Released Project Vanguard (4.0 UPDATE RELEASE 8/27/2025)

Ray_7760 · Nov 30, 2020

For your first pokemon game, this is looking great!
I will play the game right now!
Also, I think I will be able to help you if you want!
I'm okay with sprites I think...for my game I did two trainer battle sprites and they look good.

Ayrei · Nov 30, 2020

Akvagirl said:
For your first pokemon game, this is looking great!
I will play the game right now!
Also, I think I will be able to help you if you want!
I'm okay with sprites I think...for my game I did two trainer battle sprites and they look good.

Thank you, and tell me what you think of it!
Any help is wanted, so if you are interested in helping please add me on discord @Ayrei#5764, or if you would prefer to, dm me on here :)

pkthedragon · Nov 30, 2020

Install the fonts!

Ayrei · Dec 1, 2020

pkthedragon said:
Install the fonts!

Had forgotten to do that originally, should be fixed now!

Ayrei · Dec 16, 2020

Updated to v1.2!

XeroTheHero · Dec 18, 2020

My game crashed when I tried to fight the gym leader

Ayrei · Dec 18, 2020

XeroTheHero said:
My game crashed when I tried to fight the gym leader

Which version were u playing on?

XeroTheHero · Dec 18, 2020

Ayrei said:
Which version were u playing on?

1.1

Ayrei · Dec 18, 2020

XeroTheHero said:
1.1

Those bugs have been fixed in 1.2

emzee · Dec 24, 2020

Well, I've been playing the game so far and I love it! I enjoyed the selection of Pokemon and the music, as well! Really great job for this release so far! I'll put my thoughts under spoilers.

The plot is interesting so far. A person who's found in some tiny town with no recollection of their memories except their name. Gives me such nostalgia for Pokemon Mystery Dungeon. Would it be wrong of me to assume the storyline would be something of the sort?

The overworld design is amazing, just like Gen 5/Black and White.

I also love that little area where Ralts was hiding. A cute surprise! The hidden grottos are amazing, too. Always nice to find one! I got an Elekid!

The antagonist grunts are terrifying! Love their design. Wow, that part in the secret base at Crosstown freaked me out! The part when my character entered the room on the left and then that blackout! Whew I thought I was gonna get jumped!

What’s with the level cap at 18? Oh man that cliffhanger with the phone call! It had me anticipating for more!

Suggestions:

-I wouldn’t put a level cap at that point because it just seems wrong, especially for my pokemon when they were fighting the gym leader, level up at 18, and their exp bar didn’t go up.

Just a few bugs to report:

-got stuck trying to exit the Fateseer's house at Crosstown. Had to restart the game. also got stuck on the top part of the stairs (at the bottom side) near the pokemon center.
Also some mapping stuff where my character walked through trees and cliffs, though I quickly backed out when I realized what happened.

Personal Nitpicks:

-grammar and spelling. wrong use of your and you're, etc. Kinda annoyed you didn't capitalize Crosstown unless it's intentional?
-the music is way louder than the battle sounds so I had to lower it in my options.

I'll go ahead and add you on discord. I don't know much about designing sprites or programming but I can help you with dialogue stuff.

Here is my team!

Ayrei · Dec 24, 2020

emzee said:
Well, I've been playing the game so far and I love it! I enjoyed the selection of Pokemon and the music, as well! Really great job for this release so far! I'll put my thoughts under spoilers.

The plot is interesting so far. A person who's found in some tiny town with no recollection of their memories except their name. Gives me such nostalgia for Pokemon Mystery Dungeon. Would it be wrong of me to assume the storyline would be something of the sort?

The overworld design is amazing, just like Gen 5/Black and White.

I also love that little area where Ralts was hiding. A cute surprise! The hidden grottos are amazing, too. Always nice to find one! I got an Elekid!

The antagonist grunts are terrifying! Love their design. Wow, that part in the secret base at Crosstown freaked me out! The part when my character entered the room on the left and then that blackout! Whew I thought I was gonna get jumped!

What’s with the level cap at 18? Oh man that cliffhanger with the phone call! It had me anticipating for more!

Suggestions:

-I wouldn’t put a level cap at that point because it just seems wrong, especially for my pokemon when they were fighting the gym leader, level up at 18, and their exp bar didn’t go up.

Just a few bugs to report:

-got stuck trying to exit the Fateseer's house at Crosstown. Had to restart the game. also got stuck on the top part of the stairs (at the bottom side) near the pokemon center.
Also some mapping stuff where my character walked through trees and cliffs, though I quickly backed out when I realized what happened.

Personal Nitpicks:

-grammar and spelling. wrong use of your and you're, etc. Kinda annoyed you didn't capitalize Crosstown unless it's intentional?
-the music is way louder than the battle sounds so I had to lower it in my options.

I'll go ahead and add you on discord. I don't know much about designing sprites or programming but I can help you with dialogue stuff.

Here is my team!

View attachment 1219

I read through your thoughts and I'm glad you enjoyed it. The bugs you pointed out I am a bit aware of and do plan on fixing in the next update. The level 18 cap was a bit unintended. The cap was planned to be 18 before I revamped a lot of things, but I guess it didn't cross my mind to change it to what it needed to be (20). Also the battle music being louder than the battle effects is still something I am still trying to figure out myself and will hopefully have that figured out for the next update.

CelestialFearow · Dec 25, 2020

Greetings, I finished the demo a few days ago. Here is what I have to say...

-Story
The story is a bit basic. But it's pretty basic, to appeal to a lot of people. And I'm sure with a little work the story will be really interesting.

-Ui
Ok.

-Region Map
Non existant. However when I look in the game files I can find a map of the region. And personally, I find it a bit too small.

-Mapping
The maps are way too square. Of course I am not saying that all maps are like that. But there are many who are like that. It should be taken into account, that each map of the region must be clean and work. You don't have to do them quickly, then put the project online, it's not very good. So please take your time when making a new map for the region.

-Tileset
Seriously what is this? Every time I go to a new place it's always a new tileset, there is really a problem. Honestly choose only one tileset. Otherwise you'll find yourself in a death trap, that I myself have fallen into...

-Music
Cool music I have nothing to say. Except the fact that they must be looped somehow.

-Section Name
There you go, I don't think I have too much else to say. Then of course I could talk about all the problems I encountered in the game... But hey, since someone is already talking about it above, I don't need to explain.

-Section Name2
By the way, I found someone on the internet who played the demo. Take a look for yourself.

-Section Name3
Anyway, have a good day or an evening, and I hope what I said will be useful.

CelestialFearow · Dec 25, 2020

Oh yes I just remembered something, it's about sprites. You really need to fix the problem, of sprites that are literally melting.

Ayrei · Dec 25, 2020

CelestialFearow said:
Greetings, I finished the demo a few days ago. Here is what I have to say...

-Story
The story is a bit basic. But it's pretty basic, to appeal to a lot of people. And I'm sure with a little work the story will be really interesting.

-Ui
Ok.

-Region Map
Non existant. However when I look in the game files I can find a map of the region. And personally, I find it a bit too small.

-Mapping
The maps are way too square. Of course I am not saying that all maps are like that. But there are many who are like that. It should be taken into account, that each map of the region must be clean and work. You don't have to do them quickly, then put the project online, it's not very good. So please take your time when making a new map for the region.

-Tileset
Seriously what is this? Every time I go to a new place it's always a new tileset, there is really a problem. Honestly choose only one tileset. Otherwise you'll find yourself in a death trap, that I myself have fallen into...

-Music
Cool music I have nothing to say. Except the fact that they must be looped somehow.

-Section Name
There you go, I don't think I have too much else to say. Then of course I could talk about all the problems I encountered in the game... But hey, since someone is already talking about it above, I don't need to explain.

-Section Name2
By the way, I found someone on the internet who played the demo. Take a look for yourself.

-Section Name3
Anyway, have a good day or an evening, and I hope what I said will be useful.

I read through all of what you said and I hope you realize that I'm one single person working on this and I this is my first time making a game so obviously not everything is going to be perfect and there are going to be a few bugs. The game is only in its demo phase, the region map is not finished and isn't able to be viewed ingame. I'm not very capable of making my own tilesets or sprites so most of the resources I use are pulled from the internet (and credited ofc) and just thrown in. I myself personally like using different tilesets and don't mind switching between them. Also I'm not sure what you meant by the sprits "melting." I hope this didn't come off too harsh.

CelestialFearow · Dec 28, 2020

Ok, even if you are a beginner, and the only person working on this, that's no reason to create a bad game. If you don't work the game... It will be bad.
So when you use different tileset in each new area, it will be hard to immerse in the world, so please... If you want some advice, I recommend that you create a custom tileset. I'm not saying you have to create it from scratch, no no, I'm saying you have to collect parts of other tileset. Each square of a tileset is 32x32px.
So i hope it can help. Concerning the world map, I was just saying that I find it a little too small to make a complete game with 8 gyms. And finally concerning the sprites which are melting... What i meant was... It wasnt resize very well...

If you need any help i can offer it to you.
Discord: ๖̶ζ͜͡Zigzapix⚜#5764
I tried joining your discord server, (if it was your server) I also tried to add you as a friend but it didn't work.

Anyway, good evening or day.

Cadeorade5 · Dec 31, 2020

Hey there! I just finished playing this game, and I'd like to share my thoughts on this demo. I also played this game on my YouTube channel, and I'll link the playlist below. At the end of the last episode, I also go through my thoughts on the game.

Playlist Link

Overall, especially for this game, which is your first, I think it's a really solid demo. In my opinion, it's difficult to get me invested in a story with only a one-gym demo, but that's what happened. Team Defiance is a really interesting team and I'm interested in what they do next. However, and this may just be me nitpicking, but I'm not really sure that the supporting cast of characters is as good as it could be. Firstly, I'm not sure what to think of Destiny. If that's what you're going for, then good job, but it seems like as the protagonist, we're supposed to like her, but as the player I'm not convinced. Additionally, I'm not sure that the dialogue in general is that strong. When I was playing, it seemed like I wasn't getting the emotion that I was supposed to be getting from a lot of the dialogue. The one other thing that I thought was pretty harsh was the first gym. To me, I don't think its fair to have egg moves at the first gym, and I think it's plain wrong to have illegal Pokemon (Lv. 18 Gyarados) when there's an enforced level cap. Finally, similar to previous posts, I'm not a fan of the different tilesets. In my opinion, it removes any continuity from the game. I know I wrote a lot about things that could be better, but I try to explain why I dislike certain aspects. Anyways, as I said, I think the storyline is really strong, and there are other things that I like a lot. I really enjoyed the music in this game. I know its a lot of remixes, and I really like when Pokemon remixes are included in games, and your music choices were great. Also, I really liked the ability to pick any starter that I wanted.

Ultimately, I think this is a great start, and with a few things fixed, this game could be fantastic. Great job on this demo!

Ayrei · Dec 31, 2020

Cadeorade5 said:
Hey there! I just finished playing this game, and I'd like to share my thoughts on this demo. I also played this game on my YouTube channel, and I'll link the playlist below. At the end of the last episode, I also go through my thoughts on the game.

Playlist Link

Overall, especially for this game, which is your first, I think it's a really solid demo. In my opinion, it's difficult to get me invested in a story with only a one-gym demo, but that's what happened. Team Defiance is a really interesting team and I'm interested in what they do next. However, and this may just be me nitpicking, but I'm not really sure that the supporting cast of characters is as good as it could be. Firstly, I'm not sure what to think of Destiny. If that's what you're going for, then good job, but it seems like as the protagonist, we're supposed to like her, but as the player I'm not convinced. Additionally, I'm not sure that the dialogue in general is that strong. When I was playing, it seemed like I wasn't getting the emotion that I was supposed to be getting from a lot of the dialogue. The one other thing that I thought was pretty harsh was the first gym. To me, I don't think its fair to have egg moves at the first gym, and I think it's plain wrong to have illegal Pokemon (Lv. 18 Gyarados) when there's an enforced level cap. Finally, similar to previous posts, I'm not a fan of the different tilesets. In my opinion, it removes any continuity from the game. I know I wrote a lot about things that could be better, but I try to explain why I dislike certain aspects. Anyways, as I said, I think the storyline is really strong, and there are other things that I like a lot. I really enjoyed the music in this game. I know its a lot of remixes, and I really like when Pokemon remixes are included in games, and your music choices were great. Also, I really liked the ability to pick any starter that I wanted.

Ultimately, I think this is a great start, and with a few things fixed, this game could be fantastic. Great job on this demo!

I'm glad you enjoyed it. I'm not amazing when it comes to dialogue writing so I'm still learning how to really design a proper narrative and design for each character. I wanted to focus more on introducing characters in the demo and I plan to further the development of 3 of the game's main characters (Destiny, Calvin, and one that hasn't been introduced yet) in the following 2 versions. Regarding the Gym difficulty, I am at fault myself for forgetting to fix the level cap (Was meant to be 20). I did notice that you played on casual difficulty. Even while it's the easiest mode I still intend for some aspects of difficulty and I'll admit looking back on it now I probably didn't balance out the first gym correctly. I am aware of the tileset issue and I've designed a completely new universal tileset for the game and I'm currently in the process of revamping each route with this new one.

Cadeorade5 · Dec 31, 2020

Ayrei said:
I'm glad you enjoyed it. I'm not amazing when it comes to dialogue writing so I'm still learning how to really design a proper narrative and design for each character. I wanted to focus more on introducing characters in the demo and I plan to further the development of 3 of the game's main characters (Destiny, Calvin, and one that hasn't been introduced yet) in the following 2 versions. Regarding the Gym difficulty, I am at fault myself for forgetting to fix the level cap (Was meant to be 20). I did notice that you played on casual difficulty. Even while it's the easiest mode I still intend for some aspects of difficulty and I'll admit looking back on it now I probably didn't balance out the first gym correctly. I am aware of the tileset issue and I've designed a completely new universal tileset for the game and I'm currently in the process of revamping each route with this new one.

Good to know! I'm not sure if you've watched the review on my channel, but I go a little more in-depth about how I like to think and act while writing dialogue, not sure it would be useful for you since everyone does the writing process differently. I'm glad that you're switching to one tileset as well. I think you'll notice in the long run that it's quicker and easier to only use one tileset. Finally with difficulty, it's something that each person has different opinions on, and it's important to get a wide range of thoughts and opinions when designing a game.

Ayrei · Jan 1, 2021

Hello everyone, I'm hoping anyone reading this is having a happy new year. I would like to thank everything who played through v1 as I'll admit looking back on it I could have done a lot better. In 2021 I hope to really bring the game to life and improve everyone's experience while playing. I am about 75% of the way done with v2 and I would like to share below a few things to be expected from it.

A refined, universal tileset for the entire game.
Updated maps
Overworld item sprites (Everything won't just be item balls)
Balance changes
A region map for the first area of the game (It looks small but don't worry it's only meant for the first 3 badges/versions)

And last but not least I aim for the story in the next chapter to give players more of a feel for the theme of the game.

Released Project Vanguard (4.0 UPDATE RELEASE 8/27/2025)

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