FireRed hack: Magical Altering Gym Menagerie [Now compatible with Unbound Cloud!]

[U.Flame]

What is this?​

This was my entry for Anthroyd's fourth Make A Great Map contest. Just as Naillevaihcam won 1st place in the second contest, this one also won 1st place for the fourth contest as well! For context, Make A Great Map is a sort of Game Jam-like contest where participants have 30 days to make a complete, conceptually single map, with a beginning and end. Besides being from the same series of contests, this game and Naillevaihcam have no connection to each other, they use the same placeholder player sprites because of the time constraints, it was simply easier to do. The theme for this particular contest was Gym Interior, as well as a list of gimmicks to choose from, and so I chose the gimmick: "The move Teleport must play a key role in completing the hack." No spoilers, but that alone should give away what this game will be about. I didn't think I would top Naillevaihcam, but I was so inspired by an idea that I practically self-crunched the whole month to get this done, and I'm proud of how it came out. Like Naillevaihcam before it, this is a relatively short but fully complete game. The only changes between the contest release and this one is some bug fixing and cleaning up. If any new updates like additional fixes come up, I'll update as needed, but I will not be adding any new content. The point is mostly to show off everything I was able to do in a month's time. If you speedrun straight to the credits, you might have a slightly faster experience than Naillevaihcam, but if you take your time and experience all the content, it just may end up being over thrice as long. There's a ton of optional content this time around, and it's up to you to decide when you've had your fill. This game doesn't simply end at the credits, it ends when you want it to, so have fun!

Story​

Welcome to the Magical Altering Gym Menagerie! Or MAGM for short. This is a yet-to-be-approved-by-the-Pokémon-League Gym challenge that should test your wits and your skills! The goal of this Gym is to collect 8 pins to earn the right to challenge the Gym Leader, Sothoth. Note that while there are more than 8 pins available, it is not mandatory to collect them all. I highly encourage you to talk to Sothoth whenever you're unsure of what to do next. She has a lot of helpful and contextual dialogue, and will comment on many, many different things from your progress and accomplishments, to hints on what you need to do next. Just keep in mind the waiver you sign when you get started, MAGM inc. is not responsible for injuries, displacement, lost items, persons, dimensions, or sudden dimensional implosions.

Features​

As this hack utilizes Skeli's Dynamic Pokémon Expansion and Complete FireRed Upgrade, you can expect many of it's included features by default, such as:
- Pokémon, moves, abilities, and various battle mechanics from later generations
- Customized battle-ready Pokémon in both your starting Party as well as the PC
- Improved AI
- Ability pop-ups
- Trainers with EVs
- Fairy type
- And more!

Unbound Cloud Compatible​

It's my pleasure to finally announce that Magical Altering Gym Menagerie can be used with Unbound Cloud! Unbound Cloud is an online storage program by Skeli, the creator of Pokemon Unbound, it is compatible with a select few ROM hacks, this one included. You can store Pokemon across compatible games and save files, and even trade, from GTS to Wonder Trading! Do you want to take your MAGM team with you to other games? Did you want to take the Gym challenge with your own team? Now you can! MAGM is compatible with 898 Pokemon, from Bulbasaur to Calyrex, including all their forms. Currently, Hisuian Pokemon are not compatible, I won't make any promises but I may make them as well as future Pokemon compatible as they come. It is worth noting however, that that the player's starting Pokemon and all opponent's teams are set in stone, they will never change with any updates. As of now, the known compatible browsers for Unbound Cloud are: Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge, and Opera, with some mobile compatibility in the works. This feature has basically been ready to go since 1.0, but due to the site's requirements, you will need to be on 1.2 or later (if there ever is a later) to work. There is only one in-game requirement, and that is that your save file must have interacted with the PC at least once. Technical reasons below if you're curious.

Spoiler:

In order to avoid any noticeable lag, the game does not frontload you with everything at once. While you start with a full team of 6 and all the items in your bag, the PC Pokemon aren't actually inserted at that time. Instead, they are injected from the first use of the PC, which is why it has the additional loading screen of "importing your Pokemon". Lorewise, it's just registering you with the Pokemon your character already had from previous journeys, but technically, that is the moment they are being created. The process only happens once, and you don't need to even use any of the PC functions. Just starting it up will have it do what it needs to do and set the needed flag. CFRU makes scripted Pokemon generation much faster than vanilla, but since it is still multiple boxes worth, I'd rather justify it with an ingame loading screen set here than at the start of a save. If you were to somehow view the PC beforehand, such as if Unbound Cloud didn't have such a restriction, you would not only see it empty, but messing with it can potentially screw up the code that's supposed to set other things about the PC Pokemon, as it assumes them to be in a specific order. By requiring the usage of the PC, the Pokemon will all be there, with all their settings correctly scripted and ready to go. All the Cloud is doing is checking that flag to make sure it is set.

That's about it! If you want the non-hyperlink URL to the site, it is: https://unboundcloud.net
If you need any assistance using the Cloud, you can find help at Unbound's official Discord server: https://discord.gg/k34Jm4T

How It Works: The Teleport Gimmick​

I recommend reading this part only after discovering how to properly use Teleport, or if you're still stuck even after talking to Sothoth.

Spoiler:

So, the reason I chose this gimmick was an idea I had where Teleport doesn't bring you to the last Pokémon Center, but to different locations entirely. After some deliberating with friends, my friend who is credited as The Saltiest Man I Know, suggested held items as the method, so that's what I decided to go with. At first, I tried messing with the sethealingplace scripts, but upon learning how new field moves work in CFRU, I was able to substitute the original Teleport function with my own custom script, which was later improved on by Skeli. The script checks the Teleporting Pokémon's held item and changes destination accordingly. If they hold nothing or an item that isn't special, you're taken to the lobby. If they hold a type-boosting item, you're taken to an alternate dimension matching that associated type. There are a couple other special items I'll get to later as well. So that means there are well over 8 pins to collect, with 1 per dimension, so over half the game's content is entirely optional. There's one dimension for all 18 types, 2 secretly compatible items that take you to secret dimensions, and 5 alternate items that take to the same dimension the type boosting items do. Those alternate items are Fresh Water, which take you to the same Water dimension as the Mystic Water, the Iron Plate, which takes you to the same Steel dimension as the Metal Coat, The Flame Orb, which takes you to the same Fire dimension as the Charcoal, and The Toxic Orb and Black Sludge, both of which take you the same poison dimension as the Poison Barb. The 2 secret items are the Light Ball, which the Pikachu in your PC is holding, which takes you to a special Pikachu dimension, and the MAGM Badge you earn after beating Sothoth, which takes you to the secret boss and ending. The way the actual Teleport script works is after confirming the held item, it copies your X and Y coordinates to the destination so you warp to the same tile in relation to the maps, all of which share the same height and width. Each map also contains a level script that checks the tile you enter in, if it detects you end up in a problematic tile, it warps you to the map's entrance. Problematic tiles being walls, void, obstacles, water, shore next to water, on top of people, and behind Sothoth. I manually set every used tile that's considered problematic to have the behavior byte it checks for, at least until Skeli showed me how to use CFRU to detect movement permissions and water. I had already finished the behavior byte method by then however, so that really just ended up being used to check for water. Still, a big thanks to him for that, and CFRU as whole, as Teleport could not have ended up this way without him.

Screenshots

Credits​

Spoiler:

Engine Changes and Tutorials:
Skip Intro - Sierraffinity
Skip Title Screen - knizz
All Instrument Patch - Alisa180, BlankPoints
Dynamic Overworld Palettes - Navenatox
MrDollSteak's Rombase - MrDollSteak
EV Updater - Bin, Ghoulslash
Complete FireRed Upgrade - Skeli, Ghoulslash

Graphics:
Item Icons - thedarkdragon11
Pin Icons - U.Flame
MAGM Badge - U.Flame, Jerico Pepino
Vanilla FireRed/RSE tilesets - GameFreak
Tileset Edits - U.Flame

Music:
Battle Hall - Blank Points
Black and White Gym - OfficialBrandix
Edited by U.Flame and Jerico Pepino

Tools:
Advance Map - LU-HO
Advance Text - Scizz
eXtreme Script Editor - HackMew
HxD - Mael Horz
HexManiacAdvance - haven
Pokémon Game Editor - Gamer2020
Gen 3 Tools - Kurapika
Tile Molester Alternate - SnowBro
Unnamed Trainer Editor - Jambo51
unLZ - loadingNOW, HackMew
Free Space Finder - HackMew
Sappy - Kyoufu Kawa
Nameless Sprite Editor - Link12552
Notepad++ - Notepad++team
OverWorld Manager - Kimonas
MSPaint - Microsoft Windows
IrfanView - Irfan Skijan
VisualBoyAdvance - Forgotten, VBA team
GBA Intro Manager - Sierraffinity
Advanced Palette Editor - HackMew
LunarIPS - FuSoYa, Defender of Relm
Photoshop - Adobe

Playtesters:
Jerico Pepino
Silent Vigil

Misc Assistance:
Lunos
Dark Zeta
petuuuhhh
Joexv
FBI
twixstixx
Tarma
BreadCrumbs
Zeturic
Squeetz
AkameTheBulbasaur
Darthatron
DavidJCobb
pheonixbound
Sierraffiniity
Asith
BluRose
Fan King
ShinyTillDawn
Anthroyd
Thevenomous
Jerico Pepino
malgus
Metaleviathan
The Saltiest Man I Know
Silent Vigil

Extra Spoiler-y Credits​

Spoiler:

Yog Sothoth painting - Anita S. Moore
H.P. Lovecraft is the person who made Yog Sothoth, and the origin of nearly all eldrich horror. This may have been quite a liberal take on his characters, but they're still his characters. Dude had issues, but I hope we can remember his legacy for the good it does, and learn from the ignorance he displayed to do better.

Special Thanks:
Anthroyd - Host of MAGM, (Make A Good Map, not Magical Altering Gym Menagerie) creator of helpful video tutorials, owner of Anthoyd's Discord Server, and all around good friend and cool guy. He helped me actually start to learn ROM hacking for realsies, and always believed in me.
Skeli - One of the creators of CFRU, and one of the greatest GBA hackers I know. From CFRU to personal DMs, the majority of this game and everything that makes it work the way it does wouldn't have been possible without him. Go play Pokémon Unbound, seriously it's amazing.
My IRL friends - Thevenomous, Jerico Pepino, malgus, Silent Vigil, MetaLeviathan, and The Saltiest Man I Know - For their support, feedback, encouragement, ideas, and playtesting. You guys helped more than you know.
PokéCommunity - For years of help and support. Decades at this point. They're the whole reason I discovered and fell in love with ROM hacking.

Finally, a thank you to Nintendo, GameFreak, and The Pokémon Company for creating FireRed, and the Pokémon brand in general. Please support their official releases. This has all been a labor of love for Pokémon, words can't describe how much Pokémon means to me. I hope you can appreciate them too. Pokémon FireRed belongs to Nintendo, GameFreak, Creatures Inc., The Pokémon Company, and many lawyers. I claim ownership of nothing, and I do not condone the sale or monetization of any fangames in any capacity. This is all free, and it should stay that way.

 

[Pyxal]

Looks good, approved!

 

[Ona]

awesome! I have a question, why not adding more Pokemon in the boxes? is it something you will be doing at some point?

 

[U.Flame]

awesome! I have a question, why not adding more Pokemon in the boxes? is it something you will be doing at some point?

I figure 2 and a half boxes full of Pokemon is more than enough already. Besides, this is the balance of a game made in 30 days, so I don't intend to change that by adding or changing anything, unless it's a direct bug or mistake that needs fixing.

 

[Ona]

fair enough! I was just wondering if you would be willing to add it in the future ^_^, just for more team options, but it is really good as it is !

 

[U.Flame]

fair enough! I was just wondering if you would be willing to add it in the future ^_^, just for more team options, but it is really good as it is !

Thanks! Glad you like it! Just don't get your hopes up about any new updates, I intend to leave it as is, it is 100% complete after all.

Speaking of updates, MAGM has just now been updated to 1.1! Turns out I forgot to set a specific level script's type to the right one, but that's been corrected now, so all is well.

 

[DJCherryTempo]

OK, so I just finished playing this hack.

Pros- Wide variety of Pokemon to pick from. Interesting concept with Teleport.

Cons- Felt too short overall. That one Special battle at the end was kinda pointless despite looking cool.

Overall, I'd give the hack a solid 4 out of 5. Ways that I'd improve the hack- TMs being either sold or found throughout the areas, Nature changer, and a way to farm EXP more easily/have the Pokemon be Lvl 100 out of the gate.

 

[U.Flame]

OK, so I just finished playing this hack.

Pros- Wide variety of Pokemon to pick from. Interesting concept with Teleport.

Cons- Felt too short overall. That one Special battle at the end was kinda pointless despite looking cool.

Overall, I'd give the hack a solid 4 out of 5. Ways that I'd improve the hack- TMs being either sold or found throughout the areas, Nature changer, and a way to farm EXP more easily/have the Pokemon be Lvl 100 out of the gate.

Thank you for your feedback! It's definitely a short one, since it had a short deadline, and was technically supposed to be focused on one map. But I hope the amount of variation
and optional content was enough to extend playtime for people who want to get more out of it. I concede that the secret boss is mostly just spectacle, you don't really get anything out of it but the experience, which could be said about any spectacle really. I also hoped to optimize the Pokemon as much as I could, they all come with set natures, as well as maxed EVs and IVs. Didn't have the time to include TMs, so I hoped the Move Tutor was sufficient for customizing their loadout. Balance was definitely my biggest struggle here, so I especially value feedback with that.

 

[DJCherryTempo]

I was a little worried about the EVs/IVs part, due to my addiction to Radical Red's system of maxing those out. But yeah, the team I had wound up with kinda fell to me just using Greninja and Gardevoir at the end. I wanted to use Ferrothorn, Dusknoir, and Nidoking as well, but Greninja's speed and constant STAB overruled all that. Still, a fun little hack to give me a breather from RR.

 

[Hillsy13]

I just want to say, I HIGHLY recommend people give this hack a try. It's got an innovative theme that is executed to near perfection, and will only take an hour or so of your time to complete. Additionally, it's got quite a bit of replay value in my opinion. Great work U.Flame!

 

[Anthroyd]

Amazing, one of the most innovative hacks I've played and clearly a first place winner. Highly recommend! The super secret dimensional space-time battle is my favorite part. :)

 

[U.Flame]

I just want to say, I HIGHLY recommend people give this hack a try. It's got an innovative theme that is executed to near perfection, and will only take an hour or so of your time to complete. Additionally, it's got quite a bit of replay value in my opinion. Great work U.Flame!

Amazing, one of the most innovative hacks I've played and clearly a first place winner. Highly recommend! The super secret dimensional space-time battle is my favorite part. :)

Thank you guys! I have you to thank for reaching 1st place in the first place!

Also, another small update, now MAGM is at version 1.2. I fixed some opponents' Pokemon having the wrong abilities, as well as a minor tile error.

 

[Lucario2k17]

What a fun rom. Are there any plans for mega evolution?

 

[U.Flame]

What a fun rom. Are there any plans for mega evolution?

Thanks! Unfortunately, no I won't be adding any features or content. Since it was made entirely within a month, I want it to remain the same experience to show off everything I managed to do in that time. The only updates will be fixes.

 

[Rangda803]

it's a good game. I hope in the future you will make short games similar to this. which has a lot of Pokemon ready to use on PC with the Battle Collossium feature. That will make it look like pokemonshowdown Rom hack version if played on android emulator.

 

[fnks]

Great!It is a good rom.

 

[SevenChurches]

I love this hack. Had a lot of fun, and I recorded my playthrough.

 

[U.Flame]

it's a good game. I hope in the future you will make short games similar to this. which has a lot of Pokemon ready to use on PC with the Battle Collossium feature. That will make it look like pokemonshowdown Rom hack version if played on android emulator.

Great!It is a good rom.

I love this hack. Had a lot of fun, and I recorded my playthrough.

Thank you guys! I'm really glad you all liked it! I left a comment on the YouTube video as well, I enjoyed your playthrough!

 

[fnks]

How do I download background music?

 

[Zygarde-Crowned]

Played tonight. I quite liked this game, and maybe because it featured CFRU, or focused on battling more, I think it is better than Naillevaihcam. It was another original touch, need to "teleport" across different gyms to fight all trainers and obtain all items before defeating the gym leader.