Released Pokémon: The Slowpoke Shack

[KennyCatches]

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A Restaurant Simulator X Slice of Life Story!

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Archer and his partner Growls the Growlithe have recently moved to Silverspring Town and opened The Slowpoke Shack.

Running a successful restaurant was never going to be easy, but Archer never expected so many difficult challenges to come his way...

GAME DURATION: 5 HOURS​

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TEAM
@KennyCatches
@ENLS
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v0.9.4 DOWNLOAD LINK

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DISCORD

Join the Lotad Lounge Discord Server!

Check out the Lotad Lounge community on Discord – hang out with 205 other members and enjoy free voice and text chat.

discord.com

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DEVELOPER NOTES
Bunch of thoughts ~

I've made a lot of fangames before, but this is the first one featuring completely original (human) characters and setting. Writing the story was a blast, though I ended up overscoping and couldn't finish everything in time. There were also many elements I wished I could have fleshed out more, especially the restaurant simulator minigame and Act Two.

The full version will be released after judging, but even though this version is incomplete, I still recommend playing it now.
There's plenty of content to enjoy, including a solid cliffhanger at the end.

Special thanks to @ENLS for playtesting and doing the tedious shit like UI and scripts, lol.
Also, keep an ear out for his amazing music compositions, including the main cooking theme, library/school theme, cave theme, and two tracks for Mia.
Check out the SoundCloud Album here

The main inspirations for this game include Eevee's Spooky Diner, Pokémon Family Restaurant, Pokémon Nightshade, Pokémon Halcyon, and Stardew Valley. @Ekat has always been a big inspiration for me, and you can easily see her influence in the style and tone of this game.

Lastly, after this and Farfetch'd 2, I'm eager to explore new game engines (like Godot) for future jams. I’m still open to making games in Essentials, but probably not on this scale again, especially solo.

I hope you enjoy Archer's story as much as I enjoyed creating it!
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RESOURCE PACK
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CREDITS

Spoiler: CREDITS

"POKéMON: THE SLOWPOKE SHACK"

A Game By:
KennyCatches
ENLS

Battle Animations:
Pokémon Reborn Team
StCooler

Music:
MezmerKaiser
Zame (Cobalt Coastlands)
ENLS
Meeow's Music (National Park)
Sumfira
Pokémon Ruby, Sapphire and Emerald

Tilesets:
Pokémon Syvin
Pokémon Nightshade
Pokémon Halcyon
Pokémon Abstract Team (School)
Ekat99
Vurtax
Heartlessdragoon
Alistar
Morlockhater
Nemu
Ross Hawkins
Pokemon Dawn
Slimshady
Thedeadheroalistar
The-Red-Ex
Zein
Edoardo Zuliani (Kitchen)

Fogs:
Pokémon Nightshade
Pokémon Halcyon

Accurate FRLG-style NPC Megapack by:
Maribel Hearn and Renko Usami sprites courtesy of Hemoglobin_A1C (Playable Characters in Touhoumon fangames).
HGSS OWs in FR Style courtesy of Delta231, Mimi, M.vit, and Kimoras."
Accurate" Fire Red Overworld Sprite ResourceAvatar: Psychic (Male), Rich Boy, Cue Ball (Dismounted)
Aveontrainer: Lass, a lot of bases for Emerald's Overworld Sprites
Daman: Professor Ivy, Professor Ivy's Assistant
Kalarie: Aroma Lady, Blackbelt, Burglar, Crush Girl, Dragon Tamer, Engineer, Juggler, Lady, Pokémon Breeder, Psychic (Female), Rocker, Tamer, Twin, Young Couple, All Anime Sprites
MrDollSteak: Cue Ball, Cue Ball (Dismounted), Painter, PokéManiac, Pokémon Ranger (Male), Pokémon Ranger (Female)
Pokésho: Various First Frames of Anime Overworld Sprites
Spherical Ice: Biker (Dismounted), Bird Keeper, Expert (Male), Expert (Female), Kindler, Ruin Maniac
FRLG Style RSE NPCs, ORAS Brendan and May courtesy of Poffin_Case
Gen 4 and 5 Trainer sprites and PBS Courtesy of Mr. Gela/theo#7722
TR Grunt courtesy of Othienka

"v20.1 Hotfixes" v1.0.7 by:
Maruno

"rainefallUtils" v.1.1 by:
rainefall

"Visible Overworld Wild Encounters" v.20.0.0.4 by:
derFischae

"Tip Cards" v.1.2 by:
wrigty12

"Better Speed Up" v.2.0 by:
Marin for the original script
Phantombass for updating to 19.1

"Radial Menu v20" v.3.0 by:
Yankas
Cony
Hallow

"RSE Trainer Card" v.1.1.0 by:
Shashu-Greninja
Gazza teh Fox

"Overworld Shadows EX" v.2.0.3 by:
Golisopod User
Wolf PP
Marin

"Modern Quest System + UI" v.1.0.2 by:
ThatWelshOne_
mej71
derFischae
Marin

"Luka's Scripting Utilities" v.3.3.2 by:
Luka S.J

"Following Pokemon EX" v.2.2.3 by:
Golisopod User, Help-14, zingzags, Rayd12smitty, Venom12, mej71, PurpleZaffre, Akizakura16, Thundaga, Armin (Fairies Resource Pack), Maruno

"Emerald UI Pack" v.1.1 by:
Voltseon

"Easy Debug Terminal" v.1.1 by:
ENLS

"ENLS's Fancy Camera" v.1.0.0 by:
ENLS

"Drawer/Cabinet Script" v.1.0 by:
TechSkylander1518
AnonAlpaca
ENLS

"Pokémon Essentials" was created by:
Flameguru
Poccil (Peter O.)
Maruno

With contributions from:
AvatarMonkeyKirby<s>Marin
Boushy<s>MiDas Mike
Brother1440<s>Near Fantastica
FL.<s>PinkMan
Genzai Kawakami<s>Popper
Golisopod User<s>Rataime
help-14<s>Savordez
IceGod64<s>SoundSpawn
Jacob O. Wobbrock<s>the__end
KitsuneKouta<s>Venom12
Lisa Anthony<s>Wachunga
Luka S.J.<s>
and everyone else who helped out

"mkxp-z" by:
Roza
Based on "mkxp" by Ancurio et al.

"RPG Maker XP" by:
Enterbrain

Pokémon is owned by:
The Pokémon Company
Nintendo
Affiliated with Game Freak

This is a non-profit fan-made game.
No copyright infringements intended.
Please support the official games!

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[Karthik_]

I just finished your game, and I have to say I LOVE it! Seriously, it was an awesome experience, and I felt like I was living as the character, as Archer.

I could see the influences you mentioned from Ekat right away. The fog, the pause menu everything was spot on. I even noticed some subtle nods to Nightshade, but don’t worry, I won’t spoil too much for others! Hehe.

MIA’s character Is really awesome!, And that Uncle’s disguise is perfect lol.

The writting was so great and all the character development is awesome and there is lot of things!

There are a few bugs I noticed, nothing major, just some smaller ones here and there. But overall, you’ve crafted something truly special!! So Cheers

Looking forward to seeing how you gona finish Archer story..

Bugs:

Spoiler

It would be nice to add an event to remind the player to visit Uncle before heading to bed after the Krabby guys visit us.

A reminder to go to the restaurant before heading to the north side of the beach to face the scientist would be helpful.

I noticed some characters’ battle sprites are missing.

The librarian is still there inside after the police event having both the NPC inside and outside.

Library wild Pokemon bit annoying

Team:

Spoiler

 

[KennyCatches]

I just finished your game, and I have to say I LOVE it! Seriously, it was an awesome experience, and I felt like I was living as the character, as Archer.

I could see the influences you mentioned from Ekat right away. The fog, the pause menu everything was spot on. I even noticed some subtle nods to Nightshade, but don’t worry, I won’t spoil too much for others! Hehe.

MIA’s character Is really awesome!, And that Uncle’s disguise is perfect lol.

The writting was so great and all the character development is awesome and there is lot of things!

There are a few bugs I noticed, nothing major, just some smaller ones here and there. But overall, you’ve crafted something truly special!! So Cheers

Looking forward to seeing how you gona finish Archer story..

Bugs:

Spoiler

It would be nice to add an event to remind the player to visit Uncle before heading to bed after the Krabby guys visit us.

A reminder to go to the restaurant before heading to the north side of the beach to face the scientist would be helpful.

I noticed some characters’ battle sprites are missing.

The librarian is still there inside after the police event having both the NPC inside and outside.

Library wild Pokemon bit annoying

Team:

Spoiler

Yoo thanks so much for playing and leaving such a great review!

I appreciate the bug reports - But if you ever got stuck, you can check your quests to see where to go next. Also, I didn't have time to make trainer sprites for the custom characters, so I had to leave them empty

Glad you enjoyed the story! I put a lot of effort into writing, so it means a lot that you enjoyed it.

(I'm not sure what exactly were the subtle nods to Nightshade haha, I guess I just subconsciously added elements of Nightshade somehow since I love that game so much lol.)

 

[Karthik_]

Yoo thanks so much for playing and leaving such a great review!

I appreciate the bug reports - But if you ever got stuck, you can check your quests to see where to go next. Also, I didn't have time to make trainer sprites for the custom characters, so I had to leave them empty

Glad you enjoyed the story! I put a lot of effort into writing, so it means a lot that you enjoyed it.

(I'm not sure what exactly were the subtle nods to Nightshade haha, I guess I just subconsciously added elements of Nightshade somehow since I love that game so much lol.)

Haha yeah you added them subconsciously..

 

[HumbleScotsman]

loving the chill vib and feel of the game so far did a wee first episode video on it. The mini restaurant game. can no beat a good old hotdog at the slowpoke shack and do like the pokemon popping out the grass. awesome job on the game i think i have played though a couple of the games you have made and always enjoyed them! keep up the great work . looking forward to seeing what happens next in the story!

 

[KennyCatches]

loving the chill vib and feel of the game so far did a wee first episode video on it. The mini restaurant game. can no beat a good old hotdog at the slowpoke shack and do like the pokemon popping out the grass. awesome job on the game i think i have played though a couple of the games you have made and always enjoyed them! keep up the great work . looking forward to seeing what happens next in the story!

Thanks so much for playing!!

I watched your video and had a lot of fun! I loved that you wanted to build a wholesome pokemon team haha

 

[HumbleScotsman]

thank you glad you enjoyed it! :) will defo be working more on the wholesome team haha

 

[Pi25]

Loved the game! Can't wait to finish playing the rest :D

 

[KennyCatches]

Game has been updated to v0.9.1. Just a few bugfixes.

 

[Iron_Rx]

https://i.gyazo.com/8a36d838db83329948dfda1f0ea076d4.png

https://i.gyazo.com/87f81acb05cdc4dbe9206919decdc72c.png (he can't move)

Cozy game, I'm nearly done I think. Here's a bug report for you.

 

[KennyCatches]

https://i.gyazo.com/8a36d838db83329948dfda1f0ea076d4.png

https://i.gyazo.com/87f81acb05cdc4dbe9206919decdc72c.png (he can't move)

Cozy game, I'm nearly done I think. Here's a bug report for you.

Thanks for playing and for the bug reports!

Just to clarify, are you on v0.9.0 or v0.9.1?

 

[KennyCatches]

The game has been updated to v0.9.2. More bugfixes.

 

[Jona1]

This is my second fav fangame i ever play in this year good job on making the slowpoke shack!!

 

[KennyCatches]

The game has been updated to v.0.9.3. Bunch of bugfixes.

You can no longer release Growls. Thanks @Voltseon.

 

[Ekat]

So, I finally had a chance to sit down and write my notes! (Guess I was doing my best Slowpoke imitation.)

Spoiler: Spoilers

Music
I really enjoyed the music selection (and compositions!). Some of my favs include:

• The main cooking theme (of course!) It's so upbeat. And kind of gives me Cooking Mama vibes, hehe.
• The wild battle theme
• How there was a happy & sad theme for Mia was also great. Just perfect for making the cutscenes that more effective.

Meta
The focus on double battles was a fun way to spice things up! Both from a fighting perspective and story perspective. It also meant less backtracking to heal when travelling to new areas, which was nice.

I do wish that there was a little more depth to what you can do when you're with a partner trainer, though.

• Maybe the ability to cycle through conversations with them, in their common events?
• You could also have event tiles trigger when you walk over them and you're with your partner. Or have them speak up when you interact with other NPCs. Tiny details, but ones that help make them feel more like a partner.
• I've also done stuff like mid-battle dialogue with my partner trainers in the past. (Having them be a little more helpful in the face of their abysmal AI.)

There was a great selection of mons. I was able to stack up a really fun team. The only thing I'd suggest is that you might want to turn down the encounter rate a bit. Overworld encounters are all fun and good. Until you are surrounded by t h e a r m y .

The battles were good. I did get kicked around by Darcy's Lycanroc a bit. It's nasty. Good selection of items as well. Is it possible to add repels, though? I'm not sure how they interact w/the overworld encounters script, but it would be nice to have those unlock after the first few days.

Cooking
Loved the cooking mechanic. It's relaxing, no real worry about messing up. Having different recipes and the ability to multi-task was satisfying. So were all the little cooking noises and animations! Long term, I do hope we get to see:

• Failure. Or pressure, at the very least. Maybe a timed trial. Like you have to cook a meal before Brett and Madison can trash the entire restaurant. (Because of course that's something they'd do.)
• An additional item slot get unlocked. Archer, you have two hands, I promise you can hold a bowl in one and the coffee in the other.
• Maybe you can upgrade to add tiny things in the restaurant? A TV on one wall that could cycle through a few images, a jukebox where you could change the cooking music, etc. Tiny cosmetic stuff.
  

Writing
The characters are all so charming! (Except for dad. Fuck him.)

On the subject of Dad, The way you wrote their awkward hangout was so painfully real. Makes me want to sit there with my head in my hands. I do like how he comes around, in a way. Things still seem tentative, but they walk away a little more functional than they were before.

The Kingler's Kitchen Krew is great. Every time those knuckleheads show up on screen, you know it's going to be hilarious. I think one of my favourite moments with them was when Uncle decides to get Joltik and Snorlax involved. I was dying.

Pokey is so good. Love how he interacts with the world. Just the little details, like him trailing behind... Also, I love Slowpoke. It's one of my fav mons. So fun to get to see it shine, here!

The NPCs and little pieces of the world unlocking day after day was fun, too. I liked tracking around to see what different people had to say. I wish there were more rewards, or a handful of stories that happened across the days with the NPCs. But, the change-up is still refreshing.

Along with the great cast, I'm a fan of the overarching (heh) story, too. There's everything- drama, humour, mystery. I'm a fan. And excited to see where things go next!

Bugs/Other QOL
Some of these things may have been dealt with since I first picked up the game.

• There seemed to be some strangeness going on with my partner when you head to the food scientist's place. He wasn't with me originally, but joined after I fought a wild Pokémon
• One suggestion I have is to tweak the darkness circle a bit in the library. Maybe make it a tile or two wider - not the full size of flash, but a touch easier for navigation
• With the notes in the cave, I would make them work like hidden items. You can step on them, but still interact with them if you're not standing on them. (It was a little awkward to walk up to one and not be able to read it until you were standing on it)

Misc. Notes

• Again, you really made me open Lombre's Bulbapedia page, smh. I was so underwhelmed.
• Harvey really gives me Karl the Krookodile vibes, and I'm all here for it
• That librarian should NOT be happy to see you once you're back
  • (or maybe she has a short memory, idk)
• Professor Pine you make Professor Birch look like a professional Poochyena wrangler.

I adored this demo. It's fun, different, and was so well-crafted. It's stuffed with love and great ideas! I hope it continues, and that you're able to bring everything to its full potential! I'm really looking forward to it.

 

[KennyCatches]

So, I finally had a chance to sit down and write my notes! (Guess I was doing my best Slowpoke imitation.)

Spoiler: Spoilers

Music
I really enjoyed the music selection (and compositions!). Some of my favs include:

• The main cooking theme (of course!) It's so upbeat. And kind of gives me Cooking Mama vibes, hehe.
• The wild battle theme
• How there was a happy & sad theme for Mia was also great. Just perfect for making the cutscenes that more effective.

Meta
The focus on double battles was a fun way to spice things up! Both from a fighting perspective and story perspective. It also meant less backtracking to heal when travelling to new areas, which was nice.

I do wish that there was a little more depth to what you can do when you're with a partner trainer, though.

• Maybe the ability to cycle through conversations with them, in their common events?
• You could also have event tiles trigger when you walk over them and you're with your partner. Or have them speak up when you interact with other NPCs. Tiny details, but ones that help make them feel more like a partner.
• I've also done stuff like mid-battle dialogue with my partner trainers in the past. (Having them be a little more helpful in the face of their abysmal AI.)

There was a great selection of mons. I was able to stack up a really fun team. The only thing I'd suggest is that you might want to turn down the encounter rate a bit. Overworld encounters are all fun and good. Until you are surrounded by t h e a r m y .

The battles were good. I did get kicked around by Darcy's Lycanroc a bit. It's nasty. Good selection of items as well. Is it possible to add repels, though? I'm not sure how they interact w/the overworld encounters script, but it would be nice to have those unlock after the first few days.

Cooking
Loved the cooking mechanic. It's relaxing, no real worry about messing up. Having different recipes and the ability to multi-task was satisfying. So were all the little cooking noises and animations! Long term, I do hope we get to see:

• Failure. Or pressure, at the very least. Maybe a timed trial. Like you have to cook a meal before Brett and Madison can trash the entire restaurant. (Because of course that's something they'd do.)
• An additional item slot get unlocked. Archer, you have two hands, I promise you can hold a bowl in one and the coffee in the other.
• Maybe you can upgrade to add tiny things in the restaurant? A TV on one wall that could cycle through a few images, a jukebox where you could change the cooking music, etc. Tiny cosmetic stuff.

Writing
The characters are all so charming! (Except for dad. Fuck him.)

On the subject of Dad, The way you wrote their awkward hangout was so painfully real. Makes me want to sit there with my head in my hands. I do like how he comes around, in a way. Things still seem tentative, but they walk away a little more functional than they were before.

The Kingler's Kitchen Krew is great. Every time those knuckleheads show up on screen, you know it's going to be hilarious. I think one of my favourite moments with them was when Uncle decides to get Joltik and Snorlax involved. I was dying.

Pokey is so good. Love how he interacts with the world. Just the little details, like him trailing behind... Also, I love Slowpoke. It's one of my fav mons. So fun to get to see it shine, here!

The NPCs and little pieces of the world unlocking day after day was fun, too. I liked tracking around to see what different people had to say. I wish there were more rewards, or a handful of stories that happened across the days with the NPCs. But, the change-up is still refreshing.

Along with the great cast, I'm a fan of the overarching (heh) story, too. There's everything- drama, humour, mystery. I'm a fan. And excited to see where things go next!

Bugs/Other QOL
Some of these things may have been dealt with since I first picked up the game.

• There seemed to be some strangeness going on with my partner when you head to the food scientist's place. He wasn't with me originally, but joined after I fought a wild Pokémon
• One suggestion I have is to tweak the darkness circle a bit in the library. Maybe make it a tile or two wider - not the full size of flash, but a touch easier for navigation
• With the notes in the cave, I would make them work like hidden items. You can step on them, but still interact with them if you're not standing on them. (It was a little awkward to walk up to one and not be able to read it until you were standing on it)

Misc. Notes

• Again, you really made me open Lombre's Bulbapedia page, smh. I was so underwhelmed.
• Harvey really gives me Karl the Krookodile vibes, and I'm all here for it
• That librarian should NOT be happy to see you once you're back
  • (or maybe she has a short memory, idk)
• Professor Pine you make Professor Birch look like a professional Poochyena wrangler.

I adored this demo. It's fun, different, and was so well-crafted. It's stuffed with love and great ideas! I hope it continues, and that you're able to bring everything to its full potential! I'm really looking forward to it.

Ahhh, I love your reviews! They're always super in-depth!

Spoiler: Reply

Thanks for the feedback! Some of the issues were either because I was too lazy to implement or I didn't have enough time and focused on other things haha.

• I definitely should add some extra dialogue for partner trainers, yeah! Though, I probably won't do the same for NPCs, since that sounds like a pain to do haha.
• I didn't think repels would work with overworld encounters but apparently they do! Will add them & decrease the encounter rate in the next update.
• Glad you loved the cooking minigame! I didn't have enough time to make it more complex, but I think I'll keep it simple since it seems to work well.
• I'm sooo happy you felt the awkwardness between Archer and his dad - that was exactly what I was going for.
• NPC dialogue is honestly my least favourite thing to do, so creating different NPCs each day was such a chore ahahh. I'm happy it was worth it in the end.
• I made the dark circle a tile-ish bigger and lowered the library encounter rate in the latest update so hopefully that's better.

Thanks again for your support as always. As I mentioned in the main thread, I'm always inspired by your games and The Slowpoke Shack especially was influenced by them a lot! Look forward to the full version! Coming soon ~

 

[KennyCatches]

The game has been updated to v0.9.4. Some bugfixes and balance changes.

I'm working on the full version!

 

[Voltseon]

Played the game for ~8 hours. I took my time and was thorough whilst playing it and it's an amazing kenny game. Loved what he brought. The characters were great and the balancing was great. Would love to see more!

 

[ranko]

Hey, I beat the entire game! I gotta say, I had a really good time playing. There were a lot of parts I liked, and a lot of parts that I really liked. I really liked the gradual showcase of each character. I didn't have that much of an impression of Archer and the crew at first, but then was very much pleasantly surprised as the game went on at how their characters came around! I liked the amount of depth put into them a lot, I really took note at certain times when you'd expect your character to take the high road, but is prone to being petty like an average human being, it really stuck out that how the tone of the game was really well balanced the whole way through, and I really appreciated the realistically serious undertones (that felt earned) put into parts of the game!

I'm going to be honest, I don't remember much about the gameplay for the game, except that for the most part, every trainer was a little stronger than me, but that's fine, because I'm pretty good at the game. I think some other people would have trouble though. Fun Pokemon selection though! The cooking sections were kinda basic, but actually really fun in practice! The silly little animations and how they all kind of happen simultaneously made speed running orders unnecessary but fun. The NPC small talk and reocurring customers coming in was very cool and relatable (i was a waitress for a few years lmao).

Obviously, visual polish, mapping, and the side areas for the whole hub world were nearly perfect. I don't think you could've done a better job within the time frame. Cool game!