Ray Maverick was a mapper of the famous Pokemon Liquid Crystal. Last Friday, one of our reporter got a chance to chat with him. Let's find out Ray's POV about LC and his new upcoming gba hack, Pokemon DarkFire!
UC:
What inspired you to make Pokemon Darkstar series?
Ray:
Darkstar was the revival of an old hack, Twilight: Road to Dreams, which was discontinued by its author. I contacted him about it and took on the reins of the project - I think because I liked his mapping style (it was quite a long time ago, don't remember clearly.), and we became friends. I guess at the time I wanted to work on a hack so I did, that was really the only inspiration
UC:
Did you plan to make Darkstar a series from the start?
Ray:
Yeah, I planned a series of hacks then, but apart from the first project that I mentioned the other projects amounted to just three or four maps and nothing more. It's hard to finish just one hack so that was a lesson for me to focus on just one at a time.
UC:
About the regions, is there any story behind these beautiful regions names. Or were they named randomly?
Ray:
Well, Orre is the name of the region in Pokemon Colosseum and Gale of Darkness - it's been years though, I can't remember if I ever thought to set a hack in that region. As for Rennoh, there's actually a story. The Rennoh region is where an old friend set various stories she was making in the form of video (as in, she hacked FR, scripted dialogue, filmed the story and then uploaded it to youtube, with the project not serving gameplay purposes). That person asked me to make maps for her, so I did, and then I told her, why not make your story an actual, playable hack?
UC:
One of these Darkstar games, its 1st beta was cancelled. What was the reason behind it?
Ray:
We initially released a beta, but there were myriads of bugs that made it unplayable! Since I was just starting out back then, I had no idea how to fix bugs. People complained about them, so I thought of removing the download link to save people from playing it and having a bad time.
UC:
Make sense...One of these hacks starters is two eevee evolutions. Now most of the hackers nowadays choose pokemon for starters like either from the original region, mixed ones or even random pokemons...Question is why this game had two starters instead of three and why there were eevee starters in the first place? Is there any reason for it?
Ray:
I'm afraid I can't recall an explanation for that... It could have been for story purposes. I love the Eevee line, and particularly Jolteon, and I've always wanted to make a hack with Eevee as a starter, though.
UC:
When was the time you started working on LC?
Ray:
I may have contributed to it with a map or a tileset as early as late 2010, but I didn't become a full member of linkandzelda's development team until later in 2011.
UC:
Can you please tell us about other members of LaZ's development team? Like who was doing what kind of jobs back then if you can remember it?
Ray:
Zeikku was the graphic artist. He's made several sprites, created tiles for the game and set the color scheme (the palettes of the trees, the ground walls etc.). Jambo51 did our ASM and some scripting, and Magnius made the GSC soundtrack into 3rd gen (he's a genius), and we also have FIQ on the team who did beta testing
UC;
ok, one annoying question, what was LinkandZelda's role?
Ray:
He mapped and scripted all of Kanto and Johto (the original maps, not custom ones we added later), I think for the first beta or so he did everything alone (the team wasn't formed all in one go)
UC:
I think this question has been answered many times, but still would like to ask again for the sake of the interview. Why was LC abandoned?
Ray:
Technically, linkandzelda finished what he set out to do, which was to remake Johto and Kanto. In that sense, LC is a full Crystal remake. The Orange Islands were an addition to it that he felt like he could make. The bulk of the work that was done on LC - and that's a lot of work - was done when linkandzelda was a student, as in, when he didn't need to work for food. The project started to be left behind when he got busy with trying to make a living instead. We hope one day to finish the Orange Islands to give LC fans a more complete experience.
UC:
About your recent project, Pokemon DarkFire, please tell me more about it.
Ray:
it's a hack that I'm working on with an old friend, Synonym (his username on PC). I almost do everything related to graphics like maps, tiles, tilesets, region map, overworld sprites and some sprites, and he does all the scripting and debugging. It's the first hack, apart from LC, that I take very seriously, granted that I'm much older now and more determined to get stuff done and make a genuinely good gameplay experience.
Synonym also makes and inserts the music.
UC:
That sounds good! Would you mind if you share some of the planned features of the hack?
Ray:
I'll share some that I'm at liberty to share so far. We aim to make the world in-game a bit more interactive by adding lots of Pokemon overworld sprites, so as you walk through a route, you see Pokemon relevant to the area walking or surfing around. We've added a Pidgey for example that sits on the Player's House roof from time to time.
In the same spirit of making the world feel more alive, we'll try to add as many animations we can, apart from those that already exist like waterfalls and moving flowers.
We're also aiming to write a story that has a darker tone than the main games, in order to appeal to the part of the Pokemon fanbase that has grown and desires something more serious.
UC:
thanks for giving time to this.
Ray:
alright then, thanks.
To read more interviews, visit this site
If you wish me to take interviews of your favorite ROM hacker, please let me know in comments/PM/VM.
UC:
What inspired you to make Pokemon Darkstar series?
Ray:
Darkstar was the revival of an old hack, Twilight: Road to Dreams, which was discontinued by its author. I contacted him about it and took on the reins of the project - I think because I liked his mapping style (it was quite a long time ago, don't remember clearly.), and we became friends. I guess at the time I wanted to work on a hack so I did, that was really the only inspiration
UC:
Did you plan to make Darkstar a series from the start?
Ray:
Yeah, I planned a series of hacks then, but apart from the first project that I mentioned the other projects amounted to just three or four maps and nothing more. It's hard to finish just one hack so that was a lesson for me to focus on just one at a time.
UC:
About the regions, is there any story behind these beautiful regions names. Or were they named randomly?
Ray:
Well, Orre is the name of the region in Pokemon Colosseum and Gale of Darkness - it's been years though, I can't remember if I ever thought to set a hack in that region. As for Rennoh, there's actually a story. The Rennoh region is where an old friend set various stories she was making in the form of video (as in, she hacked FR, scripted dialogue, filmed the story and then uploaded it to youtube, with the project not serving gameplay purposes). That person asked me to make maps for her, so I did, and then I told her, why not make your story an actual, playable hack?
UC:
One of these Darkstar games, its 1st beta was cancelled. What was the reason behind it?
Ray:
We initially released a beta, but there were myriads of bugs that made it unplayable! Since I was just starting out back then, I had no idea how to fix bugs. People complained about them, so I thought of removing the download link to save people from playing it and having a bad time.
UC:
Make sense...One of these hacks starters is two eevee evolutions. Now most of the hackers nowadays choose pokemon for starters like either from the original region, mixed ones or even random pokemons...Question is why this game had two starters instead of three and why there were eevee starters in the first place? Is there any reason for it?
Ray:
I'm afraid I can't recall an explanation for that... It could have been for story purposes. I love the Eevee line, and particularly Jolteon, and I've always wanted to make a hack with Eevee as a starter, though.
UC:
When was the time you started working on LC?
Ray:
I may have contributed to it with a map or a tileset as early as late 2010, but I didn't become a full member of linkandzelda's development team until later in 2011.
UC:
Can you please tell us about other members of LaZ's development team? Like who was doing what kind of jobs back then if you can remember it?
Ray:
Zeikku was the graphic artist. He's made several sprites, created tiles for the game and set the color scheme (the palettes of the trees, the ground walls etc.). Jambo51 did our ASM and some scripting, and Magnius made the GSC soundtrack into 3rd gen (he's a genius), and we also have FIQ on the team who did beta testing
UC;
ok, one annoying question, what was LinkandZelda's role?
Ray:
He mapped and scripted all of Kanto and Johto (the original maps, not custom ones we added later), I think for the first beta or so he did everything alone (the team wasn't formed all in one go)
UC:
I think this question has been answered many times, but still would like to ask again for the sake of the interview. Why was LC abandoned?
Ray:
Technically, linkandzelda finished what he set out to do, which was to remake Johto and Kanto. In that sense, LC is a full Crystal remake. The Orange Islands were an addition to it that he felt like he could make. The bulk of the work that was done on LC - and that's a lot of work - was done when linkandzelda was a student, as in, when he didn't need to work for food. The project started to be left behind when he got busy with trying to make a living instead. We hope one day to finish the Orange Islands to give LC fans a more complete experience.
UC:
About your recent project, Pokemon DarkFire, please tell me more about it.
Ray:
it's a hack that I'm working on with an old friend, Synonym (his username on PC). I almost do everything related to graphics like maps, tiles, tilesets, region map, overworld sprites and some sprites, and he does all the scripting and debugging. It's the first hack, apart from LC, that I take very seriously, granted that I'm much older now and more determined to get stuff done and make a genuinely good gameplay experience.
Synonym also makes and inserts the music.
UC:
That sounds good! Would you mind if you share some of the planned features of the hack?
Ray:
I'll share some that I'm at liberty to share so far. We aim to make the world in-game a bit more interactive by adding lots of Pokemon overworld sprites, so as you walk through a route, you see Pokemon relevant to the area walking or surfing around. We've added a Pidgey for example that sits on the Player's House roof from time to time.
In the same spirit of making the world feel more alive, we'll try to add as many animations we can, apart from those that already exist like waterfalls and moving flowers.
We're also aiming to write a story that has a darker tone than the main games, in order to appeal to the part of the Pokemon fanbase that has grown and desires something more serious.
UC:
thanks for giving time to this.
Ray:
alright then, thanks.
To read more interviews, visit this site
If you wish me to take interviews of your favorite ROM hacker, please let me know in comments/PM/VM.