Dunno if this is the right place as this is my first post, but the Rom Hacking scene DESPERATELY needs some more creativity at the minute.

[Locoflyer]

As excited as I am to play RR 4.0, I'm getting really tired of seeing 50 rom hacks that are basically "Look! it's Kanto and Hoenn but again! Also types are changed!" We literally have a full decomp of Emerald now, and I've seen nothing really done aside from the same 5 difficulty hacks over and over, I'm really sick of it.


I know it's not easy, but PLEASE...try and be a bit more creative with your rom hacks, I imagine some amazing things can be done.

 

[Corveone]

You don't have to play every Fire Red or Emerald rom hack, so if there are so many of them that are trying to accomplish very similar things, you should probably just play the ones you find more interesting and leave the others be.

Rom hacking is a very time consuming hobby, so it's not just about people not wanting to be creative, we also have to take into account that things like creating a whole new region, story, characters, events, etc. takes a lot more work and time, and some rom hackers may not actually have the necessary knowledge to go that far either.

So Fire Red but this / Emerald but that is a more accessible route. At the end they'll at least be able to make something, which won't be the most creative rom hack ever but it's the one their time/knowledge/skills can afford. And the many players who just can't go back to vanilla Gen 3 anymore for several reasons will have alternatives to revisit those games. So everyone wins... or at least nobody loses.

If we don't see rom hacks like Unbound, Gaia or Prism so often, it's not because people lack vision and ideas and don't want to do something else.

 

[Locoflyer]

I do understand this, but I also feel theres potential to go that extra mile that I think more people should strive for? Does that make sense? IDK I hardly see any fan region rom hacks any more and its honestly kinda disheartening when theres so much potential. I do get this point of view though.

 

[Flying_Piloswine]

Corveone makes a great point. Decomps definitely increase the range of possibilities, since anything in the source code can be altered. But the complexity remains quite high. I am proficient with Python and Javascript (finally) and have had dreams of making some hacks myself, but I just dont want to commit all the time, and I know there will be a huge learning curve even though I know how to write a script or two. I would be bound to hit some tough walls while developing.

All I can do is hope that someone fulfills my dream hack for me. I imagine a game that doesn't require HMs to be learned, custom HM actions instead of the defaults (like "thunderbolt" for jolting machinery to life), and a gameplay loop that involves classic rpg dungeon exploration with puzzles and exciting boss battles instead of gym badges.