Wi-Philes

I was a bit of a late bloomer what with waiting until the late 90s to jump on the Pika-train, but I eventually fell in love with Pokémon. Even to this day, Pokémon Red (along with the 32-bit enhanced FireRed) is one of the few RPGs that I not only like, but can play over and over. Red is the Pokémon that owns a nice chunk of real estate in my gaming heart.

Despite having a franchise that within 10 years had become one of Nintendo's top three, there hasn't been a whole lot of change about it. Its successors adequately took that formula and tweaked it to take advantage of the power (however noticeable) of the successive platforms. Gold was good, Ruby was fine, and Pearl was... well, I have yet to finish that one. Its spin-offs (Puzzle League notwithstanding and disregarding Snap's otherwise brilliance) just never tried to amount beyond being what Handy Manny and Little Einsteins are for Disney: young kid fodder. Even the WiiWare Pokémon game is a crazy, oversaturated chibi-poke-je-ne-sais-quoi.

Ever since the turn of the century when we first saw the modem and broadband adaptors for the GameCube, everyone has been screaming to make Pokémon some sort of Massive Multiplayer Online game (MMORPG, for the uninformed). Those screams have just become louder as games like World of Warcraft grabbed the mind share of just about everyone, that Square tried with Final Fantasy XI, and that the DS and Wii feature, compared to their predecessors, online nirvana. Maybe Online is the next real step up for the franchise - true online, not the titillating "waiting for opponent" action we've received so far with Pearl and Battle Revolution.

What kind of form should this theoretical online game take, I wonder? Would it follow in the footsteps of the GameCube RPGs (ie faux-gritty, dull, and about as much fun as watching paint peel) and offer 3D-but-not-really worlds and massive-but-not-really regions? Would it stay true to the overhead 2D style we love in our handhelds and be subtitled Trainer Mayhem on Route Twelve?



Part of the fun of Pokémon is being a trainer and creating a team that can hopefully defeat any other team (or create an all water team, because water Pokémon are the coolest). That said, the two things gamers really want are to (1) control the Pokémon directly and (2) play the adventure with friends. If you want to know what my take is on an online Pokémon, you really have hold onto the core elements of what makes a Pokémon game - catching, battling, and training monsters, and throw out the rest. Why? Because Pokémon needs fresh air and needs to not be like everything else out there. Ironically, the inspiration for a MMO Pokémon is Maple Story.

... Still with me? Good.

If you don't know, Maple Story, created by Nexon and Wizet, is a completely free (with non-performance-enhancing extras that you can purchase), downloadable PC MMO. You start the game off as a generic level 1 character and quickly differentiate between five different classes of fighter, each with their own unique attack styles and equipment. The only story is the plights of the non-playable characters (NPCs) that inhabit the various (massive) regions of the land. Your enemies? Snails and pigs. And yes, eventually giant mushrooms, yetis, balrogs, and scary Japanese women. But beyond this seemingly shallow experience is a deep social underbelly built with guilds, party quests, and friend lists, combined with enough quests and playability to keep the experience fresh, which if you haven't noticed, are a couple of qualities of which Pokémon is in dire need.


2D is Key

Imagine taking a dive to get to the Seafoam Islands and seeing a school of Goldeen swimming by and a bunch Shellder on the sea floor, or travelling a fire cave with Magmar stomping about and hoards of Zubat aimlessly flying about. Imagine a world that, while stylized, feels alive with its own systems at work.

From a visual point of view, Pokémon really needs a fresh perspective. The best way to give each city, route, and region their own unique feeling is to completely redesign them. Keeping an isometric view keeps the player above the sights and sounds, not immersed in them. Besides, you can only stretch roof styles so far before the only real difference between Town A and B City is the maroon vs. the burgundy atop the buildings. Creating a lush, inviting 2D world solves many problems. First, it's easy to go in create a feeling of a marshland or a rain forest or a desert and really show off the differences. Not only is 2D one of Nintendo's strengths, but layered backgrounds can be just as gorgeous as the pretty 3D worlds that high def systems can pump out. The artists can also show off much more detail in the settings, the characters, the monsters and animations- details that are lost when using 3D.

There's also the added bonus of 2D being much simpler for the system and the servers - lag will be minimized.

Using a 2D system also allows for an intuitive portal system, where one section of the map has portals and entrances to other sections and so on. Dividing routes and cities into scrolling areas a few screens tall and/or wide makes it easy to find specific Pokémon or quest goals. Again, large, sprawling 3D areas lead to issues including lag, poor draw distance, large load times, and difficult navigation for the feint of RPG heart.


Massive Regions to Explore

Kanto, Johto, Hoenn, Sinnoh, and Orre (and any other regions I may have missed) were sizable in their own respects. For an MMO, all these regions should not only be present, they should all be as large, if not larger than we've seen them before. Not only that, they should all have their own distinct styles: Kanto could be broad and colourful, Johto could finer and more natural, Sinnoh could be more urbanized, and Orre a desolate wasteland. On top of these established regions, a new game should have a few new regions of its own to inspire that explorer in all of us.

Not only that, but travelling between these regions should be epic. Just like Maple Story has its airships, Pokémon could use planes, cruise ships, railways, and other made-up travel systems that keep regular, real-time schedules and take a few minutes to get from point A to point B. How do you spend that time? The same way you spend time on buses and planes in real life: minigames and interacting with others.



Quests, Quests, Quests, and Catching 'em All

With a much more non-linear gameplay style, there have to be scenarios put in motion by both your actions and the NPCs that populate the world to give the game a sense of purpose. We're talking everything from "The Mukrows are destroying my crops! Please eliminate 50 of them" and "I'm making a comfy blanket for my mom's birthday and I need 25 cotton bails. I hear Mareep drop them sometimes!" to "There's an old myth that deep in the recesses of the Seafoam Islands, a legendary bird dwells. This bird is said to have control over the temperature of our oceans and seas! Say, you're a pretty tough trainer. If you could prove this myth true and catch the mythical beast, then I have a totally awesome and rare item with your name on it..."

Completing these quests provide you with all kinds of useful items, like fishing rods, TMs, and the like. Specially designed quests yield HMs, access to hidden areas, and perhaps even one-of-a-kind Pokémon, like that crazy Porygon.

Of course, the main motivation behind a Pokémon game is to go and "catch 'em all". With so many regions, it would be pretty easy to populate them with all 500ish monsters that currently exist. Some might be common across the planet, while others might be specific to certain routes at certain times during the day, of the year even. In order to build a strong team of six Pokémon that they enjoy, all players will have to patiently search far and wide, waiting until they're strong enough to survive the more dangerous areas, and perhaps even trade with some of the other trainers.

Exploration and trading with others has always been a core attribute to a true Pokémon game. This game would emphasize this point, especially if half the Pokémon were common and easy to find, and the other half were much more elusive, or harder to catch. The game's nature may eliminate the need for two versions of itself and the concept of "only one" of a particular Pokémon per game. Assuming that, for example, Mewtwo only spawns three or four times a day in one room of one cave and a million people want to catch him, even if every Mewtwo were caught, he'd still be a pretty rare find. By the way, the master ball may disappear.


Be the Trainer and Be the Pokémon

The Pokémon World that I've described so far sounds great, except for the notion of whether you play as the trainer, or just as a team of six monsters. The simple answer is, you play as both! The trainer, in a way, is the main player who makes all the decisions, like where to go, what to fight, when to catch, etc. But Pokémon has never been about a cookie cutter boy walking around, smacking Kadabra with a sword. With a tap of a button, the trainer takes the background as the starting Pokémon is called out. When the Pokémon is out, the player controls that Pokémon in real time, choosing the attacks to use, items and so on, until you either retreat, faint, catch the wild Pokémon, or defeat it to earn experience, moolah, and dropped items.

Switching between the trainer and Pokémon has its advantages. For example, only the trainer can use field items (repel and the bike for example) and access all the menu options, whereas only the Pokémon can attack wild Pokémon. Retreating from a battle is as simple as calling forth the trainer. While wild Pokémon usually don't attack humans (thus you can walk around without having to fight), they occasionally will, forcing out the Pokémon, and thus a battle. If your Pokémon faints, the next Pokémon is called out. If the whole team faints, you're transported to the nearest Pokécenter, perhaps a bit short on Pokédollars.

Plus, the trainer walks normal. It might be a bit slow trying to move as a Metapod or a Slowpoke. Likewise, it might be hard controlling a galloping Rapidash, or climbing a ladder as a Diglett - though any bird could just fly up to the platforms.

The new component here is that while the Pokémon get experience points by defeating opponents, the trainer gets trainer points for how he or she plays. This extra stat could influence how easy it is to catch wild Pokémon, how quickly captured Pokémon warm up to their new master, the quests available, and the like. How are these trainer points obtained you ask? By winning battles, defeating gyms, completing quests, saving your Pokémon from fainting, etc.

Because this is now a real-time game, it makes sense that a few of the mechanics behind the Pokémon change. Firstly, each Pokémon can know more than four moves, but only four can be assigned to use in battle at any given time. It might make more sense that Pikachu know thunderbolt when entering a water area, but have slash and thunder wave come up when entering areas with grassier types. Likewise, instead of only being able to use thunderbolt 10 or 20 times before needing to see Nurse Joy, the attacks can take up a certain amount of MP from that Pokémon's MP supply. An interesting spin on that would be if thunderbolt for the electric Pikachu would take up 20 MP points, but would take up 40 for a water/flying Gyarados. Casting times would also vary. Thundershock would cast faster than thunderbolt, and the time between castings for moves like fire blast and solar beam would feel like an eternity by comparison.

Speaking of moves, because you can learn more than four, it makes sense to have move trees for each Pokémon. Once a Pokémon masters base attacks to a given point, it can learn other related attacks. Again, once Pikachu has a certain amount invested in thundershock, it can learn thunderbolt and/or spark. Here the trainer can decide which is more important: equally learning both special and physical electric moves, or sticking with one and making its attack more powerful. Suddenly the concept of physical vs. special attacks becomes more concrete. By extension, after each levelling, the trainer decides how to divide the earned skill points between HP, MP, phyical/special attack/defence, speed, and accuracy.

After all, a Pikachu with a high physical attack should learn spark, right? Unless the trainer likes to attack from a distance, in which case he or she should focus on special attack and thunderbolt. This added flexability adds a layer of complexity and strategy never before seen in Pokémon. Plus it makes each trainer style and their Pokémon much more unique. Who wouldn't want a Pokémon that could level a city with one earthquake, but is so slow that it's defeated before lifting a leg?


Sounds Confusing. Controls, Please!

The Wii Remote and Nunchuk are best suited to playing the game. The control stick would move the trainer or Pokémon in play, C jumps/flies, and Z crouches/digs.

In the field, the B button could be used to bring up information on whatever the pointer is pointing at (like a wild Pokémon or another trainer), A selects choices/picks up items, + brings up the menu, - calls out the lead Pokémon, 1 and 2 are programmable hot keys for items, like the select button was in the handheld games.

As a Pokémon on the field or in battle, the D-Pad uses moves, A button uses the item that the Pokémon is carrying, B (with a Remote swing for style) makes the background trainer throw a Pokeball at the last monster that was attacked. Maybe there could be some basic waggle for powering up moves or something along those lines.

Because there would never be a need to press A and B at the same time, doing so could bring up the chat window to talk other players, be it the people nearby, your friends who are playing, your party, etc. Maple Story does have a robust anti-swearing filter that won't let you send a message with certain words; it's not unreasonable for the same kind of protocol to be a part of this game.


PVP FTW

So far, I haven't really addressed how a player-vs.-player match would work. The best way to approach this is that one player invites another to battle. Upon accepting, the two trainers become "locked" on screen, as a new screen is loaded. Here in the arena (which changes based on where the battle is initiated, by the way), the battle starts and based on strategy and the teams at hand, someone wins! Only the invite has several options that you wouldn't expect, options that solve certain issues with MMOs in general and that tailor the fight to the preferences of the players.

The first option is to choose between a real-time fight, akin to how the game is played, or turn-based, not unlike how Pokémon games are currently played. The second important option would be whether the Pokémon should fight as-is, or if the computer should do some math and interpolate the Pokémon's stats as if they were the same level. The third option would be whether the battle is rated and that the results are recorded on the player's trainer card. The last option would be whether to allow spectators, so that if passers-by notice two other players in a "head to head" battle stance, then he or she could click on them and watch the battle play out.


P&P, Too

So what about when players want to team up? After all, training and doing quests is always more fun in pairs, or in teams. By partying up, experience and money is split among party members, but having multiple Pokémon attacking wild monsters makes the task easier, and maybe even provides bonuses. Some quests may need a party to complete even.

You could even form guilds (or a Pokémon equivalent) to associate with other players that you like. Personally I never really understood guilds, but then again, I don't really play MMOs. I digress.


There you have it, my long, yet still brief idea of how an online Pokémon game should work. I could probably continue for another six pages, and six more. Essentially, this new game takes the core elements of a Pokémon game and transforms it into an entirely different experience - one that I think I would play even more than the time I've put into the current games! And before you ask, you shouldn't be able to transfer Pokémon from the existing RPGs to this game since it would unbalance this game at its core. Though that isn't to say that connecting a DS to this game (or activating a device that reads your Wii data) wouldn't occasionally make it easier to catch some of the Pokémon you've previously caught. If only it could read as far back as my Pokémon Red and the pages of level 100s I had - that is, if the save battery still works.