PMD Expanded Sky - EoS New Gen Starters Mod 1.2.1

Hiiii, I have a lot of questions!

• Is there a way to mix-and-match the available starters? like if I wanted a few from midday version, plus a few from midnight version, could I add them to a single rom of the game, as long as the quantity of the starters doesn't exceed the maximum?
• Is there a way to switch which gender a starter is locked to? I understand that theyre genderlocked bc of space restrictions, but would I, for example, be able to change riolu from male-locked to female-locked?
• Have you added new overworld animations for when the starters have evolved? As in, all the cute lil animations present in the unevolved starters, where they do their victory pose after succeeding at sentry duty, or waking up in the morning. I'd be thrilled if I no longer had to deal with all the walking-in-place that replaces all the fun animations once you evolve.

Not criticizing at all, I'm just really curious about the hack!

This has to be my fav Explorers mod so far. Though I was wondering if it was possible to implement the evos for the starters with partially completed lines on the sprite repository for the time being until the odd evo out gets uploaded (i.e. Incineroar and Greninja having complete sprite sheets while their respective second evos are still blank)

On 5/27/2023 at 2:21 AM, LuckyLeafeon said:

Hiiii, I have a lot of questions!

• Is there a way to mix-and-match the available starters? like if I wanted a few from midday version, plus a few from midnight version, could I add them to a single rom of the game, as long as the quantity of the starters doesn't exceed the maximum?
• Is there a way to switch which gender a starter is locked to? I understand that theyre genderlocked bc of space restrictions, but would I, for example, be able to change riolu from male-locked to female-locked?
• Have you added new overworld animations for when the starters have evolved? As in, all the cute lil animations present in the unevolved starters, where they do their victory pose after succeeding at sentry duty, or waking up in the morning. I'd be thrilled if I no longer had to deal with all the walking-in-place that replaces all the fun animations once you evolve.

Not criticizing at all, I'm just really curious about the hack!

 

Hi, those are all great questions! The answer to the first two is a definite yes if you use Skytemple - you should just be able to patch either midday or midnight onto your .nds file, open it in skytemple and update the starter list to your liking. I've added both genders into the data for each pokémon, so you should be able to swap them with ease. If you (or anyone else who could see this in the future) haven't worked with it much before, I made a quick tutorial over here explaining how to swap out heroes/partners from the roster in eos! it's pretty much exactly like this, but using expanded sky as your rom instead of a clean copy of eos.

It's worth noting that every hero listed is available in both versions as is, so (apart from the gender situation), you should be able to make any team combo by having both versions at hand

As for the third question - I don't think so, but it's been something I've debated! I might look at doing so in a future update if the list of artists behind the sprites doesn't expand too much from it - they barely fit on the top screen of the main menu as it is Would definitely be nice to have! This relies pretty heavily on external factors though - I import sprites from the PMD Sprite Repository for the new starters, and it depends which animations the artists behind each have chosen to make. You shouldn't have to worry about the walking on the spot in their sleep crap with the new ones at least though - the eventSleep sprites should be directly being copied from the regular sleep sprites for those guys.

On 5/27/2023 at 11:58 PM, GymLeaderRy said:

This has to be my fav Explorers mod so far. Though I was wondering if it was possible to implement the evos for the starters with partially completed lines on the sprite repository for the time being until the odd evo out gets uploaded (i.e. Incineroar and Greninja having complete sprite sheets while their respective second evos are still blank)

Hi, thank you so much! That's high praise for sure and I appreciate it

That's something I debated doing initially but wasn't too sure about it, so it's good to know there's interest in the idea. I might look at sorting that out when I next release a new version - got a couple small bugs I'm planning to resolve soon, so I could probably do that at the same time!

Just come across this here, nice to be seeing the starters from each generation in, with the sprite work & the like looking like they were a part the game to being with. And as who knows when some might get updated, i do agree with what the other person said, and so long as you are able to do so, could put the final evolutions in for the lines that have them, but not the second in the line as of yet. Though might seem a bit odd to some to go from the first to third (that happens a times temporarily in SMD), could be perhaps done here when you are able to & whatnot. And'll keep an eye on this mod of yours, hope it'll work out well for you.

On 6/5/2023 at 7:27 PM, DaCobraMan said:

Just come across this here, nice to be seeing the starters from each generation in, with the sprite work & the like looking like they were a part the game to being with. And as who knows when some might get updated, i do agree with what the other person said, and so long as you are able to do so, could put the final evolutions in for the lines that have them, but not the second in the line as of yet. Though might seem a bit odd to some to go from the first to third (that happens a times temporarily in SMD), could be perhaps done here when you are able to & whatnot. And'll keep an eye on this mod of yours, hope it'll work out well for you.

@DaCobraMan Glad you like it!  Thought you might like to know that I've just uploaded a new version that does exactly this! @GymLeaderRy

Nice to see this update here for it, and greninja is one of the evolutions i was looking forward to seeing in to have as my partner, good to see that & incineroar be put through. Along with those patches for the various emulators, DraStic being what i'll use for it too.

On 6/9/2023 at 4:27 AM, xanam said:

@DaCobraMan Glad you like it!  Thought you might like to know that I've just uploaded a new version that does exactly this! @GymLeaderRy

With froakie, it says the evolution can go no further, though i am on the 1.2 of the mod here. Also with froakie being my partner pokemon, so would the evolution only apply if you chose it to be the player, or would it work with the partner also? So, how do you go about evolving froakie & litten (incase litten is the same way as froakie), the partner is well above what level would be needed of course, and is it still through the post-game method, as mentioned it says that he can't evolve any further, which is odd

On 6/12/2023 at 11:13 AM, DaCobraMan said:

With froakie, it says the evolution can go no further, though i am on the 1.2 of the mod here. Also with froakie being my partner pokemon, so would the evolution only apply if you chose it to be the player, or would it work with the partner also? So, how do you go about evolving froakie & litten (incase litten is the same way as froakie), the partner is well above what level would be needed of course, and is it still through the post-game method, as mentioned it says that he can't evolve any further, which is odd

Thanks for flagging this up @DaCobraMan! Had a look through and was able to determine that despite all the evolution data being in place, the reason this was happening was due to the 'can evolve' flag still being set to false on both froakie and litten - just threw together a quick fix and this should now work on 1.2.1!

It's worth noting however that this might not work for existing save files - not sure how it handles invidual pokémon who have already been defined, but in my playtesting I've found that if I load from a save state from before I added the fix, the spring still claims they can't evolve any further, and that's also visible in their info in the team menu option. It could just be emulator weirdness since the built-in skytemple emulator doesn't seem to keep hold of save data permanently but I can't tell for sure (it's almost 1am but i wanted to throw together a fix asap, so i've not had time to check on a regular emulator/hardware sadly). If you find out either way, please drop me a message and I can update the description accordingly so others with the same issue will know to proceed.

Starting from a fresh file does seem to work, but that's obviously not ideal since you've already made it this far, so hoping it works out for you

Again, thanks for bringing this to my attention!

9 hours ago, xanam said:

Thanks for flagging this up @DaCobraMan! Had a look through and was able to determine that despite all the evolution data being in place, the reason this was happening was due to the 'can evolve' flag still being set to false on both froakie and litten - just threw together a quick fix and this should now work on 1.2.1!

It's worth noting however that this might not work for existing save files - not sure how it handles invidual pokémon who have already been defined, but in my playtesting I've found that if I load from a save state from before I added the fix, the spring still claims they can't evolve any further, and that's also visible in their info in the team menu option. It could just be emulator weirdness since the built-in skytemple emulator doesn't seem to keep hold of save data permanently but I can't tell for sure (it's almost 1am but i wanted to throw together a fix asap, so i've not had time to check on a regular emulator/hardware sadly). If you find out either way, please drop me a message and I can update the description accordingly so others with the same issue will know to proceed.

Starting from a fresh file does seem to work, but that's obviously not ideal since you've already made it this far, so hoping it works out for you

Again, thanks for bringing this to my attention!

Not long ago, i'd gotten to the master 3-star rank & to the point in the game where the player & partner can evolve, that being how far i've gotten in this playthrough as of this. Along with it being my first playthrough in quite a long time of EOS, it is indeed a good thing that the fix has worked, so my partner is able to evolve into greninja. Can't speak for litten really, but i'd guess that'd be working too, if froakie is. And i'm using DraStic myself, had continued with my regular save from 1.2, not the quicksave though, for reference. So can say that works there. And you are welcome, good thing it is fixed now.

I'm SOOOO happy to have found this mod! Now I can have Team Dewdrop in Explorers!

Quick question – so, I noticed that you added the shortcut for quickly using moves, but it overwrote the shortcuts for things like displaying the log, which is L+B. Might it be possible to get such overwritten shortcuts added back with a different button combination?

On 8/22/2023 at 10:38 PM, Damariobros said:

I'm SOOOO happy to have found this mod! Now I can have Team Dewdrop in Explorers!

Quick question – so, I noticed that you added the shortcut for quickly using moves, but it overwrote the shortcuts for things like displaying the log, which is L+B. Might it be possible to get such overwritten shortcuts added back with a different button combination?

Hi, really glad you like it!  have fun!

And sorry, I don't think that'll be possible currently. I don't have the knowledge for that level of deep-modification to the source code to add something like that unfortunately the move shortcuts patch is something that comes bundled with Skytemple that its creator has allowed anyone using it to add, but those types of patches are way more complicated to make and beyond my skill level.

Im liking this so far! is there a list of pokemon that can evolve?

12 hours ago, tiigerbones said:

Im liking this so far! is there a list of pokemon that can evolve?

Hi, thank you, I appreciate it! the text document included in the download should have the list - there's a table listing all pokemon you can get in the personality test, and there's an asterisk next to the ones who can't evolve iirc. Note that while Litten and Froakie can evolve, they evolve directly into their final stages as it seems nobody has made full asset sets for their midstages yet. All partner-exclusive pokemon are ones who already existed in the game (eg cubone) and can therefore evolve.

6 hours ago, xanam said:

Hi, thank you, I appreciate it! the text document included in the download should have the list - there's a table listing all pokemon you can get in the personality test, and there's an asterisk next to the ones who can't evolve iirc. Note that while Litten and Froakie can evolve, they evolve directly into their final stages as it seems nobody has made full asset sets for their midstages yet. All partner-exclusive pokemon are ones who already existed in the game (eg cubone) and can therefore evolve.

oh i see! also i noticed it says lycanroc dusk form isnt avialable but doing a little search i think ive found it (https://sprites.pmdcollab.org/#/0745) just changing it from normal to dusk and it shows all the sprites. hopefully it gets added soon :' ) i love me my lycanroc dusk form (ah my mistake it says it isnt added into the mod yet not that its not available)

23 hours ago, tiigerbones said:

oh i see! also i noticed it says lycanroc dusk form isnt avialable but doing a little search i think ive found it (https://sprites.pmdcollab.org/#/0745) just changing it from normal to dusk and it shows all the sprites. hopefully it gets added soon :' ) i love me my lycanroc dusk form (ah my mistake it says it isnt added into the mod yet not that its not available)

 

 

Oh sweet, thanks for showing me this! At the time of making the mod there were no dusk sprites in the sprite repository (only the portraits), but looking at the dates it looks like someone added them in last week. Will definitely look at bringing dusk form lycanroc into expanded sky as its next update

On 9/3/2023 at 2:03 PM, xanam said:

Hi, really glad you like it!  have fun!

And sorry, I don't think that'll be possible currently. I don't have the knowledge for that level of deep-modification to the source code to add something like that unfortunately the move shortcuts patch is something that comes bundled with Skytemple that its creator has allowed anyone using it to add, but those types of patches are way more complicated to make and beyond my skill level.

I've been playing for quite a while now, and I discovered that the L+B message log shortcut did indeed get replaced! The shortcut with this patch is B+Y!

I've made it as far as Dark Hill, and I think you should know that something about that dungeon, the ghost type pokemon in it, and/or their moves aren't playing nice with my 3DS. It keeps crashing the game with a data abort and/or filling up the ram (one attempt had less and less music and sounds playing as I got farther, then crashed when I got to the end). Moves like Will-o-Wisp, Feint Attack, etc get used and it crashes.

On 10/9/2023 at 9:57 PM, Damariobros said:

I've made it as far as Dark Hill, and I think you should know that something about that dungeon, the ghost type pokemon in it, and/or their moves aren't playing nice with my 3DS. It keeps crashing the game with a data abort and/or filling up the ram (one attempt had less and less music and sounds playing as I got farther, then crashed when I got to the end). Moves like Will-o-Wisp, Feint Attack, etc get used and it crashes.

Hmm, that's strange I've never heard of that happening before and I don't think I've seen it reported before either. I've not modified anything to do with those moves, Pokémon or dungeons so I've got no ideas there. Could POSSIBLY be one of the QOL patches included in the mod but I'm not too sure? Ive experienced crashes when playing it on my dsi, but that was just when advancing floors in during and happened pretty easily on. If you notice it anywhere else/if it stops please let me know!