Completed Pokémon Thyme

This game was made for the Relic Castle game jam in 2016. As I had prior experience in game dev at this point, thanks to Pokémon Jeff, and I had done a lot of work on another fangame in the past year, I actually knew what I was doing while making this. However, procrastination struck, and I ended up barely finishing in time, and the ending was really rushed. Despite this, it still won a spotlight, so I guess it's not all bad.
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Plot

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One day while you're just minding your own business, standing around in Jamstone Outskirts doing... nothing, you hear a roar of extreme distress!
Following the direction of the shout, you find a Strange Charm. Little do you know that this charm will be the centre (or like, somewhere close to it at least) of an adventure of thymely proportions! Travel through two versions of Jammest Island - past and present to stop an eccentric thief from the past and a not very interesting historian from the present from catching Celebi and causing the world as we know it to fall into chaos! Or, at least, that's what I assume would happen if Richard got it.[/tab] [tab=Feaures]

• Thyme travel I mean time travel haha get it?? You can travel through time.​
• One entire island to explore.​
• Some cheeky sidequests.​
• Richard is a whole feature unto himself.​
• Certain Pokémon have had their evolution requirements slightly changed so you can more realistically get them without grinding for several hours.​

Screenshots

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Credits

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Pokémon - Nintendo/Game Freak
RPGmaker XP - Enterbrain
Pokémon Essentials - Flameguru, Maruno, Poccil,
Music - GlitchxCity
Sprites - Spriters Resource, Dragoon, Axmarrone, redblueyellow, PokeTex
Title screen - Luka S.J.
Custom Day & Night tones - Deo
Summary screen - Aki, Epic

If you think I forgot someone, please tell me.



Download

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Oh boy, oh boy. This is the game, guys!!
Mediafire
Google drive


Resources

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Since this game was made for the game jam, any custom graphics I made were compiled here so you can use them in your own game if you want.
Mediafire
Google drive

 

[Domiok]

I gave Pokémon Thyme a whirl, and I had a heck of a playthrough. Given that this was designed for a Game Jam, you did a wonderful job to piece together a pleasant little island with interesting characters and things to do alongside this central quest of time travel.

The environments appeared pretty dynamic. Together, these areas offered a satisfying variance in Pokémon that gave me good wiggle room as a player to choose a custom team and to explore what seemed like a well-connected island. You went to some lengths to enrich the world with neat messages, both from NPCs and from objects in the world, which is a big thing that I enjoyed about this short game. By the way you set up the people in the world, I can tell that you really cared about the player's interactions with NPCs and about the NPCs' roles in the world. Simple aspects like what they had to say and how they said it gave many of the characters, particularly Richard, some distinct personality, and I went out of my way to try to talk to many people to learn more about them and the area around them.

Additionally, you escalated the challenge in the game cleanly, and you timed the rewards for the player appropriately. I personally tried to train up a team moderately as a whole, keeping most of my Pokémon close together in level. While some of the Pokémon in the main battles trumped my Pokémon individually, my team never felt behind the curve. TMs and similar items emerged when I really wanted a boost, so I never became agitated with how my team progressed. Shops and healing opportunities likewise came up enough that the amount of battling was engaging rather than laborious.

Everything about the time traveling focus to the story makes for a fun, purposeful experience that clearly defines Pokémon Thyme. This did a solid job to rope me into the game and kept me entertained. I could probably reflect on this game in the following months and still picture much of what the game represented especially due to this time theme.

Thank you for making this game! I'll be sure to check out Pokémon Jeff once I get the chance. Keep up your good work.

 

[Rhyden]

I really enjoyed playing through this game. It was like playing a crossover between LoZ: Oracle of Ages and Pokemon. It did a lot in a different manner than standard Pokemon, but it still felt like a pleasant nostalgia trip. The characters were all fairly lovable and the jokes were all funny enough to make me smirk every few minutes. This game was really well done, especially given how little time you had to work on it.

Also shout-outs to Jeff ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

 

[Djaco75]

I really like this game. It looks super-cool and I love the story and the tiles you've used. I, unfortunately, don't have time to play through it right now, but I will get to it soon. From the screenshots, it seems like you've put a lot of effort into creating the tiles and the story, which I really like.

I can't wait to play this - it looks really good.

 

[Fallways]

This is great - as mentioned above, the attention to NPCs adds a lot to the enjoyment, and Richard is a rarely funny character in the world of fan-made games.

I have just come across what seems a game-breaking bug though:

Spoiler: Bug

I lost the first battle with Alexandra/Lady Thyme, and now I can't enter that room again - the tiles that blocked me from leaving before the battle are still there and now I can't repeat that segment...

Any ideas?

 

[Hukon]

This is great - as mentioned above, the attention to NPCs adds a lot to the enjoyment, and Richard is a rarely funny character in the world of fan-made games.

I have just come across what seems a game-breaking bug though:

Spoiler: Bug

I lost the first battle with Alexandra/Lady Thyme, and now I can't enter that room again - the tiles that blocked me from leaving before the battle are still there and now I can't repeat that segment...

Any ideas?

Hi, thanks for telling me about this bug. I have now put up a new version of the game that fixes this. If you download the new version and enter the room again, you should be able to progress the story properly.

 

[Fallways]

Thank you, will check this out now! [edit - works fine now, thanks!]

Another bug: when you first pick up the charm you can accidentally warp using the nearest statue but it warps you back - feels glitchy and presumably should be avoided...

 

[LunarDusk]

Well, after a fairly fun playthrough on my quest of badge collection, I thought it might be a good idea to leave some words about my time playing Pokemon Thyme. And boy, did this game turn out to be a great blast for me! The story was light-hearted and easy to follow, the characters were eccentric and unique, the npcs all had interesting stories to follow that would all prove to be rewarding, even for the most simple of tasks such as telling a group of people to quiet down! I will say that the game had a few moments of difficulty but that was only because I kept to a small team of 2 pokemon by the end, overall my Ambipom was able to carry me throughout the game with some moderately well-planned strategy, and I appreciated the simplicity of that.

While the spritework could be improved on a couple aspects (I know it was a game jam but I feel obligated as a sprite artist to always make these comments, sorry! ^^"), overall I thought that the experience playing Pokemon Thyme was a fun one, and for this being a game Jam I certainly cant wait to see what you come up with next!

 

[Limesy]

Enjoyable little game with fun characters. I had some challenge with the fights (as I didn't bother with grinding), which made it all the more enjoyable. I found the flavor text on objects hilarious, especially the ongoing gag about the trash cans, and I audibly let out a laugh in the room with the guy who had eaten really expensive food from the fridge.

The only peeve I had that drove me nuts, were the sideways stairs on ledges since they don't transport you diagonally.

After completing the game I figured I'd try my hand at fighting Celebi, but quickly had to give up since it was level 40 - and my team hovered around 25.

If you're interested, I stumbled on a bug:

Spoiler: it's actually a bird

This might be because I had the screen size on Large, but when Lady Thyme Alexandra's Swellow swoops in and grabs Richard from Beyond Yonder Regions' head, the sprite turns into a burgundy-colored box, before flying away.

Overall I loved the characters and the humor, as it is right up my alley. I definitively have to try out Pokémon Jeff sometime soon - I almost missed the joke about the tourists, and I can't wait for the next installment in the Hukon Cinematic Universe where nearly everyone is a wacky moron.

 

[Presley]

Now this game I really enjoyed. I definitely feel like you learned a lot from Pokemon Jeff and just kept all of the good aspects from that and made Thyme. I like how there wasn't as many crammed in jokes everywhere, it was the right amount. I genuinely laughed at parts with Richard, although, I don't know why. It was quite enjoyable, as I played the game in one run. That really says something because I'm super impatient, but I just kept playing at 1 in the morning. Props!

 

[AgitatedLemon6]

There is a slight bug, not sure if you should fix it, but I had a laugh. There is a trainer to the left of the Jamstone Boat House, who says something along the lines of, "You want to go into the boat house? TO BAD." and starts a fight, only his detection range isn't far enough. I had to walk towards him, so move him forward a tile or make his detection longer. I have already been into the Boat House, then I talked went to him. When he said his line I laughed and said (In my head) 'A little to late for that!'

:P

btw I can't help but notice in both this and Jeff, Headbutt is really strong, so you might want to nerf that.

 

[SamanthaMatoiStein]

Is there a key to speed up everything. It moves very sluggish to me.

 

[Yin]

I think I was the one copying Richard XD

Btw AMAZINg game, really fun with real feeling characters (Except Richard but he gets a free pass cuz he is awesome)

The only criticism I have is training BlueBird was not worth it lol And that one is on me