itch.io

Thanks for replying! I have seen far too many creators be completely absent from their communities, and it breaks my heart when amazing concepts and ideas go to waste for no reason other than "the creators never listen", and the community felt ignored or alienated and left. Even Pokémon itself would be one of these if it wasn't being pushed so much by Nintendo; How many times have we all asked for real time battles, or new types?

Also, I just wanted to ask a few questions (and then a few of my own opinions, because I can't not):

What are your opinions on fakemon? I personally like the concept of them, but they always just feel... wrong, or alien, or other, or whatever word you want to use to describe it. In my experience, new forms (regional variants, megas, even prevolutions and evolutions) usually work pretty well. I obviously don't know your plans or have any weight in the matter, but I feel like a new form for the Mistress could be very rewarding, both narratively and precedent wise (Usually, Pokémon remakes and sequels give new forms or just new legendaries altogether, Black and White 2 with kyurem/merging and Platinum with the Mistress are key examples of this).

Plotwise, what are your ideas to keep it fresh? You obviously have the framework of "Beat the gyms" combined with the Mistress' aims of corrupting the world, but I feel like the basic loop you have already set up of "Get new Pokémon to corrupt more people to progress the story to get more Pokémon" could get repetitive very fast. My hope is that you continue with the precedent of "Sidequests are the main quest", like what you did with Deoxys. I feel like it rewards exploration and makes the game feel a lot less like a novel or movie and more like a living world, and it also feels more like you are taking advantage of opportunities.

Also, here are a few ideas for if you ever need something new, if you need a new mechanic, or if you just really like the ideas (obviously no pressure to use them or anything):

Plate integration: As of current, plates just give a bonus to a specific type of move. I think it could be really interesting to have them instead add a second type to a monotype, or change one of the types of a dual type to the type of the plate. This would fit really well with the established lore of arceus and the Mistress, maybe with a sideplot of gathering plates to give the Mistress power to beat arceus or something. To be honest, they could probably be guarded by Bosses who use their power to become even more powerful (Like frosslass using the ice plate to mega evolve, or Deoxys using the psychic plate to be more powerful). Maybe they are only plate shards or something if you don't want to give the plates too early. I just feel like there are a lot of Pokémon that have multiple types that could have been available to them, and this could be a good way to access their lost potential.

Trainer moves: We can use moves on enemy Pokémon in battle, and some trainers outside of battle, but what if we could use moves or some other equivalent in battle on the opponent trainer? Either by our Pokémon using moves on them, or us channelling the Mistress to do it ourselves, to get some minor effects (getting them to use a damaging move, or switch Pokémon, or something similar). Probably a lategame thing, and with some restrictions (a chance to fail and waste your turn, only once a battle, uses a turn, uses a resource, something like that), but I feel it fits well into the narrative being built so far.

Custom moves: Moves that you create. Obviously this would be hard to do, but it could be a custom named move that you choose the type, special or physical, and if it has a stat change effect or a flinch chance or something (with these lowering the power or accuracy of the move). Probably also lategame.

Anomalies: Pretty much just better shinies. A much lower chance (like 1/100), but they look different to reference different media. For example, a white Shedinja with a blue eye as a reference to sans (again, anyone who doesn't get this reference should play Undertale), or a pokemon with the colour palette of one of their regional variants (like decidueye being red instead), or an Ash cap Pikachu. Maybe these could be suggested by the community, or as Patreon rewards (if you wanted to do something like that).

Partner Mechanic: By having a Pokémon with really high friendship or designating it as your partner or something, they get their base stats scaled up to a preset total. Just so that people with a really bad favourite Pokémon can still use it in the game without feeling like it's wasting a slot or they need to swap it out to something "more useful".

There are probably plenty more ideas to come (I'm ADHD, my brain just does that), but if you don't want suggestions just say so. I would 100% rather to not annoy someone with ideas they don't want.

But anyway, thank you for all your effort!

Most Pokémon fangames are hard. Sure, someone who's been playing Pokémon for years would probably love a more difficult game, but most fangames just seem difficult beyond reason. As someone with pretty mediocre Pokémon skills (I beat soulsilver and played a chunk of platinum and ZA, but I didn't know what EVs and IVs were until a year or two ago, and I sure as hell didn't pay attention to them in this game), I feel like this game hit the right balance: Difficult when it wants to be, but you have everything you need and more to win. The bosses and gyms are difficult, yes, but not overwhelmingly so, and the normal battles are either at your level or a little below (especially at the ends of a route).

This also leads into my next point: the bosses can be retried infinitely. If you only had one shot at that mega frosslass fight or the deoxys fight, it would be insanely difficult without having foreknowledge or being a Pokémon master. But because you can try again, you can try a different team or even just a different order. That's what I did: I pretty much used one team for everything (that was definitely not the best team), but I won decently quickly just by doing a few fights to find which Pokémon and which moves were the best to take out each specific Pokémon, then practically just find the best run for your team. For example, the first Pokémon in the Roxanne fight (I don't remember which one it is) is pretty much only there to set up stealth rock. If you use a low speed (so they go second) sandslash with rapid spin (clears terrain effects and does a bit of damage), it gets you into a loop where the opponent just uses stealth rock repeatedly until you beat them (please don't fix this). So, in short, I used the power of determination to win (if you don't get this reference, go play Undertale. Now. *Calls out Abra menacingly*).

Also, the plot is fucking amazing, one of the best concepts I have ever seen in a Pokémon fan project. Giratina is such an interesting Pokémon that should have gotten a lot more depth. Also, it isn't afraid to dive into what the reality of Pokémon would be like, whereas other fangames that try to do this still do dance around some of these themes. Sure, a lot of people would just look at this and say it's weird or gross, but you know what I say to that? Good. The NSFW keeps out all the Pokémon snobs who seem to only talk about fangames specifically to diss them, and the difficulty / slow start (NSFW wise) keep out the creepy pervs who are only here for the porn.

And now this brings me to the next topic: the NSFW. As I mentioned before, I really enjoy the depth of the plot and where it is willing to go, which reflects how the Pokémon world would actually play out. If you have all these pets that can use hypnotism and possession and stuff, why on earth would they not be used for other purposes? Yes, it starts off a little slow, but once new characters and Pokémon are introduced it really gets going. One critique: why does every single main character (who have better scenes than the normal NPCs) have tits the size of melons? Yeah, I know a lot of people like that sort of thing, but can we get a little variety? Some with smaller chests please?

Finally, two requests: A new NPC, and a new Pokémon:

First, the NPC. You know that girl who is meant to give you the map and whatnot in the originals? She's absent from this game so far, but could she maybe appear at home upstairs when you corrupt leaf in azure town?

And the Pokémon request: Ninetales. Yes, I know they aren't psychic or ghost, but read these quotes from bulbapedia: "A legend claims that Ninetales is the reincarnation of 9 united noble saints. While intelligent enough to easily understand human speech, Ninetales is a vengeful Pokémon known to curse those who mistreat it... It can live for 1,000 years due to the energy within its nine tails, each of which is said to have a different mystical power. Flames spewed from its mouth can hypnotize an opponent and its gleaming red eyes are said to give it the ability to control minds." Reincarnation sounds pretty ghostlike to me, and it canonically has two different methods of hypnosis (I also believe that I once read that its tails can be used for hypnosis as well, although I couldn't find a source for this). If you could make a fire/control Ninetails, that would be great (and if they could give the people they control tails, that would also be amazing. Not as in full furry, just a tail. Like how frosslass and misdreavus change the person's appearance. Yes, I know it's because they are possessing them, but there is no reason that the clothing should be affected. It could also be a way to reflect the reincarnation side of things).

But all in all, this is a very good fangame, and definitely the best I have ever played. Keep up the good work, and make sure to take breaks. I've seen it far too many times where someone starts a passion project, spends all their free time working on it, and then get super burnt out and it collapses.