[Gen II] Pokémon Dark Energy

[Miksy91]

Hi guys! This is Miksy, and here is an "RPG-typish" rom hack I've been working on for around four years now.

(Rest of the info currently copied from Pokecommunity thread.)

Storyline

You're a 19-year-old university boy from the Southern Edge of The Capital. The Capital is the biggest city in the world we live in, Suden.

The game itself starts surprisingly with a cutscene, not involving the main hero in it. It looks like some strange fellow, Maxime, has come to see Mr. Burton, one of the richest people in all of Suden. Maxime tells him about 5 precious stones, Elemental Orbs, that are scattered across the world. He couldn't seek out the Orbs all by himself so he asks if Mr. Burton paid for building an organization which could look for the Elemental Orbs in their place. Mr. Burton isn't interested about the idea at all, and asks Maxime to leave. Suddenly, some strange light knocks Mr. Burton down and when he awakes, he surprisingly accepts Maxime's offer. Maxime, then again, couldn't even "feel anything". I wonder what that was about? But thus, Team Darkness was born.

Finally, the game begins with the main player, a 19-year-old university boy from The Capital, the biggest city in world we live in, Suden. The player gets a phone call to go to see his professor at the university due to an exceptional found in Rocky Mountain in eastern part of Suden. The finding is old writing about Elemental Orbs and how they were created around 1000 years ago. Due to how the timeline in the game works, no one should have heard of the Elemental Orbs by now, not even Maxime..

And the further you progress, the more you'll start discovering about the Elemental Orbs, a thing called The Crisis and disappearance of energy in the past. What does all this mean? Find out by starting to play already today!


Features

-Explore a whole new world with everything made from scratch: maps, texts, scripts etc.
-Unique storyline, doesn't include trying to become a pokemon champion, that's for sure!
-Elements of other RPG games; sidequests, character development and more
-An organization, Team Darkness, who seems to have the same plan to unlock these secrets... or are they up to something else?
-Minigames such as "Magical Book" and "Magikarp man" (and there are more than that!)
-Lots of boss fights and each one having an actual purpose
-Plenty of game-engine hacks


Read Me before playing!

Spoiler:

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POKéMON DARK ENERGY BETA 4.1
-------------------------------------

Pokemon Dark Energy offers a unique gameplay experience by mimicing that of Final Fantasy series;
There are lots of quests and the gameplay is focused on development of the story rather than "traveling from town to town".
Even so, most gameplay related things are borrowed from the original game the hack is based on, Pokemon Silver.

Below, you can find information you might want to know before starting to play. This information mostly contains changes to the way the game engine works.
(After all, you would normally assume several things function the way they would in the game the hack is based on.)

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Naming Characters
---------------------
There will be situations when you can give a name to a certain person. If you give it an "empty" name and click END, a default in-game name is picked for that person.

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Battle Modes
--------------
There are two battle modes you can choose from - Normal and Active.
The current battle mode can be changed by opening Options from the Menu.

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Move Tutors
--------------
Certain people, who have pokemon with moves they couldn't normally learn, can teach your pokemon the same abilities.
Only a few may do this though.

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Sidequests
------------
There are 7 sidequests you can finish in this beta. A rumor is that if you complete at least 5 of them, and talk to a certain person,
something might be unlocked...

Other than that, finishing all of the sidequests doesn't serve for any special reason, at least not yet.
But every sidequest as its own gives you a handy prize!

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Pokemon Changes
--------------------
-Traded pokemon always obey
-"Trade-evolution" pokemon evolve now by leveling them up (some evolutions could be changed to evolution stone evolutions though).
-Eevee and its upper forms have had lots of changes. All that's related to this is revealed in the game.
-Magikarp evolves now by Water Stone (due to certain in-game sidequest).
-All the pokemon that evolve with evolution stones have their upper-forms' movesets edited.
--How this works is that you don't have to wait for the pre-form to learn a certain move (like Pikachu's Thunder or Vulpix' Flamethrower) before giving them the evolution stone.
Their upper form, in this case, Raichu learns Thunder and same way, Ninetales also learns Flamethrower.

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FAQ
----
Usually when you think you got stuck, try talking to people around the area and that should give you the "keys" to move forward.
But if you, for one reason or another, run out of options, you can check the FAQ below.

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Credits
--------
BlueEmerald Correcting loads of grammar errors, and drawing overworld sprites.
Poketto Drawing battle sprites.
Roareye Drawing battle sprites.
jwibagi Testing, and giving ideas.
Mateo Testing, helped me out back in the day.
Tauwasser Giving advice with various game-mechanism hacks. Also, maker of the Scripting Compendium.
Koolboyman Inventing the base of Running Shoes routine I borrowed. Also, wrote lots of handy documents I needed.

Apart from everyone above, I like to thank all of the following guys on the list.
Getting help has been awesome!

Graphical help:
-----------------------
Solar
Cheestendo
Squall
Ben

ASM help:
----------------
IIMarckus
Sawakita

Tool makers:
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Lin
Harrison
score_under

And of course you and everybody else who has taken their time reading all this!
Hope you enjoy the hack!

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Need help in getting the hack running ?
-You'll need a Pokemon Silver (U) rom and an ips patching utility to apply the "Dark Energy Beta 4.1".ips patch to the Pokemon Silver (U) rom for the game to work.

Ips-patching utilities
Windows (Lunar IPS): http://fusoya.eludevisibility.org/lips/
Linux/Mac (Lazy IPS): http://www.romhacking.net/utilities/844/
Pokemon Silver (U) rom: http://www.google.com/

Pictures









Things you will miss if you never play this...






FAQ

Spoiler:

I can't get to The Capital!

Spoiler:

Read what's written in the Read Me.

You said you implemented Running Shoes in the game. Why can't I run by holding down B button then ?

Spoiler:

Running Shoes can be received by escorting the little girl, next to the university, back home.

Is the encountered Squirtle meant to be shiny ?

Spoiler:

How am I able to get past North Star ?

Spoiler:

You need to defeat the gym leader of Little Stone, and you'll be rewarded with Woolly Hat, which protects against cold.

Where do I get the First-Aid Kit ?

Spoiler:

Keep playing till you reach Area 104. After that, it's kinda straightforward.

Why did you make Isaac's pokemon so powerful ?

Spoiler:

You're not supposed to beat him at that time, only win the access to Milky Village.

What to do with the De-Stone ?

Spoiler:

You'll hear when you find the first Page and return it to the magical book.

After reaching Milky Village, I got stuck. What to do?

Spoiler:

Explore Milky Village!

What's the code you should enter to that PC in Argent Warehouse ?

Spoiler:

Loaning the words of a certain scientist:
0118....0118..881? No, that was not it either. Darn it! I have forgotten the damn melody!

What should I do after I've gotten HM03 (Surf) ?

Spoiler:

You may find neat things by exploring the areas you've already been to. To continue with the normal gameplay, you should first go training to Western Lake from Argent Warehouse and then fly back to The Capital and leave surfing towards Brightbulb City.

Are you kidding me? Should I really enter the Cave of Illusions?!

Spoiler:

Yep, but that place is far from as confusing as you would think. Inside, you'll run into a certain person who you gotta follow. Follow him to his hideout, and you'll learn how to pass the cavern. Don't worry about getting stuck, it's made certain you won't.

Some thief stole my money and got away. Where did he go?

Spoiler:

Talking to people might help as usual.

Where does the hack end?

Spoiler:

Answering this question is literally impossible since there are tons of things you should be able to do after reaching the "end point". But in case of how long the game is, I'd say it's going to take you as least as much time to beat as an official pokemon game. And even so, it's still just a beta but a long beta indeed.

Where can I get the HMs ?

Spoiler:

HM01 - Eventually by playing
HM02 - Milky Village
HM03 - Eventually by playing
HM04 - Area 120
HM05 - Brightbulb City
Rest are currently unobtainable (or will never be obtainable).

Can I find Elemental Orbs in the current beta ?

Spoiler:

Sure!

Support banners

http://img832.imageshack.us/img832/7677/darkenergy.png

Credits:
Mateo - Creating the support banner
Poketto-Monsuta - Battle sprites of Ashlyn and Goon
Cheestendo - Battle sprite of Cactus / Player

Download Beta 4.1 here
Length: More gameplay than in many original pokemon games made by Gamefreak.


Changes between betas

Beta 4.1 is an improved version of beta 4.0 which I wanted to release by the end of 2013, but I was out of the hacking scene for quite a long time but have returned to continue working on this project and finally finished everything for beta 4.1.
There are some changes here and there but nothing that drastic. Probably the biggest improvement I can think of right now is re-coding how feeling cold works in North Star. In 4.0, you would freeze by walking on spots where there are trigger events that "activate" the freezing. Now in 4.1 it's adjusted to real-time clock and you may get frozen just by standing at the same spot for too long.

Other things I can pick up are for example re-writing the script for the gentleman asking for Super Onix, making it possible to insert the code of the PC (in Argent Warehouse Central) automatically once you have done it before, and re-writing dialogue in the beginning to give a better view on who Maxime really is.


Is 4.1 a bug-free version?

There may be minor bugs (or even bigger ones but I don't think so) in beta 4.1 because I haven't beta-tested everything properly for this release (although I did give it a test-run). However, most things worked 100% fine in beta 4.0 and there weren't any "bad" glitches out there. And because I have only edited a bit of that and tested that my edited "hacks" work, beta 4.1 should be bug-free too. But if you download it, save often 'cause you'll never know...
I'll be fixing things later if there are bugs you run into

[Alice]

Whoa, this looks really badass o.o

I'm gonna have to take a look at this sometime, because whoa

[Elsa]

Oh yeah! My pressure caused you to post ;p

This looks so awesome. I've got to play it! Nice job

[Fractal]

Originally Posted by Miksy91

Length: More gameplay than in many original pokemon games made by Gamefreak.

Yeah, absolutely true!
I'm curious, now what you'd going to add in the next beta.
Who knows, maybe there an 3rd region or little more going on to EAST side. (?)
Well, I think now it's time to just "Wait and Watch"! Hehe

[Miksy91]

Originally Posted by Sukiyami

Whoa, this looks really badass o.o

I'm gonna have to take a look at this sometime, because whoa

Thanks! I did pick up the screenshots and all that carefully, hahha!
Though it's not like I've spoiled anything here in the thread either.

Originally Posted by Rocka

Oh yeah! My pressure caused you to post ;p

This looks so awesome. I've got to play it! Nice job

I guess it had something to do with me posting this here.

Thanks Rocka. Have fun playing this!

Originally Posted by Fractal

Yeah, absolutely true!
I'm curious, now what you'd going to add in the next beta.
Who knows, maybe there an 3rd region or little more going on to EAST side. (?)
Well, I think now it's time to just "Wait and Watch"! Hehe

From what I've planned, beta 5 will cover everything that happens in East-Suden which leads to a question, "Why isn't beta 5 the final version then?".
Well, there's more content to come which makes sense when you get that far in the game as well!

The current release contains ~60% of the gameplay of final version (if I get that far in the development someday). Beta 5 covering "everything" would be ~80% release. What comes after that may stay a secret for now - but it's not about sidequests, nor a postgame, that I can reveal

Edit:
Also, I like being a "mystery man" as you can see

[Team Fail]

I've seen a lot about this hack and I'm looking forward to playing it in my spare time. Looks great so far though. And the amount of gameplay you have here makes me happy too. Most Pokemon games tend to be far too short.

[Miksy91]

Originally Posted by jwibagi

Amazing hack Miksy91. You've done a great job of distinguishing this hack from others with the non-Pokemon RPG elements.

I know it's been around or less than a month since Beta 4 came out, but I'm already looking forward to Beta 5.

I'm surprised you don't have any more screenshots, stuff like the Super Onix and the title screen.

Thanks "jwibagi"! (You know I don't like calling you by that "nickname" :P )

For once, I had lots of other screenshots in every other forum there's a thread about this hack as well. But then I thought, why should I show more than that (which is shown at the moment right here) ? The current amount of screenshots already provokes the interest in trying out this hack and that's all that matters I think

Surely I could show more cool stuff! But I'll rather let that for the players to see.

Originally Posted by Team Fail

I've seen a lot about this hack and I'm looking forward to playing it in my spare time. Looks great so far though. And the amount of gameplay you have here makes me happy too. Most Pokemon games tend to be far too short.

Thanks... And I guess I owe you for contacting me as well.

I may remember wrong, but when I said my dumb opinion in PC, in the "Community hack discussion" thread, about somebody (I don't really remember the name) being a better choice for storyline "manager" than Bela, I think you also discussed about it with Bela afterwards. And why wouldn't you have if you're friends - at least so I think.

I apologized, and told him it was a stupid thing I did. It hasn't even been so long since that day (4 or 5 months maybe?), but I've changed a lot since then. Even now, I sometimes think something negative, but a lot of stuff has been going on, and I've learned simply not to say anything like that because it's pointless and only thing you can cause by doing that is gathering "bad attention". Instead, I'll rather try to find the positive things to be said about others since that's what they want to hear.
I think my english here makes sense, but since I'm not a native speaker, forming a "speech" in fluent english doesn't always go the way intended.

But that really went out of the thread and I could as well write you a visitor, or private message, but why do that? I'll just let others see what I think as well.

Anyway, hope you try out the hack and have fun with it

[Shhwonk]

I've had a huge interest in this hack for a while now but I never got around to playing it. Now that I mention it, I really must play it soon. Nice to see that you posted Dark Energy here, by the way.

I really admire the RPG elements that you threw into the game, and it works well- the whole "collect these orbs/crystals/gems to save the world" kinda thing. Final Fantasy is my favourite video game series beside Pokémon, so I respect this. Also reminds me of a GB hack by Hat called Fatal Fantasy, haha.

[Miksy91]

Originally Posted by Esmas

I've had a huge interest in this hack for a while now but I never got around to playing it. Now that I mention it, I really must play it soon. Nice to see that you posted Dark Energy here, by the way.

Good to hear you've been liking what I've shown

Originally Posted by Esmas

I really admire the RPG elements that you threw into the game, and it works well- the whole "collect these orbs/crystals/gems to save the world" kinda thing. Final Fantasy is my favourite video game series beside Pokémon, so I respect this. Also reminds me of a GB hack by Hat called Fatal Fantasy, haha.

Yeah, I thought mixing pokemon with RPG elements would play out nicely as well. Well if it didn't... there wouldn't have been much purpose to make a hack of this kind either.

Also, collecting the elemental orbs is something you gotta do at some point in the game so you got that right. Now that I think about it... I guess if I had to look for similarities to other RPG games, Elemental Orbs are somewhat close to the crystals in Final Fantasy V.

I'd played Hat's Fatal Fantasy before as well, but don't really remember a thing about it. So I guess I'll agree there can be similarities, but hard to say anything myself

[Miksy91]

I already put this post in Pokecommunity, but I might as well post it here as well to revive this thread, and more importantly, get feedback on it.

Originally Posted by My own post from PC

I've got an idea that I'd like to get a little bit of feedback on. I think you (if not all, most) are going to like it, but I'd still like to know if you guys see it worthy of doing or not. I've been thinking about the functionality of the Battle Room. As everybody who has played the game (and used it) knows, it works so that you choose which mode you want to fight on, and then the game randomly makes you face one of 5 possible opponents (of that mode). If you win, you'll receive some Battle Points (BP), but if you lose, you simply won't get any.


But here's the deal;

I picked up the idea of Battle Room from Final Fantasy VII. There is a place called "Battle Arena" in that game. It works so that if you enter, you're made to battle randomly chosen enemies and each time if you win an opponent, you're forced to continue with randomly chosen handicap. I was thinking of implementing a very similar functionality in DE.

It would work so that you choose which battle mode you want to participate in. Let's say, we choose "Novice" mode. There are five opponents in that mode and we are made to fight three of them. First, the game randomly picks up either opponent no. #1 or #2. If you win, you're made to go on with a handicap and face the next opponent, no. #3 or #4. If you win this time as well, you're given another random handicap and you'll get to battle opponent no. #5. If you win, the mode is over and you'll get all the possible BP you can get. If you lose at one point or another, you won't get that much BP. You'll receive a certain amount of BP every time you beat your opponent, depending on how strong that opponent was. And participating costs a little bit of money, so it's always worth a shot to make it all the way to the end.

But that's it basically. I was thinking of handicaps such as halving either max HP, Str (original Attack), Def, Spr (orig. Sp. Atk), Int (orig. Sp. Def) or Spd of ALL pokemon. The reason for halving and not for example reducing the values to 75% or something similar is because of "memory usage problems" only. I know of a good way to save space so that each change would only cost me 7 bits of RAM (if it makes any sense, hahha!).

But yeah, if you like the idea, "Like" this post, or post a comment or something If you think that Battle Room is good the way it is and you'd rather not see me do this, reply about that too. I don't want to spend time doing something that's not worth it at all in the end. However, making this should be fun since it should be good exercise (especially implementing the "handicap box" functionality that randomly draws the chosen handicap depending on the time the player presses A button for instance) for further development.

Other than that, I haven't done much planning yet, but after taking a look at my notes, there aren't that many things to be done for beta 4.1. I should have an improved version out soon (not that it would really change much, the biggest, and real issue with beta 4.0 is pretty much the fact that Battle Room is not self-explanotary and I want it to be like that for the next release).