Released Pokemon: The Two Towers

AenaonDogsky · Aug 16, 2021

An organically mapped game, with variety in gameplay sections, and a good sense of cutscene direction.

Thoughts:

- New intern monk - I laughed, are they gonna make them do all the work? xD I think "intern" monks are called "novitiates".

- that grass sound is stronk but nice

- lovely natural tree mapping. Great mapping in general, routes in particular

- scary bald head in tall grass

- some of the text employs internet abbreviations like "nvm". While this might feel natural these days, it isn't in most writing contexts. Just imagine some random Johto monk saying en-vee-em-e

- This may be a nitpick, but the monks are talking rather unnaturally for monks. Especially elder-disrespecting is a big no-no in almost every religion. Monks are really big on introspection, and talking like that could only be indicative of them being like actual team rocket grunts disguised as monks or something. Okay, seems like Zinzolin is involved... so the elder monks could be an evil team after all. But still, it doesn't feel organic. Also "management" is not something you'd see in that linguistic context, or that kind of corporate terminology in general.

- You can remove the badges display on the save menu by commenting out that part of the code.

- Nice trick with the "changing" tower at the beginning

- I personally do not mind edge-snapping maps, but people are not used to them in Pokemon games. If you started mapping in a way that didn't allow you to map further to the left, then add a filler map and connect it to the appropriate edge

- it's got humor potential

- do the kimono girls respond depending on how many of them you've defeated, or is every one saying different things?

- Kimono fights might be tough if you aren't lucky - I cheesed them with flail bonsly

- Do the dialogue options do anything or are they there just for flavor? Seems flavor and perhaps different responses.

- Hospital map looks awesome

- like the little details

- I managed to get some op mons from the southern routes, some people may not like the fact that you can do that, but it's a grind timesaver, so I like it

- interesting quizes

- nice event animation, and mechanics

- perhaps use shaded tiles right below the walls on the labyrinth/vent pokemon-controlling section?

- you might want to disable access to the trainer card, bag, etc when controlling a pokemon (simply use a switch and put a "if !game_switches[xxx]" after each entry

- what happens if you send in a poisoned mon and then it faints in the labyrinth? where do you respawn? does it break anything?

- gauntlet 1+2 is a bit tiring if you haven't got strong mons. healing during the break would have been appreciated just so that no backtracking is needed

- it'd be nice if post-battle monk dialogue would have changed

- DK music, yeah!

- perhaps you could enlarge dark map light radius

- I felt the game had a lot of battles

- dark cave can get annoying due to backtracking

- encounters in same cave are a bit high

- B1F doesn't need encounters since you have trap event encounters already

- it'd be good if we knew what the switch in dark cave did, cause I spent quite some time to find the ladder since I tend to follow right or left hand side walls to orient, while ladder was smack dab in the middle of the path, in the middle of the map

- include a restart function for the puzzles in distortion world, e.g. an event that resets the positions of the boulders and transfers you to the starting position

- the sacrifice part was a bit sudden, not to mention that you lose any other mon upon selecting it, while you dont lose the "closest" one... It does feel quite forced in a canonical-pokemon context too.

- the game is quite large, with lots of "optional" content. Can you get rock smash?

- fighting the kimono girls again felt a bit too filler-y to me

- overall, it seems that if you aren't prepared or have a balanced team, or aren't very experienced with mons and semi-competitive settings, some battles might feel a bit unfair

- have you messed with the paralysis chance etc? cause the game sure likes paralyzing me all the time

- do enemy mons have perfect IVs and EVs? it feels like it

- how easy it is to find a pokemon that can learn surf in the first place?

- there's no indication that you have to press the action button in the dancing platform's upper part's center, to battle the birds. Either use a specific tile with touch activation that's distinct from the others, or put each mon closer to the platform, and have two separate events for each. But since it's a double battle, the former sounds like the best choice.

- legendary mon level jump is big.

- From the way the elders are presented, with almost every single one of them being corrupt or/and evil, it seems as if the religious hierarchy in the game is something negative by virtue of simply being one (further emphasized by the juxtaposition to the kimonos' greater spiritual standing). It would have felt more natural if it was one or two head monks that were corrupt or evil. Moreover, there is no tendency for introspection in part of the elders, and while the player earns mon ackgnowledgement through trial, he seems to posses a purity that is innate rather than acquired/ given as a reward for his strife.

Bugs:

===============BUGS===========

-- Major, Progression-halting ---

if you activate the rock switch in the tunnel while on the right-side tile, you get stuck since you're inside the "moved" rock

-- Major, Softlock ---

- the player is unable to return to town post iris-tower transfer

- the player is trapped if they don't have any mon that can learn surf, since there's no way to actually place the bells

---- minor bugs----

- first floor lower part of tile entrance doesnt work

- fletchling doesnt have a cry, some mons like noibat dont have any either

- why does route 32 lag so much? is it the grass tiles?

- early event dialogue with friend that is activated when you climb up/down the stairs keeps repeating if you pass by these tiles again. If you are adding to story variables instead of activating switches, this is gonna cause sequence breaks

- riddle givers keep giving riddles even after you defeat them (I checked this post-elder battle)

- trainers during the trial, gauntlet battles, repeat the same lines

- fletchling's backpsrite position is... so far down you can only see a small part of its head, lol! Fletchinder too and I assume talonflame

- same for rockruffs front sprite

- you can keep pressing puzzle switches

- poison type mons will get poisoned if you activate a poison trap. Do a check to see if the first mon in the array is a poison type/has an ability that cant be poisoned before using that.
Same with paralysis

- getting a wrong answer (at least on the ninetails question) forces you to repeat the battle, and then re-enter your answer

- on that same quiz map, the wall tile right in the middle is missing

- Lugia learns whilrwind at lvl 77 in gen 2, despite the fact that it does at 1 for every other gen, so maybe specify it?

- building tilework is a bit messy. It doesn't bother me personally, but it isn't necessarily the best way to go about it.

- The monk sprite isn't resized properly, improper pixel density

- Kimono girl sprites improper pixel density >>

- ecruteak has no neighboring map on the lefthand side, black borders visible

- fletchling lacks a party menu icon

- interacting with hospital bookcase fires up the map, where route names and region name are broken

- locked doors shouldnt be walkable.

- "all or nothing" text Kimono lacks a full stop

- if you rest in Violet City tower and then exit (and even if you dont rest probably), you spawn back in Ecruteak

- Tree tiles in Route below Violet are missing their upper parts, and some of the bigger ones are missing more parts

- You can continue obtaining Sprinkletoads if you keep talking to the flower-tending monk

- Sprinkletoad doesnt have an icon

- some beds either 1) do not give an indication of being healed 2) do not fade out the screen

- monks on the upper floors dont have any dialogue early on

- speedup doesnt seem to work for me (F, right?)

- ecruteak tower map where your bed is doesnt have any music post-loss and upon respawning

- dark cave ladder exit transfers you to switch, rather than ladder's exit

- distortion world jumps only work if you walk towards the respective edge from 1 tile away

- distortion world corner tiles

- you can still jump on some floating rocks when they aren't there (but not from the "move towards goal" side)

- iris tower map's tree upper parts are missing

- iris tower tile priority allows half the monk's body to defy the laws of physics

- black bar to the right of same map

- bald head can go through ecruteak dance hall side roof

- monk's sprite changes to red's sprite when you surf

- you can walk on the bell placement tiles before you place the bell, resulting in needing the player to be one tile under to activate the event

- the dancing event only activates by climbing down the dancing platform, whereas it'd be better if it was automatic and transferred the player to the appropriate position, since the player doesn't get any indication of the event transpiring

- losing to the legendary duo fades the screen in too fast, resulting in seeing your character stare at them before you get transferred to the tower's "exit" which isn't there

- walking down the bridge (at least post-win) asks the player to surf, and the only tile that activates the story event is the leftmost one. 19.1 event "width" problems I assume.
===========================

Strong Suit: Mapping, Presentation, Event Animation, Cutscene handling, Mechanics Implementation

Feel: Ritualistic (a bit heavily so for a Pokemon game), Trial

whichfahim · Aug 16, 2021

Thank you SO MUCH for playing my game, and providing such an extensive list of feedback points.

- do the kimono girls respond depending on how many of them you've defeated, or is every one saying different things?

They respond differently based on how many you've defeated.

- Do the dialogue options do anything or are they there just for flavor? Seems flavor and perhaps different responses.

Mostly for different responses + flavour

dark cave can get annoying due to backtracking

Gotta have a travelling nurse midway. Thank you.

B1F doesn't need encounters since you have trap event encounters already

Good feedback.

it'd be good if we knew what the switch in dark cave did, cause I spent quite some time to find the ladder since I tend to follow right or left hand side walls to orient, while ladder was smack dab in the middle of the path, in the middle of the map

Ahahaha I'm so sorry I was counting on there being Flash, but it was removed from Essentials v19.1 for some reason? And I couldn't figure out how to add a new HM + set which Pokemon would be able to learn it lmao.

the sacrifice part was a bit sudden, not to mention that you lose any other mon upon selecting it, while you dont lose the "closest" one... It does feel quite forced in a canonical-pokemon context too.

I actually wasn't sure what I wanted to happen with the third task. I knew the theme had to be sacrifice, but didn't have any other ideas on how to go about implementing it. Any ideas would be really appreciated.

the game is quite large, with lots of "optional" content. Can you get rock smash?

Yes! I wanted it to be an open world but then saw that we don't have a plugin for level scaling in v19.1 yet.

- have you messed with the paralysis chance etc? cause the game sure likes paralyzing me all the time

- do enemy mons have perfect IVs and EVs? it feels like it

ahaha no to both of these. I just tried to give them decent mons and keep a challenging level.

how easy it is to find a pokemon that can learn surf in the first place?

I think you can use a rod to fish up a few + some in the wild near water bodies

DogzNDogz113 said:
From the way the elders are presented, with almost every single one of them being corrupt or/and evil

I only meant for the Brass tower to seem that way, the other ones weren't. It was probably the negative connotations attached to the team plasma sprites used?

DogzNDogz113 said:
while the player earns mon ackgnowledgement through trial, he seems to posses a purity that is innate rather than acquired/ given as a reward for his strife.

Hmmmm. Interesting point. Is this something I could fix by modifying the dialogues?

DogzNDogz113 said:
legendary mon level jump is big.

Ahh it just didn't feel right having them be <lvl40 haha. I meant to have a grinding spot for that, but lost it while versioning.

- This may be a nitpick, but the monks are talking rather unnaturally for monks. Especially elder-disrespecting is a big no-no in almost every religion. Monks are really big on introspection, and talking like that could only be indicative of them being like actual team rocket grunts disguised as monks or something. Okay, seems like Zinzolin is involved... so the elder monks could be an evil team after all. But still, it doesn't feel organic. Also "management" is not something you'd see in that linguistic context, or that kind of corporate terminology in general.

-I hope I didn't offend anyone with my monk analogy, I was just drawing parallels between my personal experience in the work place and the game. I understand that this is not how communities of monks work, but I thought it'd be funny to use corporate terminology, and the abbreviations.

the player is trapped if they don't have any mon that can learn surf, since there's no way to actually place the bells

these are the kind of things you need testers for. Thank you so much for pointing this out.

if you activate the rock switch in the tunnel while on the right-side tile, you get stuck since you're inside the "moved" rock

and this^

- the player is trapped if they don't have any mon that can learn surf, since there's no way to actually place the bells

Yikes. Thank you.

- why does route 32 lag so much? is it the grass tiles?

I'm not really sure, I think it might be the size of the map??

- poison type mons will get poisoned if you activate a poison trap. Do a check to see if the first mon in the array is a poison type/has an ability that cant be poisoned before using that.
Same with paralysis

This is also good feedback hadn't thought of that, thank you.

building tilework is a bit messy. It doesn't bother me personally, but it isn't necessarily the best way to go about it.

I'm not sure what you mean?

- getting a wrong answer (at least on the ninetails question) forces you to repeat the battle, and then re-enter your answer

This was intentional. I didn't want the player to be able to go through without knowing the answer.

- speedup doesnt seem to work for me (F, right?)

I think it got reset to the default (Q), for some reason.

distortion world jumps only work if you walk towards the respective edge from 1 tile away

Some of them had to be this way (Player Touch as opposed to Event touch)+facing the direction, otherwise it leads to some really wonky movement. (Trust me, I spent 2 whole days making the Distortion world level). But I was in a rush and looked for the quickest solution. I'll try and see if I can implement them differently.

- the dancing event only activates by climbing down the dancing platform, whereas it'd be better if it was automatic and transferred the player to the appropriate position, since the player doesn't get any indication of the event transpiring

Yessss that's a better idea thank you.

And again, I REALLY appreciate your thoughts and feedback on my game. I'm working on polishing it up. Thank you so much for playing it and taking the time to give valuable feedback. I didn't have any testers so I'm working on fixing the bugs as we speak, and I'm aware of most of the other bugs you mentioned and they will be fixed in the next release, along with other gameplay + experience improvements, so please look forward to them!

AenaonDogsky · Aug 16, 2021

whichfahim said:
Ahahaha I'm so sorry I was counting on there being Flash, but it was removed from Essentials v19.1 for some reason? And I couldn't figure out how to add a new HM + set which Pokemon would be able to learn it lmao.

You're very welcome. Regarding flash, you should still increase the radius, it was quite difficult to deal with high encounters, no way of knowing where I had to go post-switch activation, and a tiny visible portion of the map.

whichfahim said:
I actually wasn't sure what I wanted to happen with the third task. I knew the theme had to be sacrifice, but didn't have any other ideas on how to go about implementing it. Any ideas would be really appreciated.

You can still have him be "forcibly asked" to "leave/release" his first mon, as it would still count as a sacrifice of sorts, and be within reasonable canonical expectations.

whichfahim said:
I think you can use a rod to fish up a few + some in the wild near water bodies

The thing is, the player shouldn't be expected to go out of their way to get access to surf when it's required to progress (not to mention the fact that you can't access it as soon as you get transferred to Iris map). In any case, unless this is made easier by implementing it into the main quest, or presented clearly in a side quest that isn't a chore (such as an easy to do ingame trade with a water mon, or a gift mon, or the best of it all, frequent encounters with surf-capable mons)

whichfahim said:
Hmmmm. Interesting point. Is this something I could fix by modifying the dialogues?

I have to leave rn, but this seems to be an overarching presentation found in the way the dialogue flows throughout, I will try to give an example when I can, sorry.

whichfahim said:
Ahh it just didn't feel right having them be <lvl40 haha. I meant to have a grinding spot for that, but lost it while versioning.

Understandable, but the player shouldn't be expected to grind unless it's either easy to do or implemented in an organic way.

whichfahim said:
-I hope I didn't offend anyone with my monk analogy, I was just drawing parallels between my personal experience in the work place and the game. I understand that this is not how communities of monks work, but I thought it'd be funny to use corporate terminology, and the abbreviations.

It's not a matter of it being offending, it's just isn't something that you'd meet in any average ascetic setting. Understandably this isn't common knowledge unless you have academic or work experience with these groups, so don't think too much about it. Simply replace the terms with "initiate" and "elder". I don't know if "management" is the right term either, although it's not incorrect. It's just not the Management. Perhaps "Elder Council". I understand your workplace-related pains though xD

whichfahim said:
these are the kind of things you need testers for. Thank you so much for pointing this out.

Wow, you had no testers? It wasn't that ridden with bugs considering you had none.

whichfahim said:
I'm not sure what you mean?

Can't get a pic rn, but you pasted some parts of buildings that are part of, say, a particular building that's not meant to have "extra floors" or a particular roof or something, over another building/ or the same building, resulting in the tiles feeling like artificially placed parts of a particular set, and not designed to be that way.

whichfahim said:
This was intentional. I didn't want the player to be able to go through without knowing the answer.

The thing is it also happens post-trainer defeat, and post-elder defeat...

whichfahim said:
Some of them had to be this way (Player Touch as opposed to Event touch)+facing the direction, otherwise it leads to some really wonky movement. (Trust me, I spent 2 whole days making the Distortion world level). But I was in a rush and looked for the quickest solution. I'll try and see if I can implement them differently.

I can't look into it rn, but consider including a conditional branch using the premade "player is facing" condition, into an event touch page. This should only activate upon the requested player direction, rather than by simply being there without looking at the right one.

Congrats on the release!

whichfahim · Aug 17, 2021

DogzNDogz113 said:
"forcibly asked" to "leave/release" his first mon

:OOO

DogzNDogz113 said:
not to mention the fact that you can't access it as soon as you get transferred to Iris map

This really is the issue. Thank you for pointing this out.

DogzNDogz113 said:
the player shouldn't be expected to grind unless it's either easy to do or implemented in an organic way

I'll add a nice and easy grinding spot and make it so that you don't get soft locked if you lose to the legendary duo so you can come and grind and stock up on items and go back.

DogzNDogz113 said:
Simply replace the terms with "initiate" and "elder". I don't know if "management" is the right term either, although it's not incorrect. It's just not the Management. Perhaps "Elder Council"

Thank you. I appreciate the feedback.

DogzNDogz113 said:
It wasn't that ridden with bugs considering you had none.

I play tested it myself and did a final playthrough but just so the story could be completed from beginning to end.

DogzNDogz113 said:
The thing is it also happens post-trainer defeat, and post-elder defeat...

I'll look into that.

DogzNDogz113 said:
"player is facing" condition, into an event touch page. This should only activate upon the requested player direction, rather than by simply being there without looking at the right one.

I did use the player is facing AND the button being pressed in that direction, but even that lead to some really wonky behaviour like if you keep holding the button, the player will jump again and could land somewhere unexpected.

AenaonDogsky · Aug 24, 2021

whichfahim said:
This really is the issue. Thank you for pointing this out.

Oh man, sorry for the super-late reply.

I understand it might be subjective, but, especially in game jam games, which are expected to be short or easier to finish in mini-sittings, the player shouldn't be expected to suddenly go seek something required to progress in a manner that demands a specific party composition (which means catching other mons etc). Especially late-game (and since the rod is missable, correct?). This means 1) player must remember spots where surf-compatible mons can be found, 2) player must remember which mons can actually learn surf from the available mons possibly after searching, 3) player might be required to backtrack. All of these add a lot of filler time and possibly annoyance, that can easily hinder player experience.

whichfahim said:
I'll add a nice and easy grinding spot and make it so that you don't get soft locked if you lose to the legendary duo so you can come and grind and stock up on items and go back.

See previous comment, stocking up on items is fine assuming the player has easy access to money, but grinding shouldn't be encouraged unless baked in in the entire design process somehow. And while low-level legends might feel strange, I don't think dropping them down a notch would be that immersion-breaking.

whichfahim said:
I play tested it myself and did a final playthrough but just so the story could be completed from beginning to end.

Understandable, but a fresh pair of eyes is always a must!

whichfahim said:
I did use the player is facing AND the button being pressed in that direction, but even that lead to some really wonky behaviour like if you keep holding the button, the player will jump again and could land somewhere unexpected.

Okay I'll try looking into this when I can. Same for those dialogue instances you asked about. I hope it won't take me another week...

KingScar · Jan 26, 2022

Was giving this a play. Ah, never found/got the... rock switch? but managed to continue nonetheless. Now apparently supposed to battle the Kimono Girls, wouldn't be a problem except their Pokemon eeveelution each is level 30. My highest might/not be at level 25 yet even.

KingScar · Jan 27, 2022

Well, just the flareon one leave to beat.

whichfahim · Feb 24, 2022

KingScar said:
Was giving this a play. Ah, never found/got the... rock switch? but managed to continue nonetheless. Now apparently supposed to battle the Kimono Girls, wouldn't be a problem except their Pokemon eeveelution each is level 30. My highest might/not be at level 25 yet even.

Have to boost the exp gain a little bit. But there's also supposed to be a grinding spot in the second town. Not sure if I lost that while versioning.

TheGamingPaladin · Feb 12, 2023

cool theme, added to my collection, will have to let you know what i think after i play it.

Released Pokemon: The Two Towers

Attachments

AenaonDogsky

Arbiter of Doggos

whichfahim

average Pokemon enjoyer

AenaonDogsky

Arbiter of Doggos

whichfahim

average Pokemon enjoyer

AenaonDogsky

Arbiter of Doggos

KingScar

Novice

KingScar

Novice

whichfahim

average Pokemon enjoyer

TheGamingPaladin

TheGamingPaladin - Youtuber, Foodie, Gamer 4 Life