《宝可梦水晶进阶重制版》

This is not a new hack, it has been in the works since October 2021, however following on from a post within Liquid Crystal's thread where LAZ gives out permission to moify and post based on his hack: https://www.pokecommunity.com/threads/pokémon-liquid-crystal-3-3-xxxxx-live-beta.242023/page-293 - I present to you a continuation, of sorts, officially...

About the Game

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This game has a bit of a history. It started out life as Pokémon Liquid Crystal, skilfully created by LinkAndZelda/Zeikku, then transformed into Pokémon Crystal Advance by Kertra; This is where my version comes in. It is an updated version of that ROM. Essentially, it is a hack of a hack of a hack of Pokemon FireRed V1.0. As to why I worked from Crystal Advance and not Liquid Crystal directly...Well...We will get to that in a minute.

This is not a 100% faithful recreation of Pokémon Crystal. Most events are 1:1 however there are differences, some call-backs to the original Pokémon Liquid Crystal. new areas to explore. This game retains the faithful GBA styling but sprinkles some niceties here and there. Think of this game as a sort of HGSS demake with some newer additions. With that, that brings me to -

About AI usage​

As of 11-10-26, some limited AI usage has been employed to fix the most stubborn of bugs, mostly to do with features made 15+ years ago that no longer have legacy data to reference, You may note that the weird game engine related issues are no longer on the bug list. That is because they were all fixed. I do not and will not be using it to create assets or steal from anyone else's good work. I will be transparent on where and how it is used, via the hackdex changelogs. I pride myself on having worked on various Pokémon games for nearly 20 years at this point. Am not about to start slopping now! If you feel you absolutely must not play this game because a few bugs were fixed with aid, that is on you and while I respect your right to an opinion and have free will, nothing you say will sway my choice. This is my hack and I will finish it with its best interests (and my own) in mind. It is not as if I see 8327547135417 people jumping at the bit to help fix issues with tangible code, after all.

Now that I have gotten that disclaimer out of the way, let's continue.

Features
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- The Complete Experience: This game can be played from start to finish, from picking your Pokémon to beating Red. Aside from some other features and additions I am currently working on, it is fully enjoyable

- Character Choice: You are able to select between 9 different characters to play the game with. Each protagonist from the first 4 generations of mainline games, both male and female. Plus a bonus option where you can play as Ash Ketchum.

- GBA Compatibility: This game is regularly tested on real GBA hardware to ensure that it works correctly for those of you (and myself) who occasionally like to play it as authentically as possible.

- Day, Night, Seasons: The environment will change depending on what time of day/month it is, to keep things fresh. The DNS has seen some improvements since this initial post. The game now has a fully implemented night lighting system.

- High Quality Arenas: I have worked hard to create a multitude of battle backgrounds, some modified from existing public works, some of my own creation. Static Legendary encounters have more gravitas by having their own unique battle background, as well as many more. Outdoor backgrounds also change based on time of day, and what season you are playing in.

- Battle system speed improvemets: Scroll-in animations removed for all trainers and wild pokemon, wait time between actions have been vastly shortened, dialogue loads quicker. All adds up to a far better than stock experience, even on real GBA hardware.

- Type chart improvements: Includes the addition of the Fairy Type. This change also affects Goldenrod Gym which in-turn has become a dual Normal/Fairy type Gym. This includes most Fairy type moves from gen 6 and the inclusion of Sylveon as an Eeveelution.

- Pokémon Migration: Creatures from the 3rd and 4th generations are a-plenty here, as well as regional variants and evolutions of Gen 1-4 Pokémon from newer Generations. Want to do a solo run with Dudunsparce? Now you can! In total there are 553 Pokémon visible in the Pokédex, with more obtainable via the Form Changer.

- Learn-set improvements: All Pokémon have had moveset improvements, largely based on moves obtained within other vanilla Pokémon games, a few have been...more creative...And have added moves based on moves obtainable through other Pokémon franchise games (Wobuffet obtains Psywave and Rock Smash based on moves used in the mystery dungeon games and TCG, for example) - This was heavily inspired by Drayano's hacks, of which I am a huge fan of

- Item availability improvements: Gone are the days where you have to wait 16 hours just to obtain some Leppa Berries; Ethers and Elixirs are obtainable within the Dept Stores and Pokémon League. Poéballs are cheaper to buy, PP Ups are purchasable from Dept Stores, Vitamins are cheaper to buy. All Wild Pokémon have had their item tables improved upon. Evolution items are attainable this way, However they are also purchasable. Additionally, the Gen 6 version of the EXP All system is included as a key item for you to collect, being ablke to enable/disable it at will.

- Stat EXP system: The EV training system has been tweaked to recreate the old Gen1/2 Stat system, whereby you can get max EVs in *every* stat, not just the current maximum of 2. This can be achieved either through Vitamin use or pure battling, it does not matter. the Power items are also available for direct EV training regardless of encounter.

- New/Reinstated areas: Areas that were available in Pokémon Liquid Crystal have returned, meaning extra places to explore. More to come on these in the future. Sadly the Orange Islands from Pokemon Liquid Crystal have been removed in their entirety.

- New TMs and Move Tutors: Some old, less useful TMs have been replace with more useful ones. Say hello to Avalanche, Play Rough, Drain Punch, Drain Kiss and Dive. Every Gym also has a learnable Tutor move via the Champ Guy upon completion

- New Items: Gen 6 EXP share? Check! Portable PC? Check! Nature Mints and Ability Pills? Check! An item that allows for HM-less travel? Check! Items that allow you to max out your IVs and EVs? Check too! (The last 2 are late game unlocks...)

- Higher difficulty Curve: trainers will be a little harder, with expanded teams. By the time you get to the elite four, trainer levels will be on average 10 higher than vanilla Crystal, and 20 by the end of the game. Kanto has been re-blanced to actually be fun to do battles in, and not feel like a chore.

- Double the trouble: Quite a few trainers are now double battles. Every Gym Leader is a double battle. Wild Double Battles also have a 20% chance to occur.

- Battle Speed improvements: The game has had improvements to general performance, the battle system in particular has seen some animation speed changes, delay reductions and other things to make playing on real hardware a bit more tolerable.

- Placement differences: There will be some things that are still the same but in slightly different areas. I will leave these to be discovered.

- Evolution Changes: I have turned most single use held items into assistive evolution items. Pokémon that required trading now simply need to hold one of these associative held items and level up in battle. Eevee is now a purely stone evolving Pokémon, for example

- Higher Quality Audio samples: You may notice that Pokémon sound different, a bit more realistic? This is because I painstakingly ripped and recreated the sounds used in Pokémon Stadium 2 and inserted them into this ROM. Gen 3 and 4 Pokémon use their Gen 6 modulated sounds. These are encoded in a higher bitrate than standard also to give a more immersive experience. IDK about you but I was not a fan of the old square wave audio.

- Increased Shiny Odds: Gone are the days of you searching for 84 years just to get a rattata. Shiny odds are 1/256. Furthermore within Celadon Game Corner there is a machine that will generate a random Shiny Encounter for you to catch (this costs quite a few coins, mind)

- Fully Implemented Dive System: A complete implementation of Dive, fully scripted (no ASM/C# injection involved)

- Fully Functional GB Player: Remember when the GB Player in Liquid Crystal played a bunch of sounds with missing channels? Pepperidge Farm remembers; and so do I. Which is why I re-coded an entire section of the music bank handler, and then went through and remastered most of the music in the game. As of 18/4/24 (or 4/18/24 for those across the pond) every single GBA track in the game except for 2 has an accompanying GB audio variant - even then that is soon to change.

- Following Pokemon: Yeah you read that right; EVERY single Pokémon in this hack can now follow you around in the overworld. This could possibly be the first Vanilla Binary hack to get this done, but it is here in full, alongside specific special interactions with them. These are all custom drawn full 3 frame (still based on the original HGSS ones) follower sprites, so motion is as fluid as the player movement.

- Player Bedroom Decorations: Pokémon Gold/Silver/Crystal allowed you to decorate your bedroom with various ornaments and things. I have recreated that experience here, with many things to purchase and unlock throughout the game.

- Hidden Grottos: The feature that debuted in Gen 5 is also here, thanks to the engine powering the following pokémon system.

- Expanded Game Corner: You can now do more than just play the slots. Emeralds Roulette and the classic Snake can be played to earn coins as well, with more games to come.

- Classic multiplayer options: I have recently managed to restore Link cable trades and battles. As long as you have a compatible emulator or real hardware you can link up and trade/battle with others who are playing Crsytal Advance Redux. Singles, doubles and Multi battles should work.

- Basic Tweaking: This game now features a Level Cap system (which covers almost the entire game), soft Nuzlocke mode (it is nothing more than blocking pokemon capture after catching one in a route), a No EXP gain mode - have fun with that one...
- And Many, many More...

Screenshots
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Tools used

Hex Maniac Advance
Sappy2006 Mod15
Cry Editor (4bit aligned version)

Bugs?

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- Nine to speak of right now, at least not any that causes game breaking issues!

Download?

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I post fresh builds on Hackdex now: https://www.hackdex.app/hack/pokemon-crystal-advance-redux meaning you don't have to use discord to stay updated. Just use the hackdex link.

Additionally the patch file can be found on my Discord server alongside instructions on what you need to do to patch the game (input this code into the server window within Discord):

As for why a direct link is not being provided here? The development is really active, sometimes seeing 2+ builds per day. It would be inefficient if I were to update this thread every time I post an update patch. My Discord server is far easier to manage for me.

Mentions and Credits​

First of all it goes without saying that I need to credit everyone involved in the original Liquid Crystal (the end credits are actually retained so you will see all of these guys names in-game):

Spoiler: Liquid Crystal Crew

a special thanks to Kertra, without whom this version would not be possible, and for all the random questions i threw at him over the course of the past 2 years.
a special thanks to Haven and Shiny Till Dawn, for quite frankly the best software available in Binary hacking, and most definitely without it I would not have this hack where it is now.

I uh, don't really need to thank myself. This is a passion project of mine and is built for me to play, and for you to enjoy.

Any questions or queries should be directed to my Discord server. I will not be checking here often.