Recruiting Pokémon Randomizer PVP - Recruitment

[AlephSubZero]

[Essentials v19.1]

Have you ever had that moment in a randomizer nuzlocke challenge where you could’ve sworn the randomizer was a sentient being, twiddling their thumbs and carefully calculating exactly which Pokémon to give your rival in order to cause the most destruction to your team? If yes, I’d like to propose a question that has gone unanswered for far too long: why should our AI overlords get to have all the fun?

Introducing the Pokémon Randomizer PVP, a 2-player game where one person gets to take the steering wheel and choose all the Pokémon that the other player should have to cope against! The game is centered around both players trolling the other person as much as possible in order to gain an edge. Of course, this means that the person playing as the randomizer won’t get to have all the fun; your victim has all sorts of ways to fight back and make your life just as miserable as theirs! While Player 1 has to go through a randomized Pokémon nuzlocke playthrough, Player 2 has to play a resource management game where the only way to get resources is by damaging the first player’s Pokémon, and the only way to win is to wipe Player 1’s team! Player 1 will have all sorts of tricks up their sleeve in order to fight back and force Player 2 to adapt to their playstyle.

What does Player 2 do exactly?

Upon starting a game, Player 2 will be dropped into the room showcased here:

This room currently gives you access to the following features

• A plinko machine that gives out random Pokémon as prizes
• A menu that allows you to modify said Pokémon in various ways after obtaining them
• A menu that lets you increase the level of your Pokémon and/or purchase more plinko coins
• An items shop

The gameplay loop
Every time Player 1 enters a battle, the opposing NPC trainer will send out a Meouter unit.

This little guy will patiently wait for Player 2 to modify and send over a Pokémon of their choosing.

At this point, Player 2 can plinko a selection of Pokémon to choose from! You can access the plinko machine at any time, and you get to use each of your reward Pokémon once. While you can send out your strongest Pokémon immediately in order to deal enough damage to make a profit, you can also hold on to them until you can level them up, allowing you to evolve them and/or teach them moves over the course of the game. This allows you to strategize with which ones you’ll want to keep as long term investments, and which ones you’ll want to utilize immediately.

Here’s a video of a blind playthrough that thoroughly showcases exactly what all the game currently has to offer!



At this point, the game has a pretty solid blueprint laid out for it. Unfortunately, we've hit a bit of a roadblock. A lot of our future plans involve polishing the game up drastically in one way or another, and we simply don't have the expertise on our team to efficiently provide that extra coat of paint.

What’s currently needed:

Map designers
So far, we only have a game that goes up to the first gym, and while I like to think the maps we do have aren’t terrible, they are still improv work and they need a bit of polish. More than willing to translate rough drafts into RMXP myself. We could also use someone who can design cooler plinko machine layouts as we currently only have one and it’s unfortunately kind of mid

Artists
Our only experienced spriter can only do Pokémon battler sprites. Anyone who can contribute any type of artwork is more than welcome; top needs being UI artwork, tilesets and character design/spriting.

Someone better at Pokémon Essentials than me
We’ve been able to program anything that doesn’t rely on having extensive knowledge of how and why vanilla essentials actually works. We’ve had no issue writing custom scripts for the new menus, online connectivity, a plinko machine, etc.. Unfortunately, anything that has required us to understand how to modify base essentials code without causing a cataclysm has been a little rough. Anyone who is willing to function as a senior dev for essentials would be more than welcome.

Balancers
Since the two players are in two completely different environments, there are a lot of factors that can determine the outcome of a game. The biggest problem right now is that the economic system Player 2 is forced to survive in is kind of janky. We need someone who can help us figure out where and how exactly the numbers need to be adjusted.

Sound design
I will likely go insane if I have to use the default essentials music for much longer

Contact Info:
Email: alephrpvp@gmail.com
Discord: alephsubzero

Credits:

AlephSubZero - Design, Mapping, Programming
AceOfSlayers - API Implementation, Programming
Xenomus - Various Spritework (most notably Meouter), Playtesting and Feedback
Raktor94 - Mapping, Playtesting and Feedback
TheRedGenesect - Playtesting and Feedback
Galarian Blades - Playtesting and Feedback
dinomite 72, focus_sama, merxh00z- Video Recording (YouTube accounts linked in the video’s description)
audreyeyeyeye - Type icons used for plinko (DeviantArt page linked here)
Special thanks to StCooler for explaining how to actually implement Meouter units

Pokemon Essentials:
Maruno
Poccil
Flameguru
Emily Konichi
AvatarMonkeyKirby
Unknown
Wachunga
KitsuneKouta
xLeD
Harshboy
FL
Soundspawn
Popper

Luka S. J.: Randomizer and Nuzlocke Plug-ins
Gen 8 Project:
Battler Sprites:
Gen 1-5 Pokemon Sprites - veekun
Gen 6 Pokemon Sprites - All Contributors To Smogon X/Y Sprite Project
Gen 7 Pokemon Sprites - All Contributors To Smogon Sun/Moon Sprite Project
Gen 8 Pokemon Sprites - All Contributors To Smogon Sword/Shield Sprite Project
Overworld Sprites
Gen 6 Pokemon Overworlds - princess-pheonix, LunarDusk, Wolfang62, TintjeMadelintje101, piphybuilder88
Gen 7 Pokemon Overworlds - Larry Turbo, princess-pheonix
Gen 8 Pokemon Overworlds - SageDeoxys, Wolfang62
Gen 1-5 Pokemon Overworlds - MissingLukey, help-14, Kymoyonian, cSc-A7X, 2and2makes5, Pokegirl4ever, Fernandojl, Silver-Skies, TyranitarDark, Getsuei-H, Kid1513, Milomilotic11, Kyt666, kdiamo11, Chocosrawlooid, Syledude, Gallanty, Gizamimi-Pichu, 2and2makes5, Zyon17,LarryTurbo, spritesstealer
Icon Sprites
Gen 1-6 Pokemon Icon Sprites - Alaguesia
Gen 7 Pokemon Icon Sprites - Marin, MapleBranchWing, Contributors to the DS Styled Gen 7+ Repository
Gen 8 Icon Sprites - Larry Turbo, Leparagon
Cry Credits:
Gen 1-6 Pokemon Cries - Rhyden
Gen 7 Pokemon Cries - Marin, Rhyden
Gen 8 Pokemon Cries - Zeak6464
PBS Credits:
Golisopod User, Zerokid, TheToxic, HM100, KyureJL, ErwanBeurier
Script Credits:
EBS Bitmap Wrapper - Luka S.J.
Gen 8 Scripts - Golisopod User, Maruno, Vendily, TheToxic, HM100, Aioross, WolfPP, MFilice, lolface, KyureJL, DarrylBD99, Turn20Negate, TheKandinavian, ErwanBeurier
Compilation of Resources:
Golisopod User, UberDunsparce
Porting to v19:
Golisopod User, Maruno

 

[Jaete]

Hey man, just passing by to say that your concept is INSANE! I loved it! I've seen some nuzlockes with PChall where there was another player controlling the NPCs, but using the normal team and movesets from that NPC in the game. This is randomizing everything but is competitive in some sort of way since player 2 also have some maneuverability with their randomized Pokémon in regards to moveset and held items.

While I can't participate actively in the project due to lack of time with college and I'm already starting on a project of my own, by watching your video I've realized some stuff if you don't mind me pointing out:

I'll be referring to Player 2 as "Rival" and Player 1 as "Player", just to clarify.

"Rival's" Economy:
I've noticed that the only thing that scales too much and makes the rival's life so difficult is the prices for leveling up their Pokémon. The player has free access to EXP and the playthrough is meant for the rival to give some headache to the player but they should get to the end game together. If the rival loses, the game ends (I guess?). So while the player has free access to EXP, the rival has to pay for it, but there's a pretty high scaling, getting to the thousands of PokeDollars quite fast, and still being some 4 or 5 levels behind (Believe me, that makes a (un)fair difference)

Aside from this, I just think your rival in the video just played pretty poorly, with no intention of offense here. The Emboar was the player's "ace" Pokemon so if the intent is to cause the most damage possible (and a huge win would be knocking it out since we're playing a Nuzlocke game)... I mean, there was a Marshtomp there and my guy chose the Sunkern? While I presume he could get the mega Swampert? Or just Swampert?

Quality of life for the Rival:
The "Change form" thing should inform the Rival how much is gonna cost before he confirms the change, because maybe - for instance - the Swampert would be outta budget, but the Marshtomp would still be a viable choice amongst the other randomized Pokémon. I'm saying this just because being the rival is hardcore as a whole since any early game mistakes that you make will be snowballing to the future where you'll be low on cash because you didn't made enough damage with your poor previous choices. So you get to a point that you are in debt in such way that you'll not be able to recover.

Also, I think the rival should have some TMs available at the beginning. For instance: Azumarill, while being a water type, only learns a decent physical water move at level 21 (Aqua tail) to get its advantage with Huge Power. And since the player can catch some final evolutions and just go to the move relearner to get some sick moves right at the beginning (such as that Flygon), the rival is at a huge disadvantage here. In this case, some TMs should be available for the rival to buy and be getting progressively better as the player earns their badges. (Also, another bad play from your rival: Spending his precious money with Azumarill at such low level, because of the aforementioned problem.)

Nerfing (?) the Player:
The video didn't let me see it but this is about the free EXP versus the paid EXP aforementioned: If there's EXP All turned on, please remove it. It'll just break the game in favor of the player. I'm not against EXP for catching, but EXP All is so broken.

Well, with everything said, even if you don't consider anything that I've said, I wish you all good luck with your project!

 

[Hellparkour]

I would have to wonder on what type of mapping design you would be in need of. Because I do not know if you want to remain into the Pokémon Essential's basic default tilesets or newer and optimised one's like Gen 3 / Gen 4 / Gen 5 tiles.

 

[AlephSubZero]

I would have to wonder on what type of mapping design you would be in need of. Because I do not know if you want to remain into the Pokémon Essential's basic default tilesets or newer and optimised one's like Gen 3 / Gen 4 / Gen 5 tiles.

The details are completely up for negotiation. We'll be sticking to the default Gen 3 tilesets for the foreseeable future, but it kind of depends on how further recruitment goes and what would work best for the people that are interested.

 

[Hellparkour]

The details are completely up for negotiation. We'll be sticking to the default Gen 3 tilesets for the foreseeable future, but it kind of depends on how further recruitment goes and what would work best for the people that are interested.

Since I do not know then the Map's Tileset Generation, I will not be able to know. But here are some of my maps creations if ever.
I do believe that the mixture of Gen 3 and 4 is amazing looking even thought I am still learning some things on map making.

Spoiler: Some of my Maps

 

[AlephSubZero]

Bumping this because we’re still looking for a few key roles, so I might as well drop an update. We’re still struggling with a few aspects of essentials code, and we're still looking for more artists/balancers. However, a lot of progress has still been made thanks to some of our new members.

Huge shoutouts to Hellparkour for coming in and polishing all of the maps as well as adding new ones with custom tilesets. Special thanks to PDM20 as well who helped to polish up the randomizer menu and shuffle the gym order.

Gameplay wise, we’ve implemented a meter that automatically increases/decreases your levels based on the strength of the Pokémon you are sending. This helped to close the level gap between the player and the randomizer. Everything still gets one-shotted by Emboar Hammer Arm, but we’ll deal with that issue separately. We've also implemented a feature that allows you to combine multiple weak Pokémon into a strong one, mitigating the problem of the randomizer’s inventory getting crowded with garbage.

Spoiler: Updated Screenshots

Randomizer Menu:

New maps: