FireRed hack: RED RETURNS Rom Base (GBC styled)

[Danno]

HISTORY

Spoiler:

A few years back, I had been out of the hacking community for a few years when I came across PokeMMO, an online multiplayer game which used a FireRed rom as it's core. It was possible to hack the graphics and music, so I got right back into ROM Hacking. I ran into Coolboyman over on their forums, making a patch that would make the game look 8-bit while playing PokeMMO. I assisted him by making the pokemon menu sprites for the first 2 gens of pokemon. If you use that patch in a normal emulator however, you'll see almost instantly that it's not meant to be played the real way. Rooms were laid out as they were in FireRed, but with the graphics from GSC. The project has been abandoned for a few years, and I decided to bring it back to life. Response from Coolboyman pending lol

BASICS
POKéMON Red Returns is a Community Made Rom Base that started with Coolboyman's PokeMMO: 8-Bit Edition IPS patch that changed some of the graphics, mainly some tiles into GSC graphics. I'm taking it further to make it a real playable rom base that people can use to create their own GSC styled hacks. My intention is, once the maps are fixed (and they need a lot of work) and all of the scripts are adjusted to fit the GSC version of Kanto, to recreate Johto and flesh it out with Red's story there.

FEATURES
•Maps and tiles from POKéMON GSC's Kanto
•FireRed scripts modified to work with Gen 2 Kanto's Maps
•Original Firered menus (?)
•2nd gen battle sprites, trainer sprites, and a few customs (such as the player backsprite)
•Some late-game goodies near the start of the game
•Both genders (I considered removing the option to keep true to Red but screw it :D)
•Running Shoes immediately from the start


PLANNED FEATURES
•GBC Soundtrack
***Johto***
Custom all-white battle backgrounds

CREDITS
Meowth
Coolboyman/KBMII - 8 Bit Original PokeMMO Patch
Comboy - Pokemon Essentials GS graphics

YOU ARE WELCOME TO HELP!
Whether you're a mapper or a graphics inserter or whatever, the more people who contribute to this, the quicker it shall be done. Remember, this rom base is supposed to be based on RBY with GSC's Kanto in the FireRed engine.

I currently need:
Mappers
Sprite Inserters

You're welcome to offer ideas, too.

RELEASES
None yet.

 

[AtecainCorp.]

Finnaly. I found an great project here... Meybe if you want I can help you with this project. Johto is the smallest problem here since you only need simply earse Sevi Isles and replace them with Johto. With some tasks which you notice I can help you like with Blank Battle Backgrounds.

 

[Danno]

Johto will be the last thing that will be worked on, because this is intended to be a fully playable standalone rom base before its a new game, but as i said anyone is welcome to help. If you make a patch with the blank battle backgrounds, just keep track of the offsets you used. :)

 

[curiters]

oh my nostalgia.

 

[Danno]

oh my nostalgia.

Awesome feeling, isn't it?

Here's a piece from my worksheet showing the original back sprites compared to my new ones.

And the Teachy TV guy became the dude from Route 29 in GSC who also teaches you how to catch Pokemon:

Also, the "Previously on your quest" thing looks very fitting with this graphic style:

And although it's not inserted yet, here is my current mockup for the titlescreen:

original:

Spoiler:

Should this project have the day and night system in the rom base?

 

[AtecainCorp.]

Sure. I going to start work on it. When I end it. You will be first guy who's got that patch.

Anyways about DNS. I think that it should work nice when you make it in GSC Style.

 

[curiters]

Awesome feeling, isn't it?

Here's a piece from my worksheet showing the original back sprites compared to my new ones.

And the Teachy TV guy became the dude from Route 29 in GSC who also teaches you how to catch Pokemon:

Also, the "Previously on your quest" thing looks very fitting with this graphic style:

And although it's not inserted yet, here is my current mockup for the titlescreen:

original:

Spoiler:

Should this project have the day and night system in the rom base?

oh my god man such insteresting how my memories flashes back.

 

[Danno]

It's actually a lot easier to do these blank battle backgrounds by hex editing, so I don't even need to make custom tilemaps.

EDIT: on second thought, maybe the backgrounds should be light solid colors... I'll probably do that instead.

 

[ablahblah987]

Great idea. Definitely add features from the newer games.

 

[Nex]

if you do dns then please optional

 

[KrustyKong]

Amazing! I've actually been working on my own version of this for the past few months! Although I'm basing mine more on Gen I's Kanto since I have some gripes with Gen II's stripped down Kanto (Viridian Forest, Mt. Moon, etc.)

 

[Shhwonk]

Thank you for doing this! I will definitely be using it.

 

[Danno]

Amazing! I've actually been working on my own version of this for the past few months! Although I'm basing mine more on Gen I's Kanto since I have some gripes with Gen II's stripped down Kanto (Viridian Forest, Mt. Moon, etc.)

I'm probably basing those areas on RBY, but areas like Cerulean will look closer to GSC.

 

[KrustyKong]

Where did you find the frames for the water animation? I tried getting them myself via screencapping a Crystal rom, but I put it off because VBA doesn't have a proper frame advance system. Also, have you come across any weird glitches with the cut trees? When I edit the map, one of them with sometimes be moved to someplace where I can't see it. idk if this is because I switch between A-map 1.92 and Map Editor of Happiness.

 

[Danno]

Where did you find the frames for the water animation? I tried getting them myself via screencapping a Crystal rom, but I put it off because VBA doesn't have a proper frame advance system. Also, have you come across any weird glitches with the cut trees? When I edit the map, one of them with sometimes be moved to someplace where I can't see it. idk if this is because I switch between A-map 1.92 and Map Editor of Happiness.

I haven't done them yet, as I have a broken laptop screen and someone stole my TV... but I'll be getting to them soon.

I don't know exactly what you mean with the cut trees error, you may have better luck asking in a seperate thread.

 

[chaos_envoys]

What an unfortunate event.. I hope everything goes well for you, meowth... good luck on everything :)

 

[Danno]

Thanks. I just got a new job, working overnights, and im now living back with my father's house where i dont have wifi... At least i can hook up my laptop to another tv.

As for news with this project: i restarted it with Mr. Dollsteak's base and without KBM's 8-bit patch. The tiles were very messy and repeated unnecessarily, and the maps were just reskinned fr maps with gsc tiles over them. I'm currently working on remapping every map in Kanto in GSC style with a tileset that will be easy for people to use when this is released as a rom base. It's coming along quite well really, and I hope to have screenshots soon.

 

[Xertified]

Yo, this hack is cool. Keep it up. I will keep an eye on this one and definetely a 10/10!

 

[KrustyKong]

Thanks. I just got a new job, working overnights, and im now living back with my father's house where i dont have wifi... At least i can hook up my laptop to another tv.

As for news with this project: i restarted it with Mr. Dollsteak's base and without KBM's 8-bit patch. The tiles were very messy and repeated unnecessarily, and the maps were just reskinned fr maps with gsc tiles over them. I'm currently working on remapping every map in Kanto in GSC style with a tileset that will be easy for people to use when this is released as a rom base. It's coming along quite well really, and I hope to have screenshots soon.

Are you gonna be cutting out the Sevii Islands in place of Johto? Also, I have screens of my progressing hack with a similar goal if you wanted. I've done a lot of the maps already and have included is a photo of the tileset which needs work, but I don't think it's too messy.

Although, there is the tree glitch I mentioned earlier which will have to be worked out.

I had a lot of the character overworld sprites done in a separate patch, but encountered glitches due to some expanding of some of the 16x16 sprites. I can redo it easily as I have the ones I did in bitmap form for NSE.

If you're not interested in collaborating, I'm not sure if I should make a new thread because you have more credibility than I and it might be seen as redundant.
(fixed to actually show the images)

 

[Danno]

Are you gonna be cutting out the Sevii Islands in place of Johto? Also, I have screens of my progressing hack with a similar goal if you wanted. I've done a lot of the maps already and have included is a photo of the tileset which needs work, but I don't think it's too messy.

Although, there is the tree glitch I mentioned earlier which will have to be worked out.

I had a lot of the character overworld sprites done in a separate patch, but encountered glitches due to some expanding of some of the 16x16 sprites. I can redo it easily as I have the ones I did in bitmap form for NSE.

If you're not interested in collaborating, I'm not sure if I should make a new thread because you have more credibility than I and it might be seen as redundant.
(fixed to actually show the images)

Very cool, are you remaking the RBY or GSC maps mainly? Aside from the obvious ones (Cinnabar, Viridian Forest, Mt. Moon etc) I'm going with 2nd gen maps, eve n for the interiors of buildings. If you send me a copy of what you have I can try to combine your maps into my tilesets and release it back to you, although really I intended to release a patch anyways once it's playable up to the end of the first gym area for anyone to try their hand at remapping.


Also, for the rom base, i will be keeping the Sevii Islands... But the actual hack, which will come after the rom base is 100%, will have Johto instead. This is because Red Returns is a devamped FR which aims to keep all of the features introduced in FireRed, and when other hackers wish to use the rom base they will have more freedom to do what they would like with the original game just with different maps and sprites.