ORAS General Discussion - Mark 2 - Spoilers Inside

[Kairyu_Gen1]

Such as they've done for all (relevant) games straight now? Forward-compatibility?

Keep in mind that as a product, XY is considered "sold" already. Most people who are likely to buy XY, have already done so. XY has earned its money. One of GameFreak's most cynical points of strategy is to make each game look more appealing than the previous ones, and that might mean holding back features. If ORAS have features XY have not, that would somewhat diminish the game experience for XY, but again, XY's main sales period ends with the release of ORAS. Once that main sales period is over, GameFreak has no real reason to do maintenance on XY. They will be focused on making people buy ORAS, and in that case, ORAS exclusive content is considered a sales argument for ORAS rather than a detriment to the XY game experience. Once XY has made all the money it's likely to make, it's time to shift the focus onto ORAS making money instead. ORAS is a product they're trying to sell, XY is a product they've already sold, so why should they bother giving XY graphical upgrades to make it on par with ORAS? It's the ORAS game experience they want to make as good as possible (of course, without raising the bar too high for the next game following it).

If they DO patch XY to be compatible with new moves and Mega Stones, there would be a significant amount of players going "meh, everything new to ORAS that I care for will be available to me in XY, so why should I buy ORAS? I'll stick to XY and trade for the new Pokémon". For this reason (and probably others, such as the logistical hassle of issuing a patch to existing game carts without causing bugs), GameFreak have never maintained old games once new ones were shipped. One of the sales arguments for ORAS is "giving you access to stuff you can't get in your already-bought games, so hurry out and buy the new ones too!", just as it was for Platinum, BW2 and to a lesser extent FRLG, HGSS and Emerald. The former three games even put the exclusive content on the game covers just to underline the point, and movies were made showcasing the new Formes (that remained unavailable in the base games).

Yes, it would be technically possible, and probably not even that hard to do. But it would take away some of the exclusivity used to sell ORAS. Instead, GameFreak have tended to ship games with all the content they wish them to be compatible for. Namely, locations, Pokémon species (though not necessarily Formes), items and moves. Planning is done so far in advance that there wouldn't be issues with non-finalized designs such as suggested above. Those deadlines passed way before the release of XY. Again, GameFreak plan their content in advance.


As for balancing Kangaskhan-M, that could be done mostly the same way as Hypnosis' accuracy was debuffed in Platinum, as well as patching the PSS servers so that Kangaskhan was nerfed slightly for XY-vs-ORAS matches as well as online multiplayer. Kangaskhan-M would still dominate in-game in XY, and in XY-vs-XY local multiplayer, but that would hardly be relevant for any sort of metagame. No need to interfere on the cartridges themselves.

I got two minor things to clear up:

First, I should have said "best game experience possible." In previous installments, there was no realistic way they could have prepared for the next games and no way to correct afterwords, so the best possible outcome was few changes between games. Overall, that's exactly what they did, and I commend them for finding the balance between quality and realism.

Second, X and Y are far from done producing revenue. It'll be hard to quantify, but even though they're probably not going to sell all that much, the conferences, events, advertising, plushies, posters, T-Shirts, etc. will all suffer if you make X and Y noticeably worse to play. GF knows that the money they produce by forcing those few sticklers who wouldn't have bought ORAS otherwise to fork over 40 bucks won't cover the loss of revenue from removing XY's value, and that's why they've never made huge preventable changes to new in-gen games. The idea that there are 20 or so megas that you can only get if you pay for a new game strikes me as lazy and short sighted, two things I rarely use to describe GF.

 

[9 Tales of Ninetales]

Again, I can't really speak for Gamefreak, I think Cobraroll has a pretty solid mind for economics... or at least the like, business reasons to do things. What he says usually makes sense, so I don't want to discredit it.

I do want to point out though, that even if you were a totally new player to the games getting Alpha Sapphire as your first ever game there are still motivations to go back and buy XY as there is gonna be exclusive content in both directions. The legendaries are a guarantee, then there is the high likelihood that numerous 6th gen and other Pokemon won't be native to the new Hoenn games, and also the chance that many of the Mega stones in XY could not be obtainable in the ORAS games (which i think is very likely for the exact same economic reasons) Basically I'm just backing Kairyu_Gen1 here. They certainly are not done selling XY when ORAS comes out and aren't going to suddenly stop caring (not until gen 7 anyway, lol)

Ideally they can make it so if you really want all the mega stones you need to buy one copy of each X, Y, OR, and AS. Now all the blind fan boys/girls, like me, end up buying everything, lol.

I don't know that "investing" the time and resources to patch XY would necessarily boost XY sales or something, but given the content is still exclusive in an obtaining sense it will certainly not hurt ORAS sales. (And in fact, I think it would actually boost ORAS sales as it generates more hype for XY players too actually see all the new content being used online). Additionally while the investment may not "pay off" directly through more XY sales or something it does pay off in the long run because it just makes them look better. It gives us fans the sense that they do actually care about delivering quality to us and helps solidify more of the "casual" fanbase as hardcore fans. Basically, as a company that's economic success is built around a fanbase, its economically a good practice to keep that fanbase happy even if that doesn't pay off directly.

Business thinking is a pretty good way to reason at why Nintendo might be doing something... but again all we're talking about right now is still guessing. We don't actually know.

 

[Kairyu_Gen1]

Again, I can't really speak for Gamefreak, I think Cobraroll has a pretty solid mind for economics... or at least the like, business reasons to do things. What he says usually makes sense, so I don't want to discredit it.

I do want to point out though, that even if you were a totally new player to the games getting Alpha Sapphire as your first ever game there are still motivations to go back and buy XY as there is gonna be exclusive content in both directions. The legendaries are a guarantee, then there is the high likelihood that numerous 6th gen and other Pokemon won't be native to the new Hoenn games, and also the chance that many of the Mega stones in XY could not be obtainable in the ORAS games (which i think is very likely for the exact same economic reasons) Basically I'm just backing Kairyu_Gen1 here. They certainly are not done selling XY when ORAS comes out and aren't going to suddenly stop caring (not until gen 7 anyway, lol)

Ideally they can make it so if you really want all the mega stones you need to buy one copy of each X, Y, OR, and AS. Now all the blind fan boys/girls, like me, end up buying everything, lol.

I don't know that "investing" the time and resources to patch XY would necessarily boost XY sales or something, but given the content is still exclusive in an obtaining sense it will certainly not hurt ORAS sales. (And in fact, I think it would actually boost ORAS sales as it generates more hype for XY players too actually see all the new content being used online). Additionally while the investment may not "pay off" directly through more XY sales or something it does pay off in the long run because it just makes them look better. It gives us fans the sense that they do actually care about delivering quality to us and helps solidify more of the "casual" fanbase as hardcore fans. Basically, as a company that's economic success is built around a fanbase, its economically a good practice to keep that fanbase happy even if that doesn't pay off directly.

Business thinking is a pretty good way to reason at why Nintendo might be doing something... but again all we're talking about right now is still guessing. We don't actually know.

From a pure game sales perspective, you're absolutely right. But the primary purpose of multiple versions of the same game was never to sell more. That was obviously a nice addition, but the target audience was very young, and therefore unlikely to buy both (and even less likely to have 2 consoles). The point was to force players to interact and trade to build a community that would be sure to return for future games. The same with the Anime. The anime probably isn't worth it just from advertising revenue. It earns its existence through the merchandise people buy, the events people attend, and the loyalty of the community. Game Freak is selling us a franchise, not a game, and no patch would work against that in a very big way.

 

[antemortem]

What if you just see normal Lopunny model upon mega-evolving, but with the mega's typing/stats and with the mega-evolution symbol by it's name? Perhaps that is why the mega-symbol exists? It'd be a shame if there's no patch, but I've often wondered about that symbol perhaps being a way to bridge these sorts of gaps.

You must ask yourself why the information - stats and such - are available in the game's code but not the model. If everything that makes it Mega Lopunny is already present why should that disclude the model?

 

[9 Tales of Ninetales]

You must ask yourself why the information - stats and such - are available in the game's code but not the model. If everything that makes it Mega Lopunny is already present why should that disclude the model?

It isn't present. The info, such as the fact Loppuny has an alternative form, what base stats are used to calculate that form's stats, and what types and abilities that form uses are not in the XY code. If that information was present we could do things like actually know M-Loppuny's base stats rather than guess at them. We also would have known M-Loppuny exists long ago when we found the other hidden content in XY's code. But ORAS and future game will all still identify Mega-Loppuny as an alternative form of the already existing Pokemon Loppuny, as in it will still be tagged as Pokemon No.428. What is present in XY is all the regular information about Loppuny and its regular model linked to that tag.

So if we pretend we're looking at a patch-less interaction between an ORAS game and an XY game. The ORAS player sends out a regular Loppuny and the XY player sends out an Aerodcatyl. The actual data associated with these Pokemon (stats, abilities's the ball they're inside etc.) is saved on the game that they comes from. So XY tells ORAS: I'm putting Pokemon No.142 on the field, and it has these stats, this active ability, these types, came out in this ball, and so on. likewise ORAS says it's putting No.428 on the field and all its data on the Pokemon being used. Each game revives the data from the other game and then display what they were told the other is using. (oh No.428 is this model of a Loppuny)

Now the turn starts and both players mega evolve. The games continue to communicate. XY determines the stats of the mega Aerodcatyl, outputs it's new ability and so on based on the in game code that tells XY how Aerodactyl's alternate form behaves. It then says to ORAS, my monster is changing forms, here are its new stats etc. Pokemon No.142 is still on the field but ORAS recognizes it needs to display the model of the alternative form and does so. it also knows the new stats and ability based on what XY told it. Now ORAS also does and says the exact same thing. but XY doesn't have the new model for Mega Loppuny. it doesn't break XY though it can still identify the enemy Pokemon as No.428 and displays that model. And like the Aerodactyl to ORAS, all the info XY knows about the form changed No.428 is the variable data ORAS calculated on its own and fed it. So it XY continues to display the only model it has but it still using the correct numbers, types, abilities that ORAS gave it.

Basically "all the information" required to identify a Lopunny is in XY's code but not the information required to output the stats, etc. of its alternate form given inputs like Level, EVs, IVs, nature, and not the information on the alternate model. However since games have no info on the Pokemon saved to other games to begin with they just have it all fed to them by the other game. So everything "missing" about M-Loppuny can be filled in by ORAS except for the model.

 

[antemortem]

snip

I didn't read your post because while I'm sure your points are great, my post was an attempt to debunk the hypothesis the person I quoted offered. I wasn't suggesting that the code was available, but that it wasn't.

 

[9 Tales of Ninetales]

I didn't read your post because while I'm sure your points are great, my post was an attempt to debunk the hypothesis the person I quoted offered. I wasn't suggesting that the code was available, but that it wasn't.

Oh.... well.... I feel like an ass, lol. I'll leave that post there though. Just for the sake of people who want a more in depth explanation of how XY would process new megas without a patch. Sorry... haha

 

[viperGTS]

Lol, XY will most certainly be patched for ORAS content. Nothing to fret about. Plus, it'd be dumb not to patch it because then the experience when playing with ORAS players would be too awkward (sudden mega transformations with no animation, etc.).

 

[Noel Lopunny]

Well a new gameplay trailer appeared. Audio is a little bork'd. Not as info heavy as the mega evolution trailers but it's cool nonetheless. I LOVE the evolution sequence!

 

[Noel Lopunny]

So...Pokemon can evolve and you can ride a bike. Awesome trailer!

Well, I said it wasn't as info heavy as the other trailers sooo...

It's just showing us cool visuals of the landscape and what wild battles look like. I like the camera tilt when pokemon enter for one. Makes it more dynamic.

 

[Absolclaw]

I kind of miss the 1 minute long transition into battle, facepalming every time I didn't see a Feebas silhouette, lol.

 

[Lady Vader]

Well a new gameplay trailer appeared. Audio is a little bork'd. Not as info heavy as the mega evolution trailers but it's cool nonetheless. I LOVE the evolution sequence!

I love the new evolution sequence. It looks so cool.
Also: WHEELIES CONFIRMED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Sorry about that. My favorite part of Ruby and Sapphire really is the Acro Bike and doing wheelies (It's the simple things in life you treasure).
Also, it seems like the cycle race challenge will be much easier thanks to the Circle Pad. That makes me happy since it was damn near impossible with the D-Pad.

 

[Gabe]

Gamefreak probably won't release a patch. If anything this situation will play out similarly to DPPT - they'll release Pokemon Z or whatever that will basically be a better, more complete version of XY that is also compatible with new Mevos, & changes some things so that everybody buys it.

And let's face it, everyone will buy it. Platinum was so much better than Diamond/ Pearl; the one criticism I hear a lot of XY is that they feel unfinished.

That's just the way technology is. Everyone wants the latest IPhone, a new one comes out with marginal improvements and people forget about their old one.

 

[Kairyu_Gen1]

Gamefreak probably won't release a patch. If anything this situation will play out similarly to DPPT - they'll release Pokemon Z or whatever that will basically be a better, more complete version of XY that is also compatible with new Mevos, & changes some things so that everybody buys it.

And let's face it, everyone will buy it. Platinum was so much better than Diamond/ Pearl; the one criticism I hear a lot of XY is that they feel unfinished.

That's just the way technology is. Everyone wants the latest IPhone, a new one comes out with marginal improvements and people forget about their old one.

Except this is nothing like iPhones.

First of all, this is software, not hardware, and unlike DPPT, it's a very simple matter to update it. If anything like the hypnosis change happens and they don't release a patch, there'll be riots in the streets. Pure cosmetics can be dealt with, but not knowing the rules of the game your playing would be unforgivable in this day and age.

Second of all, which iPhones are you talking about. Few people with I Phone 5's updated to 5 S's because the I Phone 5 S's existence did nothing to hamper the 5's performance, and few people are wasteful or loyal enough to update for the simple reason to have the newest thing. Obviously when the 6 comes out everyone will want one, and when Gen 7 (let's call it "Pink" and "Purple"), people will update en mass or wait for the 6S or "Pokemon Lavender" to come out, but in-generation updates won't try to exploit you no matter what they're selling.

Wow, maybe this is like iPhones.

If Apple really wanted to steal people's money by forcing them to do that, they could stop supporting phones as soon as the next model comes out, but they're not stupid and realize that treatment of customers will put them out of business before they can blink.

Game Freak isn't stupid either. One of two things will happen, either there'll be a patch, or the differences between games will be purely cosmetic and able to be communicated between the cartridges without downloading necessary. The first one is just more likely considering how much work GF has put into the experience of Pokemon.

TL;DR: Give GF more credit than that, and Apple.

 

[Millky95]

Also, still thinking there'll be a third version at this point, lel.

Nothing to stop them doing it. R/S released, then FR/LG then Emerald. Just because they tried BW2 doesn't mean there will be XY2.

I'm not a fan on the new evolution scene tbh. Just a big ass ball of white...
Loving the Mach Bike on Cycling Road though. That speed time will be much more fun now we can move diagonally.

 

[Kurona]

Nothing to stop them doing it. R/S released, then FR/LG then Emerald. Just because they tried BW2 doesn't mean there will be XY2.

Except sales-wise BW2 just generally done much better than Crystal, Emerald and Platinum, plus there's already evidence found in XY's code - something about the pentagon check system - to show they've gone ahead with sequels rather than a third version. And then there's the fact that we have both Thousand Waves AND Thousand Arrows, which are assumedly Zygarde's new signature moves because what else could they be? And it'd be a little odd to give two signature moves that are so similar to each other they may as well be counterparts to one game. So honestly sequels are looking a heck of a lot more likely to me at this point.

 

[R_N]

Also, still thinking there'll be a third version at this point, lel.

Or maybe people just say "third version" so they don't have to add "or sequels or whatever else"
everyone knows what they mean!

e: HE EVEN SAID "OR WHATEVER"

 

[9 Tales of Ninetales]

Talk of sequels might be getting a little off topic for this thread, but I'll quickly go in depth on the pentagon thing again for people who are lurking or participating here but weren't around for the discussion on the original thread.

Kind of Technical Blue Pentagon Info

Basically the "Blue Pentagon" refers to that "Kalos Symbol" that appears on Pokemon stauts screens when they originated in an X or Y game. Since the new games are comparably more "tight" in terms of cheating, Nintendo uses this symbol as confirmation that the Pokemon was very likely not cheated. Like a filter that says "Oh this Pokemon came from before gen 6 so there's a good chance it's fake, but this one came after gen 6 and there are no real cheating devices for those game." It's why the Blue Pentagon is required in a lot (all? I'm no certain) of Nintendo hosted tournaments and events. (also the new breeding mechanics took away most of the motivation to cheat for many payers)

So that's the blue pentagon's purpose. To identify you as a post gen 5 originating monster (and therefor probably not cheated) However as we all know Pokebank has done a less well than hoped for job of weeding out cheated monsters. Partially becasue if a Pokemon is cheated correctly there's no real way to identify it as a cheated monster (as in, all it's data looks legit so there's no way to prove otherwise) but there are other dumb things that Pokebank should have been able to catch. For instance you can pull crap like turn on the "hidden ability hex value" on a Fraligator then give it the ability Torrent. Pokebank sees it has Torrent and lets it though even though the hex value is wrong, then once it reaches gen 6 and XY processes the data it sees the hidden hex value is on and so it reassigns Sheer Force to the Fraligator's ability. And thus a cheated HA Fraligator passes through Pokebank.

Anyway you can pull similar crap with the "game of origin" portions of Pokemon data. The game of origin is just a numerical value. I forget what the values are exaclty but they've basically started at 1 and have been increasing since the original gen 3 games when the modern format for Pokemon data started. (as in, I think if your origin value is 1 the games recognize that Pokemon as originating in GBA Sapphire version, 2 is Ruby etc.) But anyway what ever numbers B2 and W2 were you can input higher numbers and Pokebank will actually let those Pokemon through (even though it should be able to catch that crap) once the cheated pokemon arrive in gen 6, XY recognizes those higher numbers as meaning it originated in XY and gives these cheated Pokemon the Blue Pentagon.

So logically you can fake higher numbers beyond X and Y as well. And there are 4 numbers above the X and Y that will make the X and Y games give the cheated Pokemon a Blue Pentagon. The assumption here would be that the Blue Pentagon is meant as a symbol for all gen 6 Pokemon, and so the code already tells us there will be 4 more gen 6 games after X and Y. OR, AS, and then the X and Y sequels.... that is basically the technical info and reasoning behind the assumption we will get X2 and Y2 over a Z version.

Of course we can always make beta-data arguments or whatever too. But I do agree with Kurona on this one. Whoever thought up two sequel titles got a promotion in GF and they aren't going to let go of that idea. I think the main thing we can take out of this in terms of ORAS content is that, given that sequels are just really likely to happen the Thousands Moves and new Zygarde forms (maybe primal?) won't be in ORAS but instead in the next two gen 6 games.

Back on topic though, another thought did occur to me: Exclusive content is far from the only or even main selling point of ORAS games as their is also the nostalgia and or fun of a new adventure/ story. Which is generally the main reason to buy any new RPG game, lol (and I still don't see how patching content ruins the exclusive nature (and selling point) of stuff that is only otainable in ORAS games, as all it does is let you see what you're missing out on...)

But really, in terms of this whole, what GF should do for a patch based on what kind of business is best, discussion... I think we're starting to delve back into the territory where we're just making up our own reasoning for GF decisions that ultimatley none of us understand totally. And honestly I think it still kind of parrallel the two attitudes of "We trust GF to treat fans well and make and deliver quality becasue that pays off" and "Troll Freak never gave a crap about old games before so why should they spend money on them now that they could?" We can argue about how they try to sell us stuff but in the end we really don't know for sure what they're planning to do.

 

[hard]

Japan got a cheating devise it seems, so your argument about the blue Pentagon is moot. Source:http://www.reddit.com/r/pokemon/comments/2bs3ho/found_a_pokecenter_icon_in_the_pss_last_night/

Also the last few pages are horrible to read. Why do some people feel the urge to spam a thread with unnecessary arguments about compatibility purely based on assumptions?

 

[9 Tales of Ninetales]

Japan got a cheating devise it seems, so your argument about the blue Pentagon is moot. Source:http://www.reddit.com/r/pokemon/comments/2bs3ho/found_a_pokecenter_icon_in_the_pss_last_night/

Also the last few pages are horrible to read. Why do some people feel the urge to spam a thread with unnecessary arguments about compatibility purely based on assumptions?

well, the reasoning Nintendo was relying on the Blue Pentagon for may be moot, but the reasoning behind the expected sequels would still be reasonable.

Also a patch seems like a really big deal to a lot of people. So we're all discussing it, lol

 

[Lady Vader]

Japan got a cheating devise it seems, so your argument about the blue Pentagon is moot. Source:http://www.reddit.com/r/pokemon/comments/2bs3ho/found_a_pokecenter_icon_in_the_pss_last_night/

Also the last few pages are horrible to read. Why do some people feel the urge to spam a thread with unnecessary arguments about compatibility purely based on assumptions?

Hell, Nintendo might do a patch specifically to screw that over.

 

[DHR-107]

Okay guys, can we stop with anything to do with the patch? We literally have 0 idea why GameFreak does anything at this point.

Any continued posting about the patch will be deleted.

Can we please go back to the video that was posted earlier:

Well a new gameplay trailer appeared. Audio is a little bork'd. Not as info heavy as the mega evolution trailers but it's cool nonetheless. I LOVE the evolution sequence!

And talk about the contents of this? It's nice to see the Acro Bike return and the Cycling Road get a huge overhall (and be a bit wider). It might be a lot easier to set speed records down it now without bumping into things. Also Fortree City looks ace. I am a little confused why you are allowed to ride a Bike across a wooden rope bridge but hey! Why not. Not like GF have ever cared about cycling safety (your character never wears a helmet).

 

[Anty]

Hide

Judging from the screenshot the power plant is still there and so is the psychic trainer hiding underneath.

What interests me about the new trailer is the place above Larveridge Town (with the wild spoink and such), how you can get up the cliff there with the acro bike. This might be just this place (because iirc you couldnt fight every trainer without going back around), but it also could be in other places making the game much better and answering the age old question of 'why cant you climb up a small ledge?'

 

[Prof. Almeida]

Hide

View attachment 22516

Judging from the screenshot the power plant is still there and so is the psychic trainer hiding underneath.

What interests me about the new trailer is the place above Larveridge Town (with the wild spoink and such), how you can get up the cliff there with the acro bike. This might be just this place (because iirc you couldnt fight every trainer without going back around), but it also could be in other places making the game much better and answering the age old question of 'why cant you climb up a small ledge?'

I'll spend hours trying to set the records again. Every single ether was a small comfort, until I got 9.14 or 9.15, I'm not sure, and it was impossible to go better than that.

 

[CatataFish_6]

Well a new gameplay trailer appeared. Audio is a little bork'd. Not as info heavy as the mega evolution trailers but it's cool nonetheless. I LOVE the evolution sequence!

=O
Did anyone else see the TRICK HOUSE in THERE???!?
=D