Completed Dr. Professor's Quest for the Perfect Jam

It has been a long time since I've played one of your games, and I'm excited so excited to be able to again! I'll leave my thoughts when I play, but I just wanted to say congratz. Making a jam game is not easy as all, anyone who does it deserves a big pat on a pat. And from the looks of things you've done it well, so you deserve a big big pat on the back. Looking forward to the quest for the perfect jam!

Hey, I just got done with playing through the game! I was blown away, this may be one of my favorite fangames of all time- not just a favorite jam game, but in general.

Writing was smooth, genuinely funny at points, and the ending as it applies to the real pursuit of goals and making games gave me pause. I think the moral of the story, which I won't say due to not wanting to spoil the story, is excellent and well-done. It is choreographed well throughout the story. The characters were all fun to be around and all had their individual charm, with the exception of the Jam Keepers that I think could have used a bit more fleshing out to really give their words the weight that I think the game intended them to have.

The game isn't particularly difficult aside from some of the card game battles, but that's okay! I don't think I went into this game expecting a very difficult experience, and the game doesn't present itself in that way either. The gameplay was fun, the routes were large enough that I felt like I had a lot to explore without becoming genuinely lost, and the Pokemon selection was excellent. I found myself with a team of 4 Pokemon that I genuinely felt a strong connection towards through shared experiences. There was also fossil mining akin to the gen 4 games, the card game that I mentioned above, and a hand-to-hand minigame that requires you to learn everyone's individual vocal cues to know which moves to use. The game always kept me on my toes by introducing new things while still never going overboard with new mechanics and difficulty.

The character sprites could have been better, I don't like that they're all recolors or public resources, but given the time available to make this game it can be easily forgiven and this comment is easily overshadowed by the other great aspects of this game.

All in all, I recommend even the most passing of Pokemon fans to check this game out. You'll get a few laughs, see what the software is actually capable of when used to its fullest potential, and you may even learn a few things along the way. Maybe the true Perfect Jam was the friends we made along the way, Doctor Professor. Maybe it was.

Excellent game, a nice moral lesson too. It deserves a sequel so I hope you make one!!!

Hi, I played your game and I loved it. I probably wouldn't have played this if it wasn't for the positive replies left above, they convinced me to play and I'm so glad they did. I love how the game has a tendency to make fun of itself. It is just so self aware and simple but effective. Just fun. I had fun. Thank you. I have been having trouble finishing games lately, playing them I mean. I mean also I've tried to make a couple games for Jams but I never even got anything worth releasing. Maybe I just have a bad attention span? But this, this game I started it, and every chance I got I played it, until I finished it. That sentence probably had too many commas oh well. But yeah, this game was fun, funny, and actually has some real meaningful lessons and themes in it that kind of struck a cord with me.
I felt like I could relate to Dr. Professor and Erica and I love how the game teaches lessons to both those characters. The Explorer Kit was fun, rock smash and mining to break up the gameplay. Plus you had the fist fights and card games so those really helped keep my short attention span from getting bored. I got a shiny Golbat in my playthrough of this game. I was just complaining to myself how I bought zero repels and then boop there it was. I'm guessing increased shiny odds but still fun either way. Nicknamed it PkmLab.com lol. I did use the shiny Kirlia btw. Came in handy vs the Jam Master. My final team was Heracross, Salamence, Omastar, Gardevoir, Donphan, and Rotom. Replaced Lucario with Heracross, considered using Spiritomb and Zapdos, didn't end up using shiny Golbat because I had a Salamence. Zangoose helped me catch a couple of things with false swipe. I didn't do Erica's sidequest the first time but I did the second time. I wonder how that first one went. I just felt bad for that old guy gardening. Guess I'm a wimp lol. Oh man and those fisherman were hilarious. I always went ahead to go talk to them before continuing with the story. There was that swimmer in one home that mentioned how there's no water in the region lol. So much good dialogue. Some guy was like, yeah I'm a super boring npc and you just wasted your time talking to me. Idk this stuff was just perfect. Well, maybe not perfect. Heh. It all kind of fit with the theme and the lessons in the game too. The rpg maker music and even just the tiling and whatnot made it feel like the few failed projects I've tried to make. Almost felt nostalgic. Please don't take anything I'm saying the wrong way these are all positives. I like your style :)
I'll mention some potential bugs I found though:
-When you leave a cave your on top of cave exit tile. Idk it looks a little off.
-When you enter Cyana Town Erica has a text error where it says "it" not sure of the exact line.
-There was one mining spot next to blue flowers that DIDN'T open up into a secret cave! Jk lol I found the base.
-Posters in the secret O base can be walked over/wrong passability
-I used brick break on a light screen and it had bubble beam animation and an error came up.
-I'm glad that electrics types are immune to twave but I was able to synchronize a paralysis on to an electric type.
-Is there supposed to be two karate dudes in the bottom right corner of the void in Duvale Dojo?
Other potential improvements is I wish the pidgeotto taxi went to all prior towns and not just the last one. I'll also say the games title screen is uh, lackluster (I see its the same style as Pokemon Round hmm). In my opinion a more interesting title screen that you could display on this page would get more people to play it. Just my opinion. I just fear many will overlook this mostly perfect Jam. I mean to me it's perfect, the flaws it does have don't bother me. It all just kind of works. And it was fun the whole way through. I sure hope you had fun making it. I for one really enjoy the final result but I really hope the journey of making it was also a positive experience. Btw I started playing Pokemon Round in the middle of writing up this reply. Already loving the jokes and silliness of it. I'm definitely interested in whatever game you come up with next. Shoutouts to them there beverages and I hope you have a good nap.

Finished off the game!

Aesthetic

The Gameplay

The Writing

Overall
This was a fun entry! Be proud of your work!

Just finished playing the game! Great job with this jam entry! You did an amazing job and I had a lot of fun playing, with a total time of 4 hours. I did take time to build a team and collect all of the juicy secrets, though. I also caught a shiny (which could use better indication when encountered in the wild, but that wasn't a focus so it doesn't really matter)! Speaking of juicy secrets, I love the attention to detail and the small easter eggs that are interspersed pretty evenly. The dialogue was intriguing and funny, and the character development was pretty good for everyone except maybe the jam keepers. I like the cute little moral, and I like how you even gave random NPCs development. The game had nice quality of life changes and I liked the integration of the mining challenge and the fossils. The two new battle modes (I won't spoil more) were very well introduced and I didn't find either too difficult. Your maps were quaint and I thought they were a good size with the right amount of detail/secrets. The graphics weren't extra special, but it also doesn't really take away from the experience, since the cutscenes were still good. I did have a little error with a cutscene where an NPC wandered into Dr. Professor's path, but it wasn't game-breaking. I also had a little irritation with very high encounter rates in caves and long patches of mandatory grass (glad you included some skippable trainers, though). Like I said, the writing and the detail was the strongest part, with trainer Pokémon even having unique balls for their Pokémon and trash cans having custom dialogue. Overall, this was a great game and I really enjoyed it!

My final team: Lucario, Dusknoir, Rampardos, Omastar, Regice, Shiny Pidgeotto

Hey! I just finished your game and really liked it!

Great game, Doof! I genuinely loved it. There's not much I can add on to what others have already said, other than this lucky catch:

Until next time!

Just finished off the game.
While I found the philosophy to be layered too thick, I still had a blast with the while straightforward quest and digging for many secrets - sometimes literally! The digging minigame is really addictive.

One of the rare fangames worth playing for the story... even if a twist is quite obvious.