the way to the next Gym, 2nd battle with mysterious man and fourth encounter with villain team, in Libra Port (first team leader battle)

- Littlerock : A secluded island town, 6th Gym (Fighting or Steel type)

- Leaffal : Lore-dump town, fifth encounter with villain team (third admin battle)

- Stillsand : Desert city full of bedouin-like people, 7th Gym (Poison or Ground type)

- Before going to the last Gym, end the vilain plot with 6th encounter with villain team (last admin AND leader battle as well as a surprise reveal)

- Winterfall : Town on the top of Mount Libra, 8th Gym (kinda obvious : Ice Type)

- Champion's Reach : Hosts the Pokémon League.

Now I want my region to feel very multicultural, which is why it will include elemnts of tilesets from locations all around (tilesets will match art style, but will depict very distinct architectures). Many people around Libra have actually come from other regions, which justifies the presence of known figures from other pokémon games (for example, Shelly has left Hoenn after the disbandment of Team Aqua and is now Cliffside's Gym Leader; Clair has moved up in the world and is now part of the Elite four; an Elite four member from a previous game took a level in badass and has become Libra's Champion)

Spoiler:

[It's Karen, Dark-type user Elite four of Johto]

Do you have any advice or questions about the region ? Maybe some ideas you want to share ? If so please do, i'm at the start of it all so I would greatly benefit from the words of others ! :)

Second, Storyline.

Spoiler:

To make it short, the villain team is Team Havoc : a group of old employees of the regional dam who were fired after it was bought by the local supercompany, Librastar; as well as many folk from the now very poor city of Highdam.

Their goal ? Vengeance for their town and their jobs, by ruining everything that has the Librastar logo on it. Along the way they get to awaken two legendary birds, Zapdos and Articuno, to lure out the already awakened Moltres.

In the final stages of their plan they capture both Articuno and Moltres with stolen Masterballs from Librastar. Then they freeze the lake and take control of the dam, menacing to cut the electricity all around the region until they get paid fat stacks. Then, as long as the fast stacks keep coming, they will allow Moltres to unfreeze the lake.

There is also a subplot about two sisters (the admins of Team Havoc, the younger of which wants to follow her elder sister, while the older one begrudgingly accepts but doesn't want her little sister get herself in too much danger. At the end they both get scolded by their mother, a badass trainer that helps the player in the villain's final act (the mother is actually Karen, the sisters share her hair and eye color to hint at it).

Now you've seen I mentionned a mysterious man in the path description before. He' discusses myths and legends with the player, mainly about the bird trio and about the little boy who awakened Moltres by mistake a few years ago, ruining his village and the forest around in a wildfire. Now before looking into the next spoiler section, try to take an educated guess about who this guy is and why he is there.

Spoiler:

He's a man named Duncan (placeholder name for now), the same little boy who awakened Moltres by mistake. Even if he fled the region in shame, he was fascinated by the power of Moltres and surprised to learn there were two other birds with such fabulous power. From then on, he dedicated most of his life to becoming very rich, and came back with a plan to awaken and capture the bird trio. As Team Havoc's secret fundraiser, he is behind their recent rise in power and their plan to awaken the birds. He actually doesn't care about their goals, as long as they help him get an opportunity to catch Articuno, Zapdos and Moltres.

If the answer was kind of expected, but not plain obvious, it's what I'm aiming for. If it's too obvious, or if you have other ideas about how to enrich the plot or make it more believable/better, please let me know ! :)

Finally features.

Spoiler:

I'm really just getting started on this one, and the only ideas I've had right now are those of sidequests that demand diverse things from the player. Rewards for these sidequests can be rare items, pokémon that could not be obtained by other methods, $, or quality of life improvements such as the Item finder, intel about where the roaming legendaries are, pokéradar or even flippers that allows the player to swim without a pokémon that has learned Surf. The ideas i have right now include :

-- Friends Forever
Battle your rival around the region to strenghen your bond together. (As of now, the rival is not the opposite gender choice, but a teenage girl that just moved in your hometown)

-- Scoop of a lifetime
Find astonishing news around Libra and inform Gabby and Ty (the Hoenn reporters who moved to Libra) about them

--- Passing the mantle
- Exchange Archibald's (Archibald is a senior painter) Smeargle with Sally (a gifted young artist) and then show Sally beautiful vistas for her to paint

--- A thief's comeuppance
- Help Detective Looker investigate clues to find a thief and confront them (crime scenes involve using the item finder to detect clues)

-- The passion of youth
- Help youngster Joey compose the Pokémon team of his dreams (dual battles where the partner AI will try to capture pokémon if they are part of his dream team)

-- Made for each other
- Accompany two young people as they fall into a blossoming romance (help two lovestruck youths write letters of love to each other)

-- Sightseeing
- Find Cory the traveler in many remote and difficultly accessible locations (Cory is in places with not very obvious routes to reach them)

-- For the safety of Pokémon
- Help Pokémon Ranger Recruit Thomas save pokémon from all sorts of harm around Libra

-- Swimming contest
- Participate in races around Libra's waterways with Lois the pro-swimmer (basically an overworld race where your sprite must cross the finish line before Lois')

-- In search of family
- Reunite father and daughter in a big needle-in-a-haysack game (You only get a physical description of the other from the first of the two you encounter, and then you need to talk to them; i want their positions to be randomised across Libra so the quest isn't trivial)

-- Gotta see'em all
- Present Photograph Amelia (from pokémon shuffle, not the one from Kalos) rare pokémon so she can complete her personal notebook (Capture rare pokémon and talk to her when they are in your party)

-- Ruin Mania
- Explore the three ancient ruins of Libra with Ruin-Maniac Indiana (Tie-in to the fossil and a way to earn the two starters you didn't choose)

-- The Benett Mansion
- Bring useful items and challenge the occupants of the Pokémon Mansion (equivalent of the trickster house of Hoenn, go visit them with the right item after each badge for a battle harder than the last. After the 8th battle, you can gauntlet the 8 denizens for a big cash prize)

-- A Master's teaching
- Present Dojo Master Haru with Pokémon who know specific moves (Haru will become a move tutor of each requested move you show him; to do so, bring in your party a pokémon that knows the move in question)

-- Shopping List
- Acquire a collection of items for the clients of the PokéMall (each satisfied customer will give $ and a useful item; satisfying all of them rewards you with new purchase options and a discount in the PokéMall)

As for other features, I don't have many of them, except maybe a race minigame where you need to enter with a pokémon suited for races (Ponyta/Rapidash, Doduo/Dodrio, Girafarig are a few possibilities, rule of thumb is if it has 4 legs and hooves, it can race). Do you have any suggestion of features that may work with the theme I presented ? Maybe ideas to make what i already have in mind better ?

For anyone who has read any of my rant, thank you a lot ! If you read it all, you get a nice, big Jynx smooch from me also :p.