Making a pokemon-style RPG, not sure what the story should be.

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Here’s a mock-up using the first random pixel art from Google that my daughter liked:

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My design is mostly complete, on paper. I have a lot of drawings for adorable monsters and some interesting ideas for the world. It’s a very kid-friendly sort-of thing.

The monsters include a honey badger named “Badgey” who evolves into basically a larger badger called “Badgerine”, and a lot of simplistic things like that, it’s more of a return to the original Pokemon, but with enough differences to distinguish it as its own thing. I would like you to keep in mind I’m more than capable of doing this game, this is not theoretical.

This will more or less be my template for building the overworld map. I will be adhering pretty closely to these graphical standards, semi-realistic in other words and not a fantasy setting, rather a modern setting with lots of urban elements and realistic technology.

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Earthbound

That being said, I’m not entirely certain how to approach the story and I’ve nobody to discuss it with.

I’m beginning with Pokemon as a template and gradually modifying things to become more original and reflect my design intentions.

My bad guys will be called “Team Gnosis” and they will be researching mysteries, obsessed with conspiracy theories, looking for bigfoot, aliens, reptilians, etc.

That said, I have no other ideas on how the story should progress. I am not going to include the whole “pokemon league” concept where trainers from around the world gather to “bla bla bla”… I want a more organic story where you are caught up into defeating Team Gnosis by circumstances.

I have stagnated on the idea for a while, now. I’m not sure what to do next and I’m hoping by doing this it will lead to a breakthrough. You never know what will set off inspiration, I have found.

tap tap

Anyone? Anyone?

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Your “starter pokemon” is one of the rare conspiracy theories that gnosis is looking for.
Gnosis realizes you have a rare, and challenges you to a dance off.
(or they spend the game trying to steal your starter…)
but the final boss battle still has to be a “PaRappa the Rapper” kind of dance off anyways though…

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I never played Pokemon (except for the card game a few times). Can you explain the mechanics more? What do you do with these badgers? How do you encounter and interact with the bad guys?

(My hope is that something in there will lead to some story ideas for you.)

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You say it’s like pokemon. Does this mean you’ll be capturing the monsters and then using them yourself?

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@verybinary - Interesting, start the player off with a rare monster and make that the focus of the antagonist to start things off.

@JoeStrout - You traverse the map and encounter monsters. You use your monsters to battle others in turn-based combat, and try to power up your monsters and refine their abilities which presents challenge because they have a limited number of abilities. Also, each monster has strengths and weaknesses so it’s important to know as much as you can about the monsters in the game, and there are generally over 100 unique monsters.

Bad guys have their own pet monsters, and they generally use monsters that fit the theme of their character (tough, pretty, intellectual, etc.) and have lots of quips and comments that range from comical to cryptic. Stronger bad guys will have surprise dialogue, such as “Don’t expect to win so easily.” which they say during a fight, prior to sending out their best monster, which will generally be 3-5 levels above the rest and have rare abilities you haven’t had the chance to acquire yet. Just to wow you and present challenge.

Also, people will challenge you to friendly battles just for sport and you can attain staple goods from these battles, like prize money and also experience points for your monsters. These people are like NPC’s but they add an element of additional intrigue to the maps, as they like to stand in areas where you cannot pass by them without triggering a battle (if they spot you, a fight will ensue).

@EternalAmbiguity - You will be able to acquire monsters through wild encounters, and trades and purchase from pet shops. You won’t fight the wild monsters if you wish to catch them, you will attempt to lure them and gain their trust. It will be like fishing, you need to be careful not to make a mistake or they will flee.

Thanks for participating, everyone, this make my day.

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Pokemon don’t really have a story per see, it has a vague goal you can interpret (be the best) and milestone (get the badge beat elite). It’s structured more like a hobby world with every people having their own takes on the goal (being the best mean treating not/well your pokemon, being friend, having the cutest, mastering breeding, etc …) and the bad guy are just one of those but bad. SO it’s basically random event happening with a sense of continuity and character following their call, it’s all context that expend and explore the main theme. It’s because the game emphasize freedom, and all the character are just suggestion to allow you pick and choose your own take on the goal.

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Excellent take on it. It doesn’t have a linear storyline, so much as a general goal we can all relate to: Being the best.

And then it allows you to decide what that means for yourself.

Beating the elite 4 and the champion is just one way of playing, since each game also allows the goal of simply catching them all, completing the pokedex, or any number of different ways of playing in each game.

So, ideally, the story is just one layer of the game, it shouldn’t be the central focus of the entire game. And so it shouldn’t have any special precedence over the other elements, nor should I spend more time on the story than any other single element of the game.

The player shouldn’t complete the game to complete the story unless they wish to. So I think it would be best to have you encounter some of these characters, but then you can simply ignore them after bumping into them unless you choose to seek them out and further story lines through fetch quests and things like that.

In that case, it would be cool to have some kind of tournament structure. And you would have to win the lower league tournaments in order to enter into the higher ones. And you would have to qualify to enter the tournaments by competing in placement matches. And the placement match contenders could be like bosses. And if you lose the match, you don’t place and need to come back and try again.

I could have some fun with that idea.

Thanks for helping!

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Okay Master Frog, for a game like this, I would suggest going for a mix, of realistic technology and advanced technology. Because you’ll be able to do more, with your games story, characters and possible game sequels.

I hope, you’ll understand what I’m saying.

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Neoshaman hit the nail with the story telling part. Pokemon doesn’t have an story, so there are no motives for the trainer to actually “being the best”. Give the player a motive to improve himself, finding a love one, finding the meaning of something, or revenge (that is too dark, I guess XD). But I would love to playa pokemon style game that it has ACTUALLY a motive to the player.

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Let’s say you play a 15-year-old protagonist who has been sent off to “Pokemon Camp” for the summer. You leave mom, get on the bus. You get your starter Pokemon, learn how to play, etc. Arrive at Camp. Something seems a bit off, at first, and other campers also seem to notice. A counselor asks you to go retrieve something (life preserver, whatever) from a specific building and tells you “go in the right door” and so you do… and uncover the room where all the old counselors were tied up. They explain to you that a bunch of nutjobs calling themselves “Team Gnosis” came a week before and took over the camp… and go from there and see how deep the twisted web can go.

I’d much rather incorporate a central story line and have the tournament be a whole other journey. You’d have to go catch different kinds of Pokemon and at lower levels to meet the tournament requirements.

The reason why these kinds of games can actually work in the marketplace is because a simple Pokemon-style game with the right about of grinding can provide a player with over 50 hours of play time and tons of replay-ability, so it’s easily worth your money.

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Say that the pokemons are in danger of extinction, so you have a to save one type of each pokemon, but team Gnosis wants to catch’em all for their own devilish purpose. I think is good to teach the younger audience the importance of preserving the animals, and with this example you might get something.

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It sounds like you’re saying the counselor leads you directly to the tied up counselors. Was that the purpose? If so, is it an intentional trap? If so, you might have a few story beats before that point where the MC tries to figure out what’s going on. And obviously if it’s a trap, you’ve got to have a fight when the MC walks in there.

Why did team Gnosis lock up the counselors?

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Because they need help searching for a rare monster but it’s living in the lake near the camp. There’s no way they could do it without raising suspicion, so they are just posing as counselors and having the kids unwittingly help with their research.

Also, they can brainwash the kiddos into adopting their beliefs.

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Sounds like Team Gnosis is a group of adults, then. I’d assumed they were kids, but making them adults probably allows you to incorporate some standard kid vs. adult tropes.

Is Team Gnosis attached to any government system? Is the MC challenging the establishment on some level? Doesn’t have to be Final Fantasy level, but just curious if that’s part of it or if they’re a rogue group.

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Gnosis origins are so secretive that I don’t even know who is really behind it. They could have government ties, I don’t know. I haven’t explored that deeply yet. I know at the street level, they’re searching for mysterious items and certain rare creatures and if somebody doesn’t hand it over willingly, they will use force to take what they want. I see them as a highly idealistic group, where the entrants would essentially be zealots with very little knowledge and the higher-ups are revered as the ‘Enlightened’ and 'Illumined". They’re a secret society, but also a street gang and they’re also up to something else but nobody can quite piece together what it is.

I can see the game beginning on a bus ride to the camp, you sitting next to a girl that talks to you on the bus. You meet a weird monster out in the forest on a walk with her, and somehow become friends with it. Turns out this monster is the one Gnosis was looking for, but of course you’re the main character and thus begins their endless losing streak against you. They’ve grabbed your girlie friend and you have to have a showdown with them to save the day. A battle with an obviously boss-looking character with a weird monster, that is much tougher than you expected, concludes the camp scene and with a simple fade-to-black/fade-back the counselors can be rescued and you can be on a bus ride back home.

Start the next day, and cue the conversation with worried-sick mom and you with no summer plans since the camp is closed. So, she just hands you some cash and says that she’s arranged for you to spend some time with your cousin [several towns over]. Just take the bus to this town, the train to that town, etc. Then of course begins your endless run-ins with the bad guys. I suppose at this point, I need to consider a secretive ally who could appear to help you along and act as your guide into the increasingly weird world. Agent Fox Muldoon of the MIB, at first tries to take your monster but then realizes that you’re a magnet for Gnosis–he can just follow you around and gather intel on what they’re up to without exposing his cover.

This is going much better, thanks.

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Good to see a cute remake, the endless wurst for better pokemon…good to see where it goes :slight_smile: