#or. perhaps. even a romhack? goodness me

[antirepurp]

oh dear. the overwhelming urge to design a pokemon region is upon me again

[7grandmel]

Todays rip: 03/04/2024

Battle Theme - Zeno Blade Chronicle X

Season 1 Featured on: GilvaSunner's Highest Quality Video Game Rips: Volume 7

Ripped by turdl3

A lot of the time I spend on here is dedicated to explaining things in SiIvaGunner's history that I feel like I have a good grasp of. That is part of the intent with the blog - both to highlight noteworthy rips to people already deep in the sauce, but also to try and convey to people outside of the bubble, more casual fans, just how fascinating this whole channel and its goings-on are. But even though I consider myself to be very well researched on the channel, there are still times I'm caught off guard: I still don't know what to make of He is Back., I was taken aback by everything I'd missed in regards to waterwraith pokos, and rips like If Pazuzu Sneezes Do You Still Say Bless You? have sent me down little detective hunts for parts of internet history I'd entirely missed. But even amidst these, Battle Theme - Zeno Blade Chronicle X still sort of sticks out in my mind - because I've been baffled by it ever since I found SiIvaGunner back in Season 1.

Xenoblade Chronicles X is a game with a lot of history on SiIvaGunner, most evidently due to its lead composer, Hiroyuki Sawano. Channel oldhead dante has been taking cues from his incredibly distinct style of music for a majority of the Christmas Comeback Crisis' soundtrack, such as with 9​来​4s, and several rippers have followed suit from Season 1 and beyond with rips such as Kill & Learn (Recut Ver​.​). Xenoblade Chronicles X was just one more game to rip Sawano's music through - yet, as you might have already noticed, Battle Theme - Zeno Blade Chronicle X *isn't* using Xenoblade Chronicles X. "Zeno Blade Chronicle X" is a fake game, of which we see plenty of today, but back in March 2016 it was an odd one out. Just two months into the GiIvaSunner channel's life, it was (to my knowledge!) the first time that all the pretense of a rip being of actual video game music was dropped. Its unfortunate that the original comments section was lost with the GiIvaSunner termination, but I'm certain it was gleaming with confusion even back then.

But like...what *is* Zeno Blade Chronicle X? The joke died out within Season 1 after just three rips, and since then it's only been referenced within Season 3's nostalgia week and Season 7's April Fools day event that I covered yesterday with Our Sweet Pastry. The three rips made during Season 1, and the Season 3 throwback rip, all follow the same joke - arranging music from Xenoblade Chronicles X in the style of...EarthBound, of all games? I suppose there's a lot of context here I'm missing out - perhaps its a sly jab at ROMhacks such as the EarthBound Halloween Hack that Toby Fox made before Undertale, perhaps its poking fun at the many mediocre "(song) but in SNES instruments!!" arrangements that are all the rage especially nowadays...or perhaps EarthBound in particular just has such a strange sound to it, one so unbefitting of the tone of Hiroyuki Sawano's music, that it sounds very funny arranged in that style?

Either way, its what gave us Battle Theme - Zeno Blade Chronicle X, and through all of my confusion and feeling as if I'm not getting the joke, it is still REALLY funny in isolation. The thumbnail's abhorrent crunchiness, the "Megalovania" guitars contrasting so harshly with the bleep-bloopy main melody instrument, the harsh cymbal crash that stays throughout the song as a layer of percussion - it sounds like its falling apart on itself throughout the whole thing, yet carries itself through the entire battle theme in an oddly charming way. I mean, the lead instrument sounds kind of similar to the one used in Collision Clouds, there's something so oddly charming about that particular form of melody! There's so many reasons why the Zeno Blade Chronicle X rips have stuck in my mind, but its mainly just that I'm puzzled by them...like, are they meant to be rough around the edges, or is that just due to their Season 1-ness? Are they poking fun at anything in particular? What led to this becoming popular enough with the team for them to officially begin ripping Fake Games just two months in?

All those thoughts race through my mind every time I'm reminded of Battle Theme - Zeno Blade Chronicle X - all the while I'm banging out to the tune itself. Xenoblade Chronicles X's Battle Theme itself is already fantastic, and this silly goofy take on it keeps that spirit underneath all of its crust, preserving the game's legacy in the strangest of ways. This is one mystery that I don't know if I'll ever truly *wholly* understand (though I'm sure making this post will lead me on the right path at least!) but it, at the same time, embodies so much of the fun of Season 1's unpredictability! None of us watching ever knew what to expect from the channel, and I'm sure nobody watching had "SNES Bootleg of Xenoblade Chronicles X for the Wii U" on their Bingo card. That unpredictability was so novel then, and still lives on today - and in some ways, it all reached its first new high with Battle Theme - Zeno Blade Chronicle X.

[radramblog]

On Pokemon Difficulty Hacks

When romhacking Pokemon first got big, you saw many an attempt to make proper fresh experiences and truly new games. Naranja, Quartz, Ruby Destiny and the like. The ambitious attempts of people who didn’t know just how much effort would be required to finish anything remotely resembling a finished product, though in fairness. Romhackers didn’t have teams, usually, maybe a couple helpers for spriting or beta testers, but the majority of people just wouldn’t have the time, energy, or lasting ambition to make something like that work.

In this era, where tools were limited but popularity was growing, it was perhaps unsurprising that many other hackers went for the “386” style of hack. Because, frankly, one of the first things someone is going to think of when it comes to making a Pokemon fangame is “what if you could catch all the Pokemon in one game?”. And from there, the train of thought naturally continues- if the player isn’t as restricted in teambuilding as the usual Regional Pokedex system makes them, why not have that for the NPCs as well? And while I’m at it, the games are usually really easy, and everyone playing them is going to be an enfranchised Pokemon fan, so why not pump up the difficulty a bit? Hence, the difficulty hack was born.

I suspect you can attribute much of the root of this to one man- Drayano, easily one of the most well-known romhackers around. The creator of Sacred Gold/Storm Silver, Fire Red Omega, Blaze Black/Volt White (and BBVW2), and of course, Renegade Platinum. I don’t well enough know if Dray popularized this kind of hack or just followed an existing trend, but (with the exception of FRO) the versions he created ended up being, and probably still are today, the definitive difficulty romhacks for their respective original titles. They weren’t just difficult, but they had a level of effort put into tuning their difficulty that most were unable to replicate- especially considering how difficult DS hacking was at the time and especially in Renegade Platinum.

Dray’s hacks were the only real hacks of their kind that I can think of getting major attention. They’re difficult but fair, making for a good gameplay experience, and thereby a good watching experience as youtubers, let’s players, and streamers flock to do playthroughs and catch ‘em alls and Nuzlockes. The nature of this kind of project means that only one version is really going to stand tall- sure, you could play Bloody Diamond or Obsidian, but why would you when you could just play Renegade Platinum? I will acknowledge that Obsidian was possibly the best Platinum hack before RenPlat, but its age is showing. The only exception I can think of is Fire Red Omega- owing to Gen 3 hacking being significantly easier and better explored, it had competitors, such as Yet Another Fire Red Hack by DoesntKnowHowToPlay or Fire Red Advanced by Z-nogyroP, among many others.

For the record, I have no doubt that with DS hacking becoming easier and better understood, SGSS, BBVW, and even RenPlat will be replaced in time. Possibly even soon- the scene got much bigger last year on account of breakthroughs and also people being stuck inside.

I would have thought, in 2021, that difficulty hacks would likely have died out, that they would have been replaced as resources such as disassembly/decompilation and the CFRU make more complex projects significantly easier. I was, surprisingly, wrong, though the nature of the games has changed a lot. Previous hacks in this discussion served as more difficult versions of existing games, with more freedom in teambuilding and some added features. But the modern “difficulty hack” is another beast entirely. The two I’d like to highlight in particular are Radical Red and the Kaizo games.

RadRed is the culmination of the aforementioned CFRU (Complete Firered Upgrade), a demonstration of its capabilities in porting both the entire 2021 catalogue of Pokemon into a game from 2004, but in showing the advances in AI and modern Pokemon mechanics (with refinement) to push the limits of how hard a Pokemon game could be. Every major fight plays like a competitive match, with the average playthrough necessitating frequent team rebuilding, and dedicated EV training and IV breeding. Radical Red (aside from basically stealing the best name I could ever use for a Romhack) is extremely difficult, requiring both a tactical mind and a bottomless well of Pokemon knowledge to play well.

The Kaizo games, by one Sinister Hooded Figure, are difficult in a different way entirely. Blue and Crystal Kaizo are actually getting older by this point, both of them releasing in 2014, but 2017’s Emerald Kaizo is the one that is getting the most buzz as of late. The Kaizo games (named for Kaizo Mario World) are crushingly difficult, built to be Nuzlocked and make you suffer doing it. An accelerated level curve, NPCs featuring legendary Pokemon that you have no access to (including Blue Kaizo giving your Rival a Mew from the very first battle), and the earlier games having extensive edits to maps necessitating fighting every battle, churning through dozens of Wilds in extended endurance segments, and fighting bosses and accessing resources in extremely inopportune ways. Emerald Kaizo has less of this but adds difficulty in the form of expert-level AI and the game forcing you into loads and loads of treacherous double battles. In addition, while Radical Red adds future additions and competitive-style gameplay, the Kaizo games lean into their rage game roots, with many a trainer using high-variance moves or items like the Quick Claw. A Critical Hit is problematic in a normal game, in Kaizo they’re ruinous. RadRed is the culmination of the years of Fire Red development, while Kaizo presents vanilla mechanics pounding you as hard as possible.

It may come as some surprise that I’m actually not a huge fan of either of these.

As much as I love difficulty, the experiences these games present just fall on the level of unfun for me. Grinding is boring, and they often necessitate that, and I’m not a huge fan of every single opponent being a significant enough threat that I need to pay serious attention in every single battle. It’s frustrating, because I want to like them, but they’re just too much.

But these games remain popular, and I think a large reason for that is simply because watching other people play them is quite entertaining. Streamers and Youtubers have flocked to these games, challenging their might, and often failing to conquer them. They’re an experience best had while slightly removed, it appears- the approachability barrier broached by having a proxy.

I’m sure people exist that are superfans of this kind of hack. I know they do, since I’ve seen folks who’ve done multiple playthroughs of Radical Red, and those who’ve stuck it out to actually complete a Nuzlocke of each and every Kaizo game. But they aren’t for me, and that’s okay. I am not surprised that these hacks continue to stay popular, and I expect them to continue and stay relevant as long as Pokemon Romhacking continues. With that in mind, I think I’d prefer more Dray-style hacks at this point.

You can find all of Dray’s hacks on his Drive here. Radical Red can be found at this link, and here’s Blue, Crystal, and Emerald Kaizo. And….fuck it here’s YAFRH and Fire Red Advanced, they’re both classics at this point.

[altalksaboutstuff]

My Top 5 Games of the Past Generation Youtube Script Plus Notes

This is, more or less, the script for My Top 5 Games of the Past Generation video that I just published on Youtube: With the Xbox One and Playstation Four about to head out of the door to make ways for the Xbox Series X and the Playstation 5 respectively to lead us into the next generation of consoles were only Nintendo has been sitting comfortably with the Switch, the Wii U has been long gone and Nintendo also recently announced the official end of the Nintendo 3DS line cutting all the ties to this last generation.  With that almost everyone is now releasing their lists of the best games of the current generation, myself included, I couldn't help but notice a lot of same-soundy lists such as Game Informer's top 5 list.  I myself have to disagree with these, not to say that any and/or all five of those games on Game Informer's Top 5 aren't good, important or worth playing just that I don't think they are the best representative of this generation in terms of impact and wide appeal, so much as had the most money backing them. That these games on the list are more the best representative of the biggest Triple A titles.  The games that I had in mind are more impactful on how this generation swayed and set new standards.  I want you to keep in mind that while I liked some of these games, these aren't my personal top 5 of the past generation either but I think closer to what best represents our closing era of gaming, when I say the “best games of the current generation.”

First off I'd like to make an honorable mention of PT.  PT or playable trailer was supposed to be a demo for the new Silent Hill S game that unfortunately never came to be for the Playstation 4 from Konami.  A joint venture between film director Guillermo del Toro and the famous creator of Metal Gear Solid, Hideo Kojima, this demo spooked the pants off of everyone and was probably the reason a lot of people decided to buy a Playstation 4.  Unfortunately Konami let Hideo Kojima go under less than favorable conditions and the demo vanished with him in time.  Since then the immersive, first person perspective horror game demo changed the landscape of what survival horror could be.  We then saw Resident Evil VII by Capcom, the Park by Funcom, Layers of Fear by Aspyr and Death Standing by Hideo Kojima's new studio Kojima Productions that were all heavily influenced by PT (this point made more obvious for Hido Kojima's Death Stranding) and the future of Survial Horror / Suspense games seems to be headed there with upcoming games like Resident Evil VIII: The Village.  The only reason this isn't officially on the list is because, well, it was sadly never a game but its influence was too important for me not to mention.

Number 5: Sonic Mania.  Ok so Sonic Mania isn't anything new but it is very important in the sense that it is a major franchise, Sonic, by a well established publisher, Sega, and they had officially given the keys of Mobius to the fandom to make a new game and it was fantastic. While that's oversimplying things a bit errr a lot, since Sega just didn't come out of the blue offering that opportunity.  Rather Sega saw a Sonic game pitched by Christian Whitehead, aka Taxman, who worked on porting previous ports of Sonic games to Mobile platforms. Why I think it is important is that this validating the bridge between fandom and passion projects in world where game hacks and fangames are traditionally shut down almost immediately after gaining the slightest attention.  While Sonic Mania isn't a fangame, its roots were deep from the Romhack community.  This represents cracking the door between what the fandom produces and what the corporate offices allow being available to consumers in a world were popular fangames and hacks result in cease and desist orders - which is why I think is very important to put Sonic Mania as the number 5 game of this console generation.

Number 4: Rocket League.  As of today, Rocket League is a now free to play game for better or for worse.  Rocket League is high-octane fun, blasting balls across various courts and fields such as basketball and football with fast automobiles but what it is most well known for is basically soccer with cars.  Rocket League is a lot of fun to play and has a large audience of  in the streaming and esports field which would be reason enough to put this game in a top 5 but what this game marks maybe even more importantly is cross console online play. While other games have and do continue to have online play across systems, back in March of 2016 Microsoft was very interested in allowing online play between Xbox One and other consoles them being extremely hopeful for Playstation 4 in particular, however Sony was holding out.  Sony was hesitant, citing their emphasis on providing a certain quality online experience but finally came to the party and in 2019 you could finally play Rocket League online with all your friends whether it be on PC, Xbox One, Switch, or Playstation 4. Since then we have had other games slowly roll out this feature such as Wargroove and the trend seems to be expanding.  I hope to see all games adopt this in the future and since Rocket League “birthed” this concept coming to the table for cross console online play for us all to enjoy, this is why I think Rocket League deserves the number 4 slot.

Number 3: Bloodborne/Dark Souls III.  This past generation and hell even to some extent decade, spanning to the PS3/Xbox 360, has lead us to compare every challenging game that comes out to Dark Souls.  Cuphead is the Dark Souls of run and gun shooters, Dead Cells is the Dark Souls of Metroidvanias, Celeste is the Dark Souls of platformers, etc.  While the meme of “X is like the Dark Souls of” is hard to find a concrete start, according to Google Trends this first seemed to spike in April of 2015 around the release of Bloodborne, the PS4 game created by FromSoftware.  While not technically a Dark Souls game, it was made by the same team and the game play and feel is very Dark Souls in the sense that I feel the phrase is used today, in contrast to the first two Dark Souls games.  Then we can see that in/and around October 2017 the trend has risen to its peak a little after a year and a half of the release of Dark Souls III.  While this justification may seem more flimsy and ultimately the Dark Souls brand was established in 2011, I do think Bloodborne/Dark Souls III is more in the zeitgeist, if you will, of the “X is like Dark Souls” comparison that has shaped the conversation of so many games today.

Number 2: Undertale.  Undertale is perhaps the darling of this generation. A game chock full of charm with multiple ways to approach it.  Will you save everyone, sacrifice everyone, or something in-between?  This game does look next gen, current gen or even comparable to past gen games until you hit perhaps the SNES or even late NES.  Maybe a number 2 spot is too high on list – this game didn't revolutionize the industry in ways that the other games on this list did nor was it the first anti-RPG of its kind, that would probably go to MOON, but Undertale just had such a powerful impact on gamers when it came out and became so unforgettable.  I feel like Undertale will be a game that we remember for a long time and to not include it in this list because its an indie game would be a real tragedy which segways me to my number 1 game.

Number 1: Shovel Knight.  Shovel Knight is the indie game that, I think, lead to the current boom of retro inspired indie games we have been enjoying.  A love letter to the NES games of the past such as Castlevania, Mega Man and Ducktales to name a few.  Shovel Knight wasn't the first retro inspired indie games but I feel like the attention to detail in trying to stay as true to what the hardware could run in terms of look, color, sound and pixel art with its overwhelming success showed that there was a market for these type of games.  Its success kickstarter in 2013 also showed that Kickstarter could be used as a viable platform to create indie games for a wider audience without having to rely on that Triple A model of good gaming synonymous with big budget corporate funding.  I firmly believe that we wouldn't have the great retro inspired games like Celeste and Dead Cells or the Kickstarter'd Yooka Laylee and Bloodstained or games that did both like Blasphemous if it wasn't for the hard-work and ingenuity that Yacht Club Games paved with Shovel Knight.

To use a popular Youtube cliché to conclude this list, “At the end of the day” I didn't make this list to put Game Informer or anyone's personal preferences down.  If you believe that they got the Top 5 games of the decade right that's perfectly ok and valid too, to have as your opinion.  I also want to reiterate that those five games – The Last of Us Part II, the Witcher 3, Red Dead Redemption 2, Zelda Breath of the Wild and God of War are all important to this generation coming to a close as well in their own way.  While this list isn't my favorite games of the past generation, maybe I'll do that in the future, they are my subjective “best games list” of the past generation for what I think they did to the industry and you are free to agree, disagree, pick and choose between my list and Game Informers list or make a completely different list of your own.  I'm personally excited to see what the future of gaming has for us in this coming generation and optimistic for what's both around the corner and late into the next systems' life-cycle.  Happy gaming to you however you play.

Webpages noted: https://www.polygon.com/2020/9/17/21443683/nintendo-3ds-discontinued-lifetime-sales-hardware-software-units

https://www.fandom.com/articles/sonic-mania-just-nostalgia

https://www.theverge.com/2017/6/15/15807138/sony-playstation-cross-network-play-xbox-block-response

https://www.gamespot.com/articles/were-ready-microsoft-says-about-xbox-one-ps4-cross/1100-6438654/

https://www.rocketleague.com/news/full-cross-platform-play-now-live-in-rocket-league/

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/yachtclubgames/shovel-knight

https://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/DavidDAngelo/20140625/219383/Breaking_the_NES_for_Shovel_Knight.php

Games shown/referenced in the video:

The Last of Us Part 2

God of War

Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

Red Dead Redeption II

Witcher 3

PT / Silent Hill S

Sonic Mania

Rocket League

Blood Borne

Dark Souls III

Undertale

Shovel Knight

Shantae: Half Genie Hero

Cuphead

Celeste

Yooka Laylee

Mega Man 2

Ducktales

Castlevania

Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night

Blasphemous

Dead Cells

Resident Evil 7

Resident Evil 8

Moon

Layers of Fear

The Park

Death Stranding

Bonus Footage:

Xbox Series X reveal trailer

PS5 reveal trailer

Also note: I messed up in the original video and said the phrase, “X is like Dark Souls of” spiked in April of 2015 when I should have said first peaked in January to April of 2015.  I noted it in the video but wanted to note it again, sorry.

[mbistuff]

Deltarune Analysis Part 1: Relation to Undertale

Hey, this is MBIadekindEyewear and today I’m going to produce the only good Deltarune theories on the internet. Throw me an ask or something if there’s anything you want me to theorise about.  Spoilers under the cut.

 Deltarune.

There is a prophecy.

The Angel... The one who was seen the Surface...

They will return. And the underground will go empty.

Part 1: What the hell is happening? What is the relation to Undertale?

Okay, so let’s start out big.  It’s pretty explicitly not a sequel nor a prequel. Asriel being alive and well, plus Undyne having two eyes rules out sequel, while the monsters that turned into Amalgamates having graves rules out prequel.

So, what is it?

First of all, it’s an Alternative Universe.  This much is pretty obvious. Many characters are shared, and a lot of events draw strange parallels with Undertale. Deltarune is an anagram of Undertale, a familiar but distorted reflection.

Well, that’s not quite true, but it’s true enough for now.

Deltarune is a meta-sequel to Undertale. And it’s a meta-prequel to Undertale. It’s a whole meta-ton of other things things, too.

First, I’m going to briefly go over what it isn’t, then I’m going to jump into what all that means.

This isn’t the “the next world” that Chara mentioned in Undertale. I think too many people have lost sight of what Chara actually is. More on this later, as the idea of Chara is very important, but “The next world” just meant “Whatever RPG you next play”. Hey, maybe that RPG is Deltarune, but that’s by no means a sure bet.

This isn’t an Alternative Timeline. This is a very similar concept to Alternative Universe, but there’s a slight difference in what this means. Alternative Timeline very much implies that there was an event or sequence of events that happened differently that led to this. I don’t think this is possible. Asriel died hundreds of years ago in Undertale, and yet he’s college age in Deltarune.

The idea of the Meta-prequel is perhaps the easier one to grasp. Even if you were to ignore Toby’s tweet that Deltarune was Toby’s original RPG idea before Undertale, there’s plenty of evidence to go around. 

When you dig deeper into Undertale, there’s multiple hints that the world was once different. Sans “gave up on trying to go back”, and there’s that one picture in San’s hidden workshop.

... don’t forget.

Further more, in Delta Rune itself, the main menu music is called Before the Story. While this seems like it’s just referring to the fact that the main menu is where you go before gameplay, the player doesn’t actually hear this music the first time they play. They get thrown straight into the story when they launch the program for the first time, meaning it’s impossible to hear Before the Story before the story begins.

Instead, I interpret this title to mean Before The Tale.

Plus, there’s all the Gastery stuff, a character who Does Not Exist in Undertale, outside of scattered fragments hidden deep in the code.

All this points to the world of Deltarune, however it exists, to not be just a meaningless alternative universe, but instead, a precursor to Undertale’s universe. I’d go as far as to say Undertale’s universe is the reflection of Deltarune, and not the other way around, regardless of release order.

The Meta-sequel is where things get a bit confusing.

See, Undertale is a very unique game. It draws you, The Player, into the world as a character. Chara is quite explicitly a part of the player, their desire to see numbers go up. Chara’s “canon” name is even the same as your own name. 

(can’t find Toby’s 2015 tweet telling you to name the character after yourself unfortunately, but this picture from Deltarune’s naming section should do.)

You, The Player, are a character in these games. A character who has played Undertale. You’re bringing out of game knowledge into the game world through your connection with Kris. This gets commented on a few times throughout the game, but the most clear example is when you tell Sans “It’s great to see you again.” Kris has never seen Sans before. You, The Player, have. This is Undertale knowledge being transferred directly into Deltarune.

This isn’t just a funny little easter egg either. Toby did say that the game was “for those who have completed Undertale”. By design, the player shouldn’t not have out-of-game knowledge. 

So, yeah. Here’s what I believe to be the exact relation between Undertale and Deltarune.

Now that’s that’s settled, let’s have some fun. Feel free to stop reading now. The rest of the post is almost certainly going to devolving into shitposteing.

Flashback to 2008. Bloody hell, that’s an entire decade ago. A certain young man had a very busy 2008, creating a famous and later infamous romhack of Earthbound. Yep, that’s right, I’m talking about The EarthBound Halloween Hack.

For those not in the know, Toby created a dark, disturbing hack of EarthBound. In this hack, the player is initially greeted with an alternative Earthbound with familiar characters and visuals, although the protagonist Ness has been replaced with mysterious bounty hunter Varik, a character with many strange parallels to Ness. Things soon get dark and the player explores new areas, before entering the mindscape of a madman, playing through a jumble of Mother references.

The single biggest theme in this hack is the lack of player choice. No matter what the player does, the game has only one outcome. Their choices do not matter. Undertale explored these ideas to some degree (I’d love to talk about player choice in Undertale sometime, actually.), but Deltarune seems to be revisiting The Halloween Hack’s driving theme.

That, and the release date, leads me to suspect that Deltarune is The Undertale Halloween Hack, a spiritual successor to Toby’s old shame.

(Also Varik’s one defining trait is that he’s an alcoholic, and Kris apparently has an obsession with the “fruit juice” at the church that might be wine but jokingly censored and this miiight be a reference but I’m really reaching here.)

And now, we can finally stop ignoring the elephant in the room

Deltarune is a Homestuck reference aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaoookay I’m done

[pollux-ap-gold]

Recruitment For Fangame

So I got this idea about creating a sort of Homestuck x Pokemon Crossover. And I need helpers since I can't actually code or sprite or anything like that. I'll be working as a Script Writer.

Here's a small summary - You wake up in a forest not far from a town/city with nothing but a pokeball on your hip, a vaguely familiar symbol on your shirt, and 5,000 cash in your pocket. You soon realize you're in the Pokemon world! You don't know how you got here, and to be completely honest, you don't care. It was every Poke-Fans dream! You even already have a starter! Now you must set off to find out where you are. Perhaps a visit to the town/cities library is in order?

I already have some things written down, as well as ideas ans such I am hoping for. Wether the game is ROMHack or uses an RPG maker is up to you and whichever is easiest.

I don't think you need to know much about Homestuck itself, since I'll be doing most of the writing, and looking up cannon characters to see what they look like is rather easy. At most, you'll have to look up Homestuck Aspects, which will be explained.

Anyone who does end up aiding will get certain perks that will be explained.

People I'll Probably Need:

Script Writers - Not necessary, but not against, as this would help me decide some stuff

Mappers - again, I'm no good with technical things. And I'm broke so I cant buy any of those fancy stuff to attempt to learn.

Sprites (Pokemon and Humans) - I could help design any non-canon characters in a normal art way, but actually creating the sprites? I also plan on creating 12 legendaries for this Hack based on the Chinese Zodiac, but as I stated I cant sprite.

Actions - battles, what moves look like in battle

Sound: SFX - Sound Effects for the game, such as certain items being used, etc.

Cries - I suppose this could be under SFX as well, but I'll separate it just in case

Music! - I love music. I need some music makers, or people who know how to use/input music into the game.

Betas - For test plays and to make sure everything is working properly. (9/10)

Message me if you're interested. I'll explain the perks after you join. (Also, please tell me if I'm missing anything in this post so I can edit it. I also need to create a discord real quick. I did this before doing that.)

[sage-nebula]

I received a reminder to talk about how, where, and why Game Freak continues to go wrong with villain redemptions, and so I’m going to take a moment to do just that.

TL;DR: I don’t think Game Freak understands how villain redemptions work.

Here’s the thing:

There’s a truth universally known in the world that people, in general, are multifaceted. People have good qualities, and they have flaws; people can be serial murderers, but still have a soft spot for kittens. People can donate to charity, volunteer at homeless shelters, work as a nurse saving lives, and yet still be horrible, homophobic bigots. No matter how disgustingly evil, or how wonderfully sweet, a person may be, it’s always important to remember that they are still people. People are capable of being evil, just as people are capable of being good. It doesn’t make them less of people. It just makes them human.

To that end, caricatures aren’t interesting characters. What I mean by this is: It’s not interesting to have a character who is a Card Carrying Villain, who is evil purely for the sake of being evil (which is where a lot of Team Rocket’s writing went awry in the early days, even if it made for an unintentionally hilarious ROMhack once). Even if you write a character whose actions qualify them for being called a monster or a demon (even though they are, still, a person), it’s important that their reasoning goes beyond, “Well, I just want to be evil.” Maybe you’re letting them be evil, but they need to have more complex reasoning for their actions. More importantly, it’s important to have them consider whether they feel their actions are evil or not. Most people, no matter how heinous their actions, feel they are justified. If your character doesn’t, then how do they approach that question? Why are they doing what they do? Have they considered they’re morally wrong from a certain point of view, but just don’t care? Why don’t they care? They’re a person, and people are complex. People have thoughts and reasoning behind their actions. It’s important to consider this, because no one likes a mustache-twirler. They aren’t fun.

And I say all of this to make an important note: A character who is beyond horrible, and definitively evil without a tragic backstory or “morally grey” reasoning, is not necessarily a poorly written character. There are people alive in this world today---and there have been people alive in this world throughout history---who simply are heinous, horrible, vile people. They’re not automatically caricatures just because they are undeniably, inarguably evil. There is “advice” floating around nowadays that if you write a truly evil character, you’re automatically boring and your character is flat, and that simply isn’t true. Again, it’s about the reasoning. It’s about the personality. It’s about how the rest of the plot incorporates that villain, and how that villain works within the confines of the narrative, and how that villain interacts with the other characters. Sometimes people (and therefore characters) are just evil. Acknowledging that, and giving your readers a chance to fight it in the safe space of fiction (and therefore catharsis as they triumph over what they perhaps could not in real life) is not bad writing, depending on how you do it. It’s a misconception otherwise that it is.

I say all of this to say that Game Freak . . . has sorely misunderstood all of the above.

Let’s rewind the clock back to 1996, when the very first Pokémon games were written and released. As I said above, Game Freak made some mistakes when writing Team Rocket in the sense that, despite the fact that Team Rocket is quite clearly based on the yakuza (/mafia), a lot of their dialogue comes across as really hammy and cheesy. The characters will often blatantly state that what they are doing is evil, and they intend for it to be evil, in both the games and the anime. This is something that, despite all the years they’ve had to do it, Game Freak has not attempted to rectify. In Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon, Giovanni is called “the most evil person” to ever exist, or some such, to the point where Colress can’t fix the wormhole nonsense until Giovani is defeated. And that . . . well, that leads into another point that I’ll get to in a moment. The point here is, Game Freak created villains in the form of Team Rocket, but although Team Rocket did do one inexcusably horrible thing (the murder of the marowak), and while they had the potential to do more terrible things, their actual acts within the (threadbare) plot as it was didn’t match up. They claimed to be evil, but they didn’t pose much of a threat. They’re called notoriously evil and treated as all but irredeemable . . . just because.

So in this, perhaps Game Freak looked back upon Team Rocket, and realized that they made a mistake by trying to make Team Rocket (and, more importantly, Giovanni, Archer, Ariana, Proton, and Petrel) out to be completely irredeemable. So they thought, okay. Good writing means writing characters with shades of grey, so we’ll start treating our villains as characters who could, and should, and perhaps even will be redeemed.

Enter Lysandre and Lusamine.

Now, before anyone has a chance to argue, I know that Lysandre didn’t get a full redemption. He died. But there is still no mistaking the fact that---perhaps due to how well-received N was in Gen V (and more on him in a second)---Lysandre was still treated with the attitude of “alas, poor villain” within the game’s narrative itself, courtesy of Sycamore at the very end of the game. Oh yes, you’re thanked for stopping Lysandre, but there’s a “woe betide” tone to Sycamore’s dialogue as he laments that he had hoped Lysandre would “set his pride aside,” as if Lysandre had stirred up a bit of trouble instead of actively trying to commit mass genocide. We’re supposed to view Lysandre as a sympathetic individual despite his heinous actions and beliefs. This is something that is echoed in how Lysandre was described in the official descriptions for the Team Rainbow Rocket portion of USUM, where although Ghetsis (a man whose ultimate goal was power for himself, though he had child abuse as a by-product of that) is treated as irredeemably evil, Lysandre is viewed mostly sympathetically, because he was sad that he was going to personally wipe out all pokémon life, save for those few within Team Flare he’d be sparing. Lysandre didn’t get a happy ending, no, but the narrative (and Game Freak themselves) have told us that he should have, or that we should have wanted him to.

This was amplified to an even worse degree with Lusamine. In the original Sun and Moon games, we see that even though Lusamine has been horribly abusive to her children for most of their lives, to the point where she actively tries to murder Lillie on-screen, her children are forced (by the narrative) to clean up her mess and take care of her after the game’s conclusion. The narrative tells us that we should hope that she recovers, and that we should be happy that Lillie is going off with her (and that Gladion is trapped at Aether Paradise). USUM makes this even worse; Lusamine is just as abusive to her children as she was before (Gladion’s dialogue about “being an ornament to [his] mother” is the same, she still disowns them as they stand in front of her, still berates and belittles them, et cetera), but she is never called out for it. The game paints her as a hero because she wishes to stop Necrozma, and both of her children are desperate to protect and help her. In the post-game segment she is taken as a hostage by Giovanni (whom we’re supposed to believe is worse than her---and more on that in a second), and we are forced to go in and rescue her. The player and a few other characters laugh with Lusamine as they are surrounded by the pokémon that she has cryogenically frozen to fit with her aesthetic. It’s clear that Lusamine is still completely horrible, yet the game tells us that she is a good person. The game tells us that she is “redeemed”. The game tells us that we should not view her as a villain, not anymore, not now, and that we should be sad that she doesn’t get to live a happy life with her husband.

Here we see that Game Freak is still not getting it right.

Here’s the thing: It’s not inherently wrong to have a villain redemption. Some (emphasis on some) villains can be redeemed. But in order to redeem your villain, one condition must be met above all others:

The villain must have not crossed a line that makes it so that the audience no longer WANTS them to be redeemed.

This sounds vague, so let me explain. There are some (admittedly subjective, for the most part) lines that people must not cross, at any point, or else they’ll have crossed what is sometimes known as a Moral Event Horizon. These lines in the sand are so deep, and so important, that there is no looking back once they have been crossed. Committing (or attempting to commit) mass genocide is, quite understandably, a Moral Event Horizon for most people. There is no walking back from that. There is no justifying that. It doesn’t matter what your reasons are; you are undeniably, inarguably wrong regardless, and you must be stopped regardless, and you will not and cannot be forgiven regardless. There is no justification for that, there is no forgiveness for that. Once you cross that line, you will be hard pressed to find an audience who will sympathize with you, as it should be.

And while that is an extreme example, it isn’t the only example. While you get into more subjective and divisive territory as you move away from the extremes, for many (such as myself) child abuse is another line that cannot and should not be crossed without the audience losing the will or desire to see the villain redeemed. Animal abuse is another, and so on and so forth. The point I’m making here is that there does come a point when your villain’s actions make them irredeemable, not necessarily because the characters in the story won’t believe them (a writer can make a character do whatever they want, even if it would be OoC or make no sense), but because the audience won’t want to see it happen. The audience can’t write the story themselves (though fix-it fic does exist), but the audience can decide that they hate your story, and they hate what you’ve done with it, and at that point, you’ve lost them. At that point, while you can still keep your story the way it is if you wish, you have, absolutely, fucked up the villain redemption.

And this is what Game Freak keeps doing.

Game Freak, for whatever inconceivable reason, has the concept of villain redemption twisted and backwards. In Game Freak’s eyes, Giovanni is irredeemable. In their eyes, he is the Most Evil™. Yet, despite what he should be capable of as the leader of a yakuza / mafia, we don’t actually see that evil from Giovanni himself. Even including the Team Rainbow Rocket nonsense, here is a list of what we see Giovanni desire and do:

He wants power and money (lots of money). He says he wants to use everything in the world to serve Team Rocket, but outside of getting involved in the regional government via being a Gym Leader (not even the highest position!), he hasn’t done too much to succeed in this.

Takes of Silph Co to force the CEO to give him a Master Ball.

Disbands Team Rocket after being beaten three times.

Leaves his son behind when he disbands Team Rocket.

Thinks about reforming Team Rocket three years later when he hears his executives calling for him, but decides against it after being beaten in battle by another child.

Forms Team Rainbow Rocket at some point, and takes Lusamine hostage by knocking her out with an Ultra Beast. Plans to turn her into a servant when she wakes up.

And that’s it. That’s the worst he does. Even when it comes to Johto Rival, there is no indication that Giovanni ever abused or mistreated him. The most we get is in the flashback in HGSS when we see that Johto Rival confronts Giovanni over Giovanni’s decision to disband. Johto Rival is furious over this; he’s furious over the fact that Giovanni would even temporarily disband because he lost battles to a child, he claims he doesn’t understand how his father could be so weak, he calls his father a coward, and then he runs away. And what’s important to note here is that although Johto Rival is railing off at his father, Giovanni does not verbally assault him in turn; in fact, Giovanni isn’t even mean to him, even a little! Here is all we see Giovanni say to his son:

“. . . One must acknowledge one's defeat before he can move on . . . I will go solo . . . for now . . . so that one day I will form a stronger organization! [. . .] Putting together the potential of many is how you produce a huge power . . . that's what an organization is. That's the strength of an organization! I failed . . . to make the best use of my subordinates' potential . . .  ! But you shall witness one day the revival of me and my Team Rocket! [. . .] . . . One day, you will understand.”

The idea that I’ve seen some perpetuate that Giovanni is abusive to Johto Rival is one that exists purely because of the fact that Giovanni is a villain. In truth, there is no evidence of this in canon. Giovanni, despite being the boss of a criminal organization, does not commit heinous crimes. He does not attempt to destroy the world or commit murders (it was Rocket grunts who killed the marowak, not Giovanni himself). He does allow Johto Rival to run away crying, but he has quiet faith to himself that one day, Johto Rival will understand where he is coming from. He doesn’t insult or belittle Johto Rival in any way for his lack of understanding; if anything, he tries to speak to Johto Rival as an equal, tries to help him understand. What I’m getting here is that Game Freak doesn’t even have “he was an abusive father” to try to make Giovanni seem irredeemable, because in all honesty, he wasn’t.

Yet, despite the fact that there is plenty of evidence within canon for Giovanni to actually be redeemable, for him to see the error of his ways and turn over a new leaf for a variety pack of reasons (maybe he wants to spend more time with his son, maybe he developed morals and ethics over the course of his training and decided to use Team Rocket as a force for good and get money and power that way, who knows), Game Freak chose to never go that route. Instead, they chose to claim that he is beyond salvation, that he is irredeemable, that he is the most evil character they have ever created, save perhaps Ghetsis. Giovanni doesn’t get even a hint of redemption, despite how easy (and believable!) it would be; instead, he is reiterated in the most recent games to be the most evil of them all.

On the other hand, Lysandre and Lusamine . . . well, I already outlined them above.

Lysandre wanted to commit mass genocide (save for those who could afford to pay him an exorbitant fee) because he felt it was the only way to conserve beauty and natural resources. Yes, he shed a tear when he thought about all the pokémon he was going to otherwise mercilessly slaughter, but he still decided that genocide was an acceptable and worthwhile solution to what he personally saw as a crisis, and decided to go forward with it, to the point where he lies to and purposefully obstructs the player even after he acknowledges that the player is trying to stop him (and that the player successfully won his game at one point, should you choose the correct button in his base---meaning, if the player chose the correct button, he had the “out” of his plan that he supposedly wanted, and he not only didn’t take it, but laughed about how he wasn’t taking it). He pulls this same stunt again in the Team Rainbow Rocket portion, saying that he plans to commit mass genocide in this new world that he has found himself in, and that he is going to purposefully do everything in his power to prevent you from stopping the firing of the ultimate weapon. Lysandre wants genocide. He, in his heart of hearts, wants to murder countless billions, and wants it so badly that in the Gen VI games he lashes out and tries to commit murder (or “curse with immortality”) on the teenagers who successfully stopped him when all is said and done. His ultimate goal and truest desire was genocide, and when he didn’t get it, he threw a tantrum that could have resulted in murder.

Yet Game Freak, despite this most heinous of Moral Event Horizons being crossed, saw fit to sympathize with him. They saw fit to try and make him appear tragic. They decided that Lysandre, of all characters was worthy of . . . not a happy ending, per se, since he died, but people feeling sorry and sad that he was gone. They thought it would make their remaining characters look good to have them mourning a man who wanted to commit mass genocide, them included. (And this isn’t even getting into Xerosic, who willfully strips bodily autonomy and consent from a teenage girl and makes her do every little thing he tells her to in the name of science, yet is then treated like a father figure by said girl who isn’t aware of the things he made her do . . . do I need to spell out how disgustingly creepy that is? I really hope I don’t. Looker should have knocked every last one of Xerosic’s teeth down his throat and never looked back.)

Lusamine is the same way. The horrifying experiments and cruel fates she cast upon dozens of pokémon aside, Lusamine is the most realistic abusive parent Game Freak has ever written. Ghetsis’ dialogue comes across like a cartoonish villain; Lusamine says things to Gladion and Lillie, on-screen, that my abusive mother has said to me. In the original SM, I actually had to put the game down for a second because it hit me that hard. Lusamine uses her children like they are objects; it isn’t just that we hear about abuse, but rather that we see her being abusive. Yet despite this, perhaps as a result of filial piety within Japanese culture, Game Freak not only saw fit to offer her “redemption” at the end of SM by having her children look after her, but decided to pretend as if she wasn’t even villainous at all in USUM, despite the fact that she’s just as abusive to her children there (note how she’s only kind to them when they express desire to protect or help her), and the fact that she does all the same cruel experiments and cryogenic freezing on pokémon there as she did in the original. This goes beyond mere redemption; Game Freak decided that this was a character not even deserving of being treated like a villain at all, even for a second, instead choosing to foist that status on Faba, despite how it made less sense.

The problem that I am driving at here is that both Lysandre and Lusamine crossed lines that should not ever be crossed. They did (or attempted to do) things that cannot be forgiven. What they did makes an audience want them beaten into the ground, not redeemed. Yet Game Freak, for whatever reason, misunderstood that. Game Freak missed the memo. Game Freak, rather than allowing us satisfying catharsis by beating them into the dirt and having the rest of the narrative show what a correct course of action that was, decided to pretend as if these characters were the most sympathetic and deserving of redemption of (almost) all the other villains they created. Meanwhile, characters like Giovanni who didn’t do very much wrong and would have every reason in the world to change their tune (or characters like Cyrus who, yes, did a lot of wrong and could stand to have some jail time, have motivations that he could feasibly be talked down from and have a believable redemption, especially since he didn’t want to kill everyone, but just wanted to “destroy emotion,” which is . . . bad, but at least people are still alive) are treated as irredeemable. It’s backwards. It doesn’t make sense.

The truth is, I can think of only two times when Game Freak got this whole “redemption” business inarguably correct, and both of those times took place within Gen V. N is the primary antagonist of the first Gen V games, in that he is the one you interact with the most, he is the one coronated as Team Plasma’s King, he is the one passionately espousing Plasma’s ideals, who genuinely believes that what he is doing is correct. It isn’t until the end of the game that we (and N) learn that Ghetsis planned to use him as a figurehead puppet king, and that Ghetsis was truly the mastermind behind everything all along, whispering plans into the rightful king’s ear. (Well, in honesty, it was easy to tell early on that Ghetsis is evil because he is that cartoonish, but you get my meaning.) Therefore, while N is best described as an anti-villain, he still is on the side of the antagonists for the majority of the game. He was still in the realm of needing a redemption . . .

. . . and he got one.

N learned the error of his ways. We see him learning as the game progresses. And in the second games, he returns to confront Ghetsis and put an end to his plans once and for all. N was redeemed, and he was able to be redeemed because he had a likable and sympathetic personality; he had goals that weren’t actually inherently evil (mean, yes, but wanting to fight for pokémon welfare is not a bad thing); and he didn’t do anything heinous. He didn’t cross a Moral Event Horizon. Ghetsis did---Ghetsis is a serial child abuser who also enslaved countless pokémon to build a castle---but N did not. Thus, in a show of getting it right for once, Game Freak redeemed N and cast Ghetsis as the monster, as it should be.

The second Unovan games were quite similar. Colress was “in charge” of Plasma this time around, but while he did terrible things (he froze over half the region, Colress, pls), he did so mostly in the name of science and made it clear he wanted Ghetsis stopped. Colress, like N, was never truly evil; he was being used and taken advantage of. Therefore, when he was redeemed, it made sense. It worked within the context of the narrative. Once again, Game Freak got it inarguably right.

However, the Unova games are the exception to the rule when it comes to Game Freak’s writing. Even when it comes to Archie and Maxie, both of whom were redeemed by the conclusion of their narratives (especially in ORAS), it’s . . . difficult to say that this is a case of getting it right, because both of them ultimately desired to end the world and kill a good number of the people and pokémon within it, even if unintentionally. And even that (that the deaths caused by their ultimate goals would be unintentional) is difficult to say, because it’s impossible to understand how Archie could be so stupid that he wouldn’t understand that human beings do not have gills, and thus would drown. It is impossible to understand how he could be so stupid that he wouldn’t understand that every pokémon that was not a water-type would meet the same fate. Conversely, it’s hard to understand how a supposed genius like Maxie wouldn’t be able to account for the fact that the water in the oceans is an important component of the planet’s natural water cycle, which all life needs to exist. It’s hard to understand how a supposed genius like Maxie wouldn’t think of all of the water pokémon that would suffer and die with their habitat stripped away. Archie’s and Maxie’s plans caused the apocalypse, and while they seem like nice enough guys who were “genuinely trying to help” (Archie in particular is especially affable in ORAS), it’s hard to say that they didn’t cross a line that should never be crossed considering they tried to kill just about everyone on the planet, yet were apparently too incompetent to realize it.

Still, I can give Game Freak more of a pass for Archie and Maxie than I can for Lysandre and Lusamine, considering that at least Archie and Maxie have the “we failed elementary school science and are too stupid to realize how many will die when we enact our plans until it is too late” as an excuse, whereas Lysandre and Lusamine knew what they were doing and did it anyway, with great gusto. That Game Freak would create characters who so willfully, proudly, and happily cross such lines---and who flaunt it in the face of the player---and then act as though the player should want these characters to have a happy ending is just . . .

Well. I’ve already expressed my feelings on it.

Of course, much of this is subjective. Lines in the sand are inherent in an individual person’s morality. God knows there are plenty of people in this fandom who love Lusamine and purposefully ignore the fact that she was a horribly abusive mother to her children (far worse than Ghetsis was, tbh, not that he should be redeemed either, because he should not and was not and thus there is no problem to be discussed there), and I know that Lysandre has his fans despite his actions as well. And believe me, I have no interest in arguing with fans of either character about why they’re ~actually good~, so don’t try, because you’ll be wasting everyone’s time. But my point in writing all of this is that Game Freak seems to lack a very fundamental understanding when it comes to whether characters should or can be redeemed, and that is this:

If you make your characters do things that are heinous enough, then no matter how much you insist that they are sympathetic and should be redeemed, be aware that by and large, your audience will not agree with you.

And also:

If you DON’T make your characters do things that are heinous, then no matter how much you insist that they are the most evil of evil characters, be aware that by and large, your audience will not agree with you.

And lastly:

Don’t write villains who are supposed to be geniuses, yet who somehow don’t understand that their plan is going to wipe out over half the planet, for fucksake.

Like, honestly, you can I guess argue that Archie is stupid because he was a bodybuilding bro, but Maxie was supposed to be a genius, and yet he just . . . he . . .

Game Freak needs to hire me to write their games for them, istfg.

[radramblog]

“Pokémon is too easy”

It’s a relatively common complaint that the Pokémon games are just too easy for the majority of gamers. Particularly with some of the newer ones. And while I don’t agree in all cases, the complaint is rampant enough that hey, maybe there’s some worth in it. So here’s some ideas for if you think Pokemans are too easy but you still want to play them.

1. Challenge Runs

Pokémon is a series that people tend to replay over and over, and I think this is partially why people think they’re so easy- they know what’s coming because they’ve played the game a dozen times before. If you’re looking for a challenge where you can still apply that knowledge, however, consider a form of self-imposed challenge- you can combine that familiarity with the innovation required in a restrictive ruleset to great effect.

Of course, the most popular version of this is the Nuzlocke challenge. And to be fair it’s like that for a reason- adding an actual fail-state to the game, heavily limiting the available options, and nullifying many cheese strategies does make the game a lot more engaging. I’d also recommend prohibiting overlevelling in some way, since grinding isn’t fun and neither is breezing through bosses effortlessly. 

But, of course, other types of challenges exist. Monotype runs are pretty interesting, tightly constricting your team’s variety and making certain boss fights that you’re weak to much tougher than they’d normally be. It is worth noting, however, that these can vary wildly depending on types- a mono-water run is going to be a lot easier than, say, a mono-ice or ghost, with those being nigh-impossible in most games simply because you can’t get anything of those types early on and the games never have very many of them.

Other common challenge runs include solo runs, where you only use one Pokémon the whole time- these aren’t actually that hard from what I’ve seen, though, since you just end up massively overlevelled. There’s a huge variety of challenge runs available, especially when it comes to Nuzlocke variants, so I’m sure you can find something that suits your fancy for the next playthrough.

2. Competitive

Competitive Pokémon is almost alien to the main series games, but it’s easier to get into than it ever has been, and the depth of the strategy is frankly astonishing. If you’ve played much of the main games, you’ll be aware that Double Battles are substantially more complex than single battles, and it’s for that reason that the games’ main official competitive format, VGC, is exclusively doubles based.

Sword and Shield have made it profoundly easy to get into competitive battling compared to previous generations. The plentiful resources and good Pokemon available from the Raid Dens, as well as QOL features in the postgame and DLCs, make grinding up a team so much easier, and the Battle Tower is actually decent challenge now. Playing on the online ladder rewards you with relevant items and BP even if you barely participate. But more than anything else, the game now allows teams to be uploaded online and rented for use on ladder and in the Tower, meaning one of the biggest barriers to entry is null if you want it to be. Of course, this doesn’t work for IRL tournaments, but half the world isn’t getting those right now anyway, so.

Of course, if you don’t have Sword/Shield (or Switch Online, which tbh valid), then Smogon’s Pokémon Showdown is as good as it has ever been. There isn’t really a better way to practice and play such a wide variety of formats, including the competitive scene from every single generation each with its own still-developing meta and community. If you’re someone who used to play but fell off, that old OU is still available to pick back up again (man bring me back to Gen 7 monotype though).  And of course, Random Battles are just a blast. It’s a truly impressive program- and I’m shocked it’s still running after all these years.

3. Romhacks

Apparently, romhackers are well and truly in the belief that Pokémon is too easy- and to be fair, the mean age and Pokémon familiarity of a Romhack’s audience is higher than the main series. With that in mind, a huge number of the romhacks that exist do so with the intent of making a more difficult experience. One of the classic examples of this is Drayano’s romhacks- he’s done a set for HGSS, FRLG, BW, BW2, and Platinum off the top of my head, each of which was for a time the pinnacle of polished difficulty in Pokémon- Renegade Platinum is inarguably still the best Platinum hack around, and arguments could be made for Volt White/Blaze Black and its sequels.

I do intend to talk in more detail about the newer generation of Romhacking, but the tools available at this point to gen III hackers allow for the addition of all the features from modern games- Megas, Z-Moves, Dynamax , etc.- and with that comes a whole set of difficult hacks that dwarf old classics like Fire Red Omega or Yet Another Fire Red Hack. Radical Red is perhaps the most infamous of these- the best way to describe it is as a romhack where every boss fight is supposed to be like a competitive game, and you’re going to have to actually train/breed competitively to cleanly succeed. I’m actually of the opinion that hacks like this and Emerald Kaizo are too tough to the point of being unfun, but I have limited experience with them.

Regardless, between these options and more, there are plenty of ways to make Pokémon not too easy. So don’t fucking complain about it again, kthnx