What's going on with SGSSv2?

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It's been quite a while since I've posted anything on my Twitter about what's going on with the Sacred Gold / Storm Silver version 2 project. In fact, the last time was at the end of October 2020!

The project is still in progress, but I will admit it's been quite slow for a number of reasons (nothing bad). I don't have an estimated date yet.

With that out of the way, if you're interested in a lot more detail of what's been going through my head while doing this project, read on.

THE SATISFACTION DILEMMA
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So somewhat uniquely for me, I've found this project particularly challenging in the sense that it's taken me a while to feel happy about what I've actually made. I don't think I had this issue during Renegade's development, and the other hacks are all too far in the past for me to remember.

For full transparency, I've actually been working on-and-off on this project since late 2019, a little while after I stopped updating Renegade Platinum. However, I already had a big problem to start with:

Do I start with the old version of SG/SS as a base, or do I start the project anew?

At this point, I wasn't sure. However, the original SG/SS does have a lot of bugs, most notably in some of the scripts. Some of you have probably experienced the issue where NPCs appear or disappear at the incorrect times, particularly near the additional events near the Safari Zone that sometimes becomes gamebreaking, because you can't actually progress with the story.

So at first I opted to start the project completely anew. However, I think after I made a little progress into the game (I can't really remember now, but perhaps Azalea Town?) I wound up doing a u-turn and starting over using the original Sacred Gold / Storm Silver as a base, I believe after feeling overwhelmed at the amount of stuff I'd have to script all over again.

But then I soon found that I wasn't enjoying doing that, because I couldn't remember half the stuff that was in the game! For reference, the original Sacred Gold was made all the way back in 2012, so most of my memories of it were hazy at best, and basically non-existent when it came to the implementation details. Not to mention I'd have to dig up all of my old notes, check over so much stuff to make sure I caught everything I'd actually added etc. Some files of the old SG/SS just weren't in a good state, which can partially be blamed on the tool I was using at the time for pretty much everything.

So then I wound up starting anew AGAIN, because I wasn't happy with what I'd achieved on either project so far. I got a bit further on this one, up to around Ecruteak City, and that's around the time I initially announced that there was a SGSSv2 coming. I decided to do so as I'd hinted at it in some of my replies, and figured I might as well make it public. In hindsight, that was a mistake. I've since learned it's never a good idea to give dates for personal projects like this! It just adds so much extra pressure.

For reasons I can't quite remember, I wound up being unhappy with this iteration too, and I think after a break period and having forgotten some of the stuff I'd done, I wound up starting yet again. So this was the fourth attempt, on a game that I was hacking in a similar manner for the third time (I had an old hack called Spirit Gold that I've dropped support for since I released Sacred Gold / Storm Silver). So honestly, I think I was already feeling some burnout at this point.

Thankfully this fourth attempt I did keep up with and is still going. I opted for a different strategy this time; normally what I do is I just change everything area-by-area as you progress stuff through the story, so I do the scripts, wilds, Trainers etc in one map, then move on to another. This time around I tried something different and did the entirely of the scripts first (up to the end of Johto), and then opted to cover the rest of the game afterwards.

I did finish those scripts, though I subsequently ended up spending a lot of time going over a lot of the statistical changes, like the Pokémon edits, move edits etc as I felt I wasn't entirely happy with those, either. I found myself adding some more attacks from later generations too, and just doing lots of bits and bobs that weren't really on the roadmap to begin with. In the end, I didn't actually reuse the files directly from Renegade as I'd originally planned (though most changes from Renegade have still carried across, with a lot of extras).

I think between all these I was also tossing a few ideas around in my head that I couldn't decide whether to go ahead with or not. For example, one idea I had was rather than it being 8 Badges - League - 8 Badges, I'd instead make Kanto accessible much earlier from the Magnet Train in Goldenrod, and the player would then have to collect 16 Badges to challenge the League the first time. But I just couldn't think of a nice way to do it - once the player arrives in Saffron, where the heck do you guide them? Kanto is an unusually (by today's standards, anyway) open region, so there wasn't really any clear path. But if I started making multiple Leaders the same levels, the level curve would be all over the place (just look at regular HG/SS - Jasmine and Pryce being about the same causes a domino effect where lots of stuff ends up too low). So I wound up reverting back to just trying to keep the normal story path intact.

Anyway, that brings us up to about the current time, where I'm working on getting the wild Pokémon and Trainers ready for the Johto half of the game. So while I have all of the scripting done for Johto, in terms of the wilds/Trainers I'm only up to about Violet City on that, sadly, but hoping to progress a lot more quickly once I figure out what I'm doing. At the moment, I'm also still a bit unsure whether to go ahead with the Johto beta idea or just wait until the whole thing is finished.

Unfortunately, that's not the end of the problems. I've had some other thoughts crop up which is making it hard to know how to proceed. So I may as well go over those too.

THE PEAK OF DS HACKING CAPABILITIES
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So in a nutshell, the DS Pokémon hacking scene has exploded during 2020. Likely due to the lockdown in many parts of the world, a lot of talented and interested people have took up hacking and tool making, and we're at a better point in the scene than we ever have been before.

On top of that, a Discord server I'm part of that focuses on DS hacking (if you're interested in joining yourself, check out Jay-san on YouTube and look in the description of any of his DS hacking tutorial videos) absolutely exploded with users, making the community stronger than ever before. I'd pretty much worked entirely solo before this point, so seeing so many other people with interests in this stuff was a bit mindblowing!

So, we've now got three main tools that cropped up over this time period (essentially "the big three", for any MHA fans):
* DSPRE, short for DS Pokémon ROM Editor. This is a amazing tool made by Nomura (social media unknown), and subsequently headed up by AdAstra (@AdAstra_GL) that lets you do a number of things to DS ROMs, such as text editing, editing area information (controlling the weather and music, for example), scripting, and a number of functions related to mapping. In general, DSPRE made DS hacking a lot more accessible to people, in particular scripting. Previously the only real option for this was PPRE (Project Pokémon ROM Editor), which is what I used myself when I made Sacred Gold v1 and Renegade. PPRE is a VERY buggy program, and I was only really able to use it as I knew how to dodge around most of its issues. SDSME (Spiky DS Map Editor) also featured a script editor, but half of the time it just didn't work. So for a lot of people (not everyone - I wasn't the only person doing DS hacking!) adding new events and the like was just inaccessible. That's all changed, now!

* PDSMS, short for Pokémon DS Map Studio, made by Trifindo (https://www.youtube.com/user/TheVoltage15). This was a HUGE change to the scene as it meant creating new maps on the DS games was actually accessible to the common developer. Mapping wasn't completely impossible to do (as shown by the incredibly talented @Mikelan98, among other people) but the tools required were not really the best, though I can't say I ever tried it myself. PDSMS basically lets you create map models (emphasis on models, as this is DS, not GBA!) that you can insert in the game without too much trouble. It can be a bit complex to use to begin with, but there's lots of very helpful tutorials by Trifindo himself and Jay-san that can explain how to use it, as well as people on the DS Hacking server who are always happy to give support (shoutouts to Jiboule, Tartar and Silast from the server!). However, due to the way things work you can't actually edit an existing map per se in the way you can on GBA - you've got to remodel a map yourself and reinsert it if you want to apply any edits (except for one method but it's a bit restrictive), so doing simple map edits for enhancement hacks such as mine is still quite complicated in comparison to GBA. But that's just an unfortunate circumstance of the way the DS games work. PDSMS is an absolutely amazing tool and Trifindo (as well as other contributors) cannot get enough credit for their work.

* Pokéditor, which isn't short for anything, is a tool made by turtleisaac (social media unknown) that makes it easier than ever to edit data such as Pokémon base stats/abilities/types, stats about moves, level up moves and more. The tool basically lets you produce and recompile a Google Sheets document into a CSV format and reinsert it into the ROM. The spreadsheet format makes it exceptionally easy to just compare and tweak things, and essentially doubles as documentation to boot. Rather than planning on a text document and then using a tool to get it into the ROM, it's all done in one easy step so it saves a huge amount of time. Pokéditor has been used extensively for SGSSv2, so you'll probably see more tweaks to things like Pokémon and moves than ever before, as well as some other things that were just too tedious to manage in the past.

On top of these amazing contributions, we're also figuring out parts of the ROM that were previously unknown (thanks to everyone's combined efforts, but particularly Mikelan98, BagBoy (@BagBoyTM), AdAstra, Misfit, turtleisaac and PlatinumMaster who have all found a lot of stuff). For example, at least for HG/SS we do now know how to link music to Pokémon or Trainer classes, so things like Arceus with the standard wild theme might be a thing of the past. There's now a way to get fancy camera angles on maps, so when you walk in a certain spot you can see the camera tilt up. We now know how the PID for Trainer Pokémon is generated so it's significantly easier to get them with a good nature, etc etc. Basically, it's a lot of stuff! This is on top of a number of things that MeroMero (an ex-hacker, created Mind Crystal) and Mikelan98 had found and published in the past, some of which were included in Renegade.

And then, there was another big breakthrough recently. Mikelan98 (if you haven't got the message by now, he's very, VERY good at DS hacking, probably the best) released his Heart Gold Expanded Dex base, which so far adds all of the Unova Pokémon into HG/SS, complete with Pokédex visiblity, correct cries and overworlds following behind you. (Mikelan did the bulk, but AdAstra and BagBoy contributed to this, too). Pokédex expansion was previously totally unknown in the DS scene, so this is a major breakthrough, and I can't state enough how complex achieving something like this is. While this has been possible in the GBA games for a while, the way the DS games work is completely different!

So, what's this got to do with SGSSv2? The main thing on my mind has been how much of the new tech I should realistically use. How much is sensible? Is it worth releasing anything if it doesn't stack up to current standards? The mapping one in particular has been haunting me, as there's lots of people doing mapping over on the Discord server as it's so accessible now. Given my hacks are enhancement style instead of a new region, I don't need to pay too much attention to it, but it feels like sticking Regice in the middle of Ice Path for example just doesn't really cut it anymore, and it should really be in its own fancy room. The Dex expansion is also a bit of a double-edged sword, so trying to figure out what to do about it is difficult (more on this later).

The other factor is that a lot of this stuff sprung up in the middle of the project, and it was a bit derailing - should I continue on as is, or try something new with the new tooling? I basically pressed on with what I had, but there was always that thought in the back of my mind that maybe what I had just wasn't worthwhile.

So I just mentioned lots of people were doing mapping - this brings me to my next thought.

STACKING UP AGAINST THE COMPETITION
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So now that DS hacks are more accessible, there's also a lot more projects, in addition to existing ones. I've 'liked' preview posts of some of these a few times, so those of you who follow me may have seen them pop up on your Twitter feed.

Such projects include...
- Light Platinum DS by Mikelan98 (@Mikelan98, but he uses a secondary account for this, @lightplatinumnds). This one isn't new - it's been in development for 6 years and counting - but it really shows off Mikelan's incredible technical skills when it comes to NDS Hacking. It's basically a remake of one of the first GBA hacks to come out, but from a DS point of view it has a lot of really cool things going on. It was also featuring an expanded Pokédex before the new base came out (not surprising, given who made the base!).
- Legends Arise - Trinity Aenigma by the very talented AdAstra (@AdAstra_GL) and vin.derlust (and possibly one or two more people I'm forgetting). This is a game set in the Sinnoh region but is NOT a Sinnoh remake - instead, it's a new story that features an expanded Sinnoh. However, it doesn't actually use a Sinnoh base ROM! The project basically combines the best of all worlds; it uses a HG/SS base, but has a recreated Sinnoh mapped by using graphical assets from the Gen 5 games. The mapping is absolutely beautiful, the plot looks intriguing and the scripts are very dynamic. Lots of very cool stuff going on here.
- Mind Crystal, made by MeroMero. This is a hack that's several years old now that's basically a difficulty hack of HG/SS, but in terms of mechanics, it has some of the most advanced stuff the DS games have seen. You only really need to look at the changelog: https://www.pokecommunity.com/showthread.php?t=393373. New abilities, a couple new items, a bunch of other unique changes. This is a good example of what you can do if you're a real whiz at doing assembly (i.e. very low level, close to machine code) coding. Unfortunately it's not an easy skill to pick up. Resources are very scarce and it's a skill that takes a lot of time to learn, especially to the level MeroMero did. Most people won't be able to get very far with it - me included!

That's some of the main ones I wanted to mention, but there's other projects going on too that I don't know as much about. For example, there's Jiboule's remake of an RMXP fangame called Rose Gold, which has a lot of very cool looking new maps. (https://www.reddit.com/r/PokemonROMhacks/comments/l3d2rb/rose_gold_remake_in_heart_gold_nds/). There's a still early days hack called Re:Kanto (which I've got some involvement in, but only as a scripter!) which sets the game in a redesigned, much more interesting Kanto that tries to expand the lore amongst the playable characters, as well as focus more strongly on Mewtwo. There's a hack called Pokémon Australia being made which has some huge, impressive maps (https://www.reddit.com/r/PokemonROMhacks/comments/kyvdof/pokemon_australia_nds_rom_hack_new_route_design/). Then there's a number of smaller enhancement hacks that people are also making, which should also provide some good entertainment and may have some map edits. Chances are the DS ROM hacking scene being made up of almost only enhancement hacks will soon be over.

So, why am I mentioning all this? Realistically, it's probably not a big issue, but I just feel my own projects are quite weak in comparison to these, and as such they might not really be worth doing. Granted, that's probably a very pessimistic take, especially since I somehow stumbled my way onto having fans! The lack of technical complexity is a bit of a sore spot for me, but eh, maybe it doesn't matter, as long as it's fun? I just kind of feel like I can't really keep up anymore, especially with how old I'm getting! For reference, I'm in my late 20s now. Finding the time to try and learn some of these fancy skills is pretty hard, and arguably not worth it - if I were going to learn some new skills, it'd probably be better to focus on skills that would help my career as a software developer, you know?

I'm probably just rambling with this one. It's a bit of an annoying thought in the back of my mind, but even if I can't be the absolute best, it's probably still doing what I can, right?

Ah, there was one other thing. Radical Red came out during the development period of this, and while I enjoyed playing it a lot, its existence was a bit of a blow. Here was this ROM hack that contained literally every Pokémon, every move and every ability up to the end of Gen 8, which is basically a dream for someone who makes hacks in the style I do. My DS hacks in comparison were just significantly more limited. It made me wonder if it was even worth continuing the DS project, though if theoretically I had dropped it and tried to remake Fire Red Omega using the Complete Fire Red Upgrade (CFRU) that Radical Red uses, I likely would've ended up just making something similar to Radical Red anyway. (Though my gameplay is a lot less strict - so maybe that's something for the future?)

In the end I decided it was probably worth continuing, since the DS has a different feel and while similar in some aspects, my hacks are a bit different to how Radical Red does things. Plus I was already a decent way through a lot of the planning of the project, so there wasn't much point in throwing all that away.

Anyway, that's a lot of premable. Let's move on to stuff that affects the hack a bit more directly.

HANDLING THE COMMUNITY
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So, I've honestly found myself in a rather unique position. For what I do, I have a crazy amount of Twitter followers (thank you, by the way!) and lots of people who want to know how the hack is progressing, want to give suggestions to things they think could be good, and just generally showing a lot of interest. 95% of the time this is a great thing - I'm always happy to see someone playing (and hopefully enjoying!) my mods, so seeing a Hall of Fame screenshot or getting a kind DM saying they had fun with a game is always much appreciated.

I've also been fortunate thus far that I don't actually get many bad apples, which is honestly kind of surprising. Off the top of my head, I've had one guy who found my Discord and badgered me daily for months for SGSSv2 progress, which really did my head in until I eventually gave up and blocked him. I've had one person who told me he was 'disgusted' that I hadn't released SGSSv2 yet (still not sure if that was a joke or not...). I've had one or two snide remarks about the hack never being finished, which is annoying but given my radio silence might not be too surprising. And I've had one person who started telling me I was stupid and 'being a bad example for the British' because I didn't know someone they were asking about (that one was just weird - I did know the person once they rudely elaborated but it wasn't even someone I'd spoken to directly!). But honestly, that's all I can really remember, so it's not all that much. And I'm quite thankful for that.

Now, I've had a lot of comments along the lines of "Hey Dray, are there any updates on SGSSv2?". They've all been pretty friendly, but there's a reason I haven't tweeted anything - I don't have anything to comment about! As I mentioned up above, I think I made an error in announcing the project when I did. I should have probably waited until I was much closer to a release, especially as the extra pressure from people constantly asking actually has the opposite effect and makes me want to work on it less. I generally try to answer every message I receive, so having to answer 'not yet' over and over again really does get a bit annoying and honestly, kind of depressing, since it feels like I haven't achieved what I should have - even though I don't have any obligation whatsoever to meet a certain timeframe. To be fair, maybe that's on me and I should start ignoring things I don't want to answer. But every time I see a question like that, I often wish I hadn't said anything, even though I know it's because people are excited for it, which is a good thing. It's a bit of a complex feeling... But all I can really say is that it'll be done when it's done. (Especially as it's not paid-for work!)

The other thing is suggestions for the hack. I imagine this is partially due to the long development period but I have had a lot of people throw suggestions my way, with a handful of people throwing a lot of ideas into the ring. I do want to emphasize this isn't a bad thing - I'm happy to hear ideas - but I have to admit, trying to figure out what to accept and what to not accept can be difficult. I'm naturally quite allowing when it comes to things like this, so it's pretty rare I'll outright say 'no' and at most I might be like, 'ehhh, maybe'. It's especially awkward when I get suggestions from two different people that contradict eachother, such as one person saying make Pokemon X this type, and another person saying make Pokemon Y this type. I know ultimately it's my decision, but it all gets a bit confusing.

The main thing I've been a bit concerned about here is type changes, where I worry I've overstepped and started adding things that don't really make sense. However, at the same time, I know people tend to enjoy these sort of changes, so it's really hard to know where to draw the line. For example's sake, this is a list of type changes that are currently planned for SGSSv2:

Charizard - Fire/Dragon
Blastoise - Water/Steel
Ninetales - Fire/Fairy
Golduck - Water/Psychic
Farfetch'd - Fighting/Flying
Seel - Water/Ice
Shellder - Water/Ice
Gyarados - Water/Dragon
Meganium - Grass/Fairy
Typhlosion - Fire/Ground
Feraligatr - Water/Dark
Noctowl - Psychic/Flying
Ledian - Bug/Fighting
Ampharos - Electric/Dragon
Bellossom - Grass/Fairy
Misdreavus - Ghost/Fairy
Dunsparce - Normal/Dragon
Sceptile - Grass/Dragon
Masquerain - Bug/Water
Delcatty - Normal/Fairy
Aggron - Steel/Dragon
Volbeat - Bug/Electric
Illumise - Bug/Fairy
Trapinch - Bug/Ground
Vibrava - Bug/Dragon
Flygon - Bug/Dragon
Swablu - Fairy/Flying
Altaria - Dragon/Fairy
Seviper - Poison/Dark
Milotic - Water/Fairy
Banette - Ghost/Normal
Tropius - Grass/Dragon
Glalie - Ice/Rock
Huntail - Water/Dark
Gorebyss - Water/Psychic
Luvdisc - Water/Fairy
Luxray - Electric/Dark
Lopunny - Normal/Fighting
Mismagius - Ghost/Fairy
Finneon - Water/Fairy
Lumineon - Water/Fairy
Uxie - Psychic/Fairy
Mesprit - Psychic/Fairy
Azelf - Psychic/Fairy

You'll recognise some of these from Renegade, and those ones I'll probably definitely keep. But there's a few new ones on this list that I'm not completely sure about, some of which were community suggested. Not to mention I worry I've slapped Fairy, Dragon or Dark onto way too many things.

Let's take Blastoise and Typhlosion as an example. These two were the only fully evolved starters in Renegade Platinum that didn't have a secondary typing. Now, with Typhlosion, I've had a fair few requests to make it Fire/Ground. I was always a bit cautious about this one as it's not suuuuper fitting for the type, but I eventually relented after doing a bit of reading and seeing Typhlosion has some inspiration from an animal called the honey badger, which is apparently a skilled digger. Between that and the volcano aesthetic, it seemed just about fitting enough to give it Ground.

However, that then left Blastoise as the only starter to not have a secondary type, and that felt a bit strange. Another suggestion I did have a few times was to make it Water/Steel. Eventually I decided to go ahead with this although I wasn't really convinced - the only part of it that particularly looked Steel were the cannons, but even then it's unclear what exactly they're supposed to be. The change feels a bit loose, but there's nothing else that remotely fits as a second type. Of course, there's also the issue that this overlaps with Empoleon; I decided to make Empoleon's stats physically aligned instead (particularly as a lot of things about it like its Dex entries and hidden ability seem physically based) and leave Blastoise as more Special, but it still feels a bit weird to me.

Tropius and Aggron are some other examples - I think I've had both of these as suggestions and also seen some old forum threads mentioning the idea of making them /Dragon. I do like the idea - and Aggron has grown on me more - and they both learn a variety of Dragon moves while aesthetically looking like they could probably fit the type. Aggron in particular is also used by a Dragon-type focused Champion, which helps. But at the same time, am I being too forceful? Especially since both of these have two types already.

Ledian is another example - someone suggested making it Fighting, and Radical Red also did that change. So I thought I might as well. But I just don't feel like it actually LOOKS like a Fighting-type, even if it does use punches. So it's hard to decide.

Then there's a few type changes from Renegade I'm a bit unsure on. For example, Altaria, Sceptile and Ampharos all gained their type changes from their Mega forms, so there is a canon basis. But I'm not sure their normal forms really look the part. There's also Milotic, who doesn't really need the Fairy typing at all - it's perfectly serviceable as it is, but it was a common suggestion from people so I took it.

On top of all these I've had a few suggestions for types which I can't strictly deny but I'm very ehh on. For example, I've had Normal/Dark Persian, Normal/Dark Purugly, Bug/Dark Mothim and Normal/Dark Zangoose all suggested to me recently. It's just really hard to know where to draw the line on things!

Of course, there will be a version that doesn't have all these type changes, so that's an option for anyone that doesn't like them anyway. But still... I feel like if it was just types that I really believed were right, I'd probably end up reducing the list quite a lot. But as it is, it's also great to make a lot of lesser Pokémon more usable, and the type changes do somewhat help with that. Ultimately, it's about making the game fun. I just want it to at least make some sense!

I think that's pretty much all I'm thinking on that point, though I would appreciate feedback if people think any of those changes are a bit too ridiculous. Maybe a good idea would be to make a poll with a Yes/No for each, and see what the community response is? Then at least I might have more of an idea if I've gone into crazy territory or not!

Aside from all that, there's a couple gameplay elements I've been a bit hung up on that I feel like I need community input on.

THE SYLVEON DILEMMA
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So in the early parts of the Gen 4 games, I usually give an Eevee as a gift. Normally Sylveon doesn't exist in Gen 4, but myself and lot of people quite like it, so I wanted to add it.

Unfortunately, there's two issues with this.

1) When I had this idea, the only real way to do this was to replace existing Pokémon. With the dex expansion base, it might be technically a bit easier, but Sylveon is not yet available natively in that as it only includes Gen 5.
2) Each Pokémon has a limit of seven evolutions in the internal data. Eevee in Gen 4 has seven - that means Eevee as it is can't actually have an 8th evolution that would allow Sylveon, which poses a problem. We don't currently know how to expand it to 8 evolutions per Pokémon.

In the end, my solution was to replace TWO Pokémon. One would be for Sylveon, but the other would be for another Eevee, which is almost the same as the regular one but with some slight differences (slightly different sprite, different cry).
After some deliberation I thought the best Pokémon to replace would be some of the baby Pokémon, as they're honestly pretty useless. So I got rid of Chingling and Mantyke for Eevee #2 and Sylveon, respectively.
I actually had plans to erase all the baby Pokémon to begin with and add the Axew, Litwick and Deino lines, as well as Druddigon. I ended up backpedalling on that in the end, particularly because of Spikey-Eared Pichu posing a problem (I would have had to just make it unobtainable).

Anyway, returning to Eevee #2 and Sylveon, I had an extra problem in that I assumed people would expect for the event in Sprout Tower that gives you an Evolution stone to be kept (at the current time, that is still the case).
My workaround was basically to give you Eevee #2 early in the game and an item that could evolve it into Eevee #1 (i.e. the normal Eevee at #133), handwaving it with some dialogue about Eevee's genetics being unstable or whatever. That way if you evolved it into Eevee #1, you could evolve into any of the normal Eeveelutions as before, or if you kept it as Eevee #2 then you'd be able to evolve it into a Sylveon instead.

But honestly, evolving a Pokémon essentially into itself just feels weird. It's a ROM hack, so there's probably some tolerance for oddities, but it's just plain odd. Sylveon's probably worth more than Chingling and Mantyke will ever be, but I just can't help but feel it feels a bit unprofessional. But Sylveon is really cool - so I'm tempted to keep it regardless.

Not to mention it could also be changed so Eevee #1 and Eevee #2 can keep evolving into eachother, with one Eevee having half the normal evolutions and likewise for the other Eevee.

I'm also a bit concerned about offering the evolution stone at Sprout Tower at all. I've actually changed it so it's now after you beat Falkner, but there's a bit of an extra issue - I've made it so stone evolutions can still learn moves after evolution, though unlike SwSh they still need to level up to actually get the moves instead of learning literally everything at Level 1. As such, there's no real disadvantage to evolving a Growlithe immediately, for instance. So for actual balance it'd be better to not offer an Evolution stone at all and just let the player get any of the other Eeveelutions in Goldenrod (the stones are buyable there and Eevee itself is wild in National Park now), whereas Eevee #2 would evolve by happiness into Sylveon so you can still get that. But that just limits options compared to SGSSv1 which I feel like is going to leave people disappointed, particularly as I also offered the early Eeveelution in Renegade.

This is probably something I should do a Twitter poll on, but I'd love to hear thoughts about it. Is it a cool idea, or is it untidy and too hacky (pardon the pun)?

THE EFFORT VALUES DILEMMA
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So a fairly common question I get from people is, 'do the Trainers in xxxxxxxxxxx hack have EVs?'.

The answer to this is always no, as it's not actually possible to give EVs to Trainers in any games prior to Gen 7 unless you've got a big hack in place to make it possible (e.g. the CFRU that Radical Red uses).

So I had an idea to make it so beating a Pokémon doesn't actually award any EVs at all. That way instead of having to rise to enemy Trainer EVs, the player instead is forced to be equal with them (and probably statistically weaker, generally, due to IVs).

That said, EV training would still be possible via the use of vitamins or the Power items, so you'd still be able to prepare yourself for the Battle Frontier if you wanted to take that on.

Additionally, I was also thinking of using a vitamin awarding 252 EVs of the relevant stat, so it's nice and quick to EV train stuff IF you have cash to do so. (FYI, we can remove the 100 EV cap that's ordinarily in place in the Gen 4 games.) Then if you want anything more specific, you could use the Power items instead. That said, I worry that's a little too rigid. I don't want to leave the vitamins at 10 EVs each because then applying 26 of them is slooooooooow as you can't multiselect them like in SwSh. It might be that a midpoint is better, though I'd imagine for the Battle Frontier or anything else ingame, 252/252/6 spreads would probably be sufficient.

So there's all that, plus I'm not sure if removing EVs entirely is a controversial change. I know a lot of people did like Traynee's ability to train you in specific EV stats in Renegade, so it seemed like people did definitely EV train sometimes. I'd like to hope leaving the vitamins accessible should solve any issues, though if they did award 252 EVs, they'd probably need to be very expensive (maybe with a huge discount after beating Red, or something).

Again, I'd love to hear some thoughts on this.

THE DIFFICULTY MODE DILEMMA
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Previously I advertised the hack as having three modes - Normal, Hard and Master. Normal would be B2/W2 challenge mode level, Hard would be roughly the same as my hacks normally are, and Master would be harder than that.

However, after some thought I honestly don't feel like having a middle difficulty is worth it, as I feel like anyone who wants to hop in for the challenge will probably go straight to the hardest mode anyway. On top of that, my original plan was to make all bosses in the Master Mode double battles, but I did have some feedback from people who didn't want doubles as they preferred singles.

So I'm thinking what I'll instead do is this (as before, only bosses are affected):
Casual - B2/W2 challenge mode level, good if you want an easier game but want to enjoy the wild Pokémon/newer moves/other QoL stuff.
Hard: Singles - Normal difficulty level for my hacks, maybe a little harder at most. All affected battles are singles.
Hard: Doubles - Normal difficulty level for my hacks, maybe a little harder at most. All affected battles are doubles.

Realistically I can't make a game as hard as Radical Red as I just don't have the tools available to do it, so something like this is probably the best I can do anyway. I was originally trying to plan teams for the Normal/Hard/Master difficulties and honestly, trying to get a good difference between Hard and Master was just really hard to do.

I -think- I'm happy with that, but one other thing I was thinking about it is what to do with the early Gym Leaders and their amount of Pokémon. I know people often actually look down upon the first few Leaders having six Pokémon, and it honestly does feel a bit silly. I kept it in Renegade because it was just a standard thing for my mods by that point, but I have been wondering again if it'd be better to shrink it a little.

To demonstrate what I mean, let's make up a team for Falkner:
A) Six Pokémon but each one has a bit less difficulty. So something like Hoothoot, Wingull, Natu, Swablu, Doduo, Pidgeotto.
B) Four Pokémon but each one is a lot more difficult. e.g. Staravia, Murkrow, Farfetch'd, Pidgeotto.
C) Six Pokémon and they're all quite difficult (not recommended). e.g. Staravia, Murkrow, Farfetch'd, Chatot, Wingull, Pidgeotto.

I've got something in between A and B at the moment, four Pokémon but not quite that strong (Murkrow and Farfetch'd are both quite strong for this stage as I've given Farfetch'd such a huge buff). We'd still go up to six Pokémon later, but it'd be from say, Morty or Chuck instead of immediately from Falkner.

Would be happy to hear any thoughts on that.

OK, so that's all the gameplay elements I'm a bit unsure about. Let's address one more thing that some of you might be curious about - Mikelan's dex expansion patch.

THE DEX EXPANSION DILEMMA
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So to reiterate, very recently Mikelan98, along with some help from BagBoy and AdAstra, released a new base of Heart Gold that includes all Pokémon up to Genesect, i.e. all of Unova in addition to the Pokémon normally in the game.

You can view a trailer for that here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=siPqdDpGmoM

So this is super super cool, and adds a lot more variety to the game, particularly in the case of Dragon, Ghost and Bug types. And having something like Volcarona following behind you is just plain awesome!

That's the obvious reason to use it - the greater Pokémon variety, giving both more options for the player and also for enemy Trainers. Giving Lance a full team of Dragons right now is honestly pretty hard, but with the patch you could load him with Hydreigon and Haxorus, for example. It also adds Chandelure to the game, and I love me some Chandelure.

However, there are a few drawbacks to using the patch as it currently stands:
- Very few tools support it fully yet. There's a version 2 of Pokéditor coming out in the future that should support it, though.
- The patch is ONLY for Heart Gold at the moment. This means a Storm Silver wouldn't exist.
- The patch only implements the Pokémon themselves and no moves or abilities at this moment in time. This isn't an issue for the most part, but it does mean some awkward things like Zoroark not having Illusion, legendaries don't have access to their signature moves (Victini, Reshiram and Zekrom suffer in particular from this). It begs the question of whether to make them available at all, or just leave them out until their gimmicks are implemented more fully. There's also a couple cases where Pokémon lose their niche, such as Whimsicott who doesn't have Prankster available.
- It'll require a bit more planning in terms of level up moves, base stat edits etcetera, as well as needing to move files across from my current project to this base which isn't necessarily guaranteed to work. So it'd likely set my progress back a bit.
- There's been some changes to the architecture of the game which means some things may not work as they used to, which can make things harder to figure out. This point is a bit vague as I don't know exactly if that situation will crop up, but I know there's been a huge amount of changes under the hood. I can probably just ask questions if I need it, but it might make development a bit slower.
- The shiny palettes for Gen 5 mons aren't currently implemented in the patch, which is a bit of a drawback when considering the 1/512 rate.
- There's a few minor things that don't work with the new Pokémon additions yet, like the Pokéathlon.
- Wild Pokémon encounters will likely become a bit more crowded. I'm able to do Headbutt trees and the Safari Zone now so I've managed to thin things out a lot compared to SGSSv1, but having to add Unova Pokémon in will probably make things a bit less tidy.

All in all, my current point of view is that I should finish SGSSv2 as it is at the moment with just the first 493 Pokémon (plus or minus Chingling and Mantyke, depending on what the result of the Sylveon dilemma is), and then make something akin to like, SGSSv2: 649 Edition later that uses Mikelan's patch and modifies wilds/Trainers to incorporate the new additions. Of course, that does mean that I have to do two sets of wilds/Trainers, whereas if I adopted the 649 patch immediately, I'd only need to do the one set. Though I've already planned all of the wilds out for Johto at least, so maybe it wouldn't really save any time in that regard...

I'd be interested on hearing feedback with this too, might be something else worth doing a poll on. I've had a few sensible people tell me using the expanded dex patch now might be a bit out of scope as it's more stuff to think about, and honestly, that's probably correct. But if the 649 version would be more popular anyway, it does beg the question of whether a 493 version is worth it.

CONCLUSION
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A lot of that is just a stream of consciousness, so I apologise for the large walls of text, but I hope that gives you some insight into some of the things that I've been thinking about while doing this project, and why things are just taking so long in general. I'll admit that I have thought a few times about just cancelling the project, but I have done a fair bit of work for it so it'd probably be a waste to not finish it off now. Though there's still a large amount of content to do, and I'm dreading having to go over Kanto...

Anyway, would love to hear feedback about some of the dilemmas I've explained, particularly the ones relating directly to gameplay.

Thanks for reading!

- Dray

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