Trainer Customization

[LadySasaki]

There are people who enjoy the contests so much that they spend as little time battling their pokemon as they can and instead focus on only doing contests. Or making movies at Pokewood, or playing the Pokeathlon, etc. etc. For shame! How dare they spend more time on the part of the game that they like the most? That doesn't make any sense at all! On top of that, why should it matter to me how anyone else chooses to play their own copy of the game?

Buying a game when only 20% of the content appeals to you doesn't make much sense to me.

When I was a kid of like, 12, I used to enjoy playing GTA2. One of my favourite things to do was to put in a bunch of cheats (invincible, unlimited ammo, all ears etc) and just wander around randomly, not doing the missions set out, but generally playing with the different guns and stealing different cars to run over pedestrians. Annoying the cops and then exploding a bunch of them. That kinda thing.

I let one of my friends have a go on it one day - she was really pleased to actually have the controls handed to her, because although her brothers had the game they didn't let her play. However, to my surprise, she mostly just drove around aimlessly in one car and fiddled with the radio. After a while I asked if she was getting bored and she said no, she was having fun. I told her if she just wanted to drive around I had Driver 2; we could play that instead. She declined. I mentioned that there were guns and missions if she wanted to try them, but again she said she was happy just doing what she was doing.

Now here's my point: why play GTA if you don't want to do the core things that GTA is about? Why, indeed, would you pay money for a Pokemon game which is (and likely always will be) a game about raising your monsters, battling them against other trainers, and challenging gym leaders/the elite four if all of this bores you and all you want to do is play dress-up in the musical theater, which is a very minor part of the games? There's a difference between playing a game your way whilst still enjoying the things it has to offer (as I did with GTA and I believe most do with Pokemon) and doing what my friend did. Now I'm not saying that her way was wrong. She had fun. Good for her, and if you want to play a pokemon game to ignore the main storyline and do contests and have fun, then good for you too. I'm not here to demonize anyone. But it is a little strange to me that you wouldn't just pick a game better suited to you in the first place. If you primarily want to put clothes on an avatar and move furniture around but have hardly any interest in type advantages, team building and level grinding to make sure the latest gyn leader doesn't flatten you, why even pick up a Pokemon game in the first place when The Sims and Animal Crossing won't have annoying battles getting in all the way of what you actually want to be doing? That's all I was trying to say. Maybe don't buy Crash Bandicoot for the racing level when you can buy Crash Team Racing.

Anyofftopic! The Contests and the Musicals have a crucial difference to customisation - the former two are based around the Pokemon, and the latter is based around the trainer. I feel the Pokemon games are at their best when they keep focus on the Pokemon, not the trainer. So long as customisation remains an addition to the game and not a spotlight stealer to the mons, I have no problem with it. I view the PC as my doorway to the game - if you wanna hang up a little tinsel in it, cool. But let's not start painting it or buying fancy doorbells, because in the end I just wanna walk through it, y'know?

sorry for any weird metaphors it's after 1am and I have a bad head cold

I think it'd be cute to walk onto a rainy route and have my pc take out an umbrella to carry around

I WANT THIS!! <3

 

[Almonds]

So has any of you had been highly disappointed with the past games because they didn't have trainer customization? Just wondering.

I wish they allowed a lab coat as part of customization if there is :3 I'd love dressing my character as a scientist XDD

 

[VeggiePopper]

I repeat - this is pokemon, not the sims. We don't need too much customization.

The character customization would only take a few minutes at the start of the game and that's it. probably a couple of times thorughout the game to add accesories, and that's it, the rest of the game would go unchanged. Saying that it would make Pokémon too much like The Sims makes as much sense as saying that Mario games are too much like FPS's just because you shoot fireballs.

 

[Proxima Centauri B]

I honestly dont see how Character customization would affect the game all that much, it's simply making a character that looks a more like the person playing, the focus would still be on the Pokemon.

 

[FreeXax]

Customizations are fine and all - but they should be limited to clothing and accessories. If they enabled skin color as part of customizing, there will be one heck of an uproar on that about skin color issues and the like.

Well, maybe hairstyles could be acceptable as well

Why would skin color be an issue? If anything it should be a bigger issue if they don't allow customization of that lol

No one wants another Jynx and Lenora incident.

There was a Lenora incident?
Game likes SvR let you customize your character's skin tone. They get no flack for that. I don't see why it'd be a problem here. Mii's can be black, yellow, red, green, okay not green, or white. I don't think skin tone would be a problem.

^ I hadn't thought of it in terms of Animal Crossing.

But since you brought it up, let me use it as an example for a second. A little customisation would be exactly what you said - a fun addition, the cherry on the top. But what I think myself and some others are saying is that too much would turn Pokemon into Animal Crossing. Players may end up more concerned about how cool their avatar looks than actually playing the game. If Gamefreak were to implement an Animal Crossing level of customisation for the PC and the secret base (not saying this will happen or even if secret bases will come back, just hypothesising here!) you'd get players obsessing over collecting all the available hats/sunglasses/furniture rather than collecting and filling up the pokedex. If you want to do that, why not just play Animal Crossing instead of Pokemon in the first place?

I'm in no way a naysayer of customisation, I just don't want the mixing and matching of fashion ensembles and decor to eclipse the heart and soul of the game. Pokemon has always kept the PC silent, personality-free and fairly bland, and to be honest I've never had the burning desire for them to change that just so long as the plots, pokemon, graphics, regions and characters keep developing. Customisation is a feature I'd enjoy in small measure but can ultimately leave or take. But if they can add it without detracting from the focal point of the games, then I say bring it on :3

I don't think they would take it too far. People probably wouldn't be able to have extravagant avatars. But simple ones, especially if this would be the first game to do this for a main series game.
And the secret bases deal. I feel that being able to customize the crap out of your secret base wouldn't be bad. I mean, when Ruby and Sapphire came out, I logged in over 300 hours on Sapphire. I collected all of the Pokemon, and built my base. And with the new games, with the main focus after collecting the gym badges is collecting all of the Pokemon, I've only logged in around 100 hours collectively on BW and BW2. I think that bases and what not would be good for long term play.

 

[Georgie Pie]

i think the only thing i would NOT like if we had customization would be if all the coolest outfits were event only or like dlc :/ i'd want everything available in-game

 

[LadySasaki]

There was a Lenora incident?

I think they're referring to how Lenora was originally designed wearing an apron, and then some idiot decided that was racist (because aprons imply slavery? idk) so they changed it.

They've allowed skin colour customisation for the miis so there's no reason why, if customisation was included, they shouldn't allow it. Of course it would depend on how much customisation we get, but I don't think they'd avoid it because of 'race' reasons. As someone said above, it'd surely be more racist to say 'we aren't including any other skin tone in our colour palette than toilet-paper-white because we don't want to offend non-caucasians' xD

I think that bases and what not would be good for long term play.

I didn't enjoy the secret base feature, but then I didn't enjoy 3rd gen visuals as a whole. I think if they wanted to bring em back now is the time, when glorious 3d graphics have just been introduced. Just the trailer for XY makes me drool!

 

[Red]

I have desperately craved customization since Pokemon existed. Well, since I started experiencing RPGs anyway. I love immersing myself in this world, and being able to develop my own avatar would be a dream come true. For me and my wife, as we've never been taken by the standard avatars. I love extra goodies, I loved the additive features that RSE introduced, and I want secret bases back aswell. Pokemon should be a second world you could live in, and adding customization features for the PC would be a gracious bonus. If you don't want to customize, then allow those players to "Skip".

But give it to us.

 

[Garren]

The Lenora incident was more so because she literally looked like the Aunt Jemimah stereotype, despite being a fossil maniac, and the Japanese version didn't help by having her title literally being "Natural Born Mama". It's not because Jynx and Lenora were dark-skinned that caused the problem, it was because they both, intentionally or not, resembled classic stereotypes of black women.

Having the option to change skin color is something I think Pokemon should really do. We've had 5+ generations of Caucasian characters, I think it's time to have a bit more diversity when it comes to our personality-less avatars.

 

[TheBugChampion]

The Lenora incident was more so because she literally looked like the Aunt Jemimah stereotype, despite being a fossil maniac, and the Japanese version didn't help by having her title literally being "Natural Born Mama". It's not because Jynx and Lenora were dark-skinned that caused the problem, it was because they both, intentionally or not, resembled classic stereotypes of black women.

Having the option to change skin color is something I think Pokemon should really do. We've had 5+ generations of Caucasian characters, I think it's time to have a bit more diversity when it comes to our personality-less avatars.

thank you for your *actual* explanation of said incidents.

i dont see why we've never really been able to pick from the list of npc sprites like we can for linking/battling w other trainers. i mean i GET why, but still it would have been easy. except i guess they dont all have backsprites. sooo *shrug*

 

[AlphaMouse]

I don't see what's the problem with customization. If people don't want to customize their character, then don't. If Game Freak can put this idea into their games it would be a nice quirk, like walking Pokémon in HG/SS

 

[Penn251]

I don't think I'd like total customization - I love the past player characters to death! But some customization like clothes and hairstyle might be kind of nice.

 

[Akromatic]

^ I hadn't thought of it in terms of Animal Crossing.

But since you brought it up, let me use it as an example for a second. A little customisation would be exactly what you said - a fun addition, the cherry on the top. But what I think myself and some others are saying is that too much would turn Pokemon into Animal Crossing. Players may end up more concerned about how cool their avatar looks than actually playing the game. If Gamefreak were to implement an Animal Crossing level of customisation for the PC and the secret base (not saying this will happen or even if secret bases will come back, just hypothesising here!) you'd get players obsessing over collecting all the available hats/sunglasses/furniture rather than collecting and filling up the pokedex. If you want to do that, why not just play Animal Crossing instead of Pokemon in the first place?

I'm in no way a naysayer of customisation, I just don't want the mixing and matching of fashion ensembles and decor to eclipse the heart and soul of the game. Pokemon has always kept the PC silent, personality-free and fairly bland, and to be honest I've never had the burning desire for them to change that just so long as the plots, pokemon, graphics, regions and characters keep developing. Customisation is a feature I'd enjoy in small measure but can ultimately leave or take. But if they can add it without detracting from the focal point of the games, then I say bring it on :3

WHY IS EVERYBODY COMPARING THIS TO ANIMAL CROSSING!!! ANIMAL CROSSING DOESN'T EVEN HAVE CUSTOMIZATION ON THE PLAYER!!! (which is weird, considering you can customize basically everything else in the game).
Sorry for spazzing out. I'm just... blah.
Anyways, you people DO realize you have to battle to get money right?
If someone is obsessed with buying clothes, they'll have to battle a bunch of trainers. And they'll eventually run out of trainers in the area, so they'll be forced to continue on the story to battle more trainers and get more money. The champion could give you some sort of special "golden" outfit.
Plus, in the post-game, there could be a fashion-esque city with tons of awesome clothes, INCLUDING the older character's outfits! Of course, these clothes would cost more moola, but the trainers there could be of the Rich Boy/Girl Trainer Class.
I got nothing for furniture, though. Maybe only a limited amount of furniture is available and the rest is in a city that's only available in the post-game?

In short, using the clothes to motivate the player to move on, instead of making them stop.

Now, for my actual addition to this place. I'm thinking about 1/4 quarters into the game you could find a clothing store. An employee would run out of the store for an emergency, and the manager of the place would come out too, and give you the option of working at the store until the employee comes back. If you say Yes, you could play a minigame with you fufilling the customer's desires. When you finish, you could get a free outfit, some money, and a discount card for any item in the store. :ching: but with clothes!
You can try to apply after, but the manager won't let you, because you have to have done a major accomplishment to apply. After you defeat the Champion, you can apply again and the manager will gladly take you in. You can do the minigame anytime you want now, because you're an extra helper, and therefore only in a minor position and you have no need to come every day. When you're not working there, you still have your discount card from earlier, so you can buy anything you want with a discount!

Edit: The manager could give you a worker's outfit. When you have the outfit on when you come in, the manager automatically assumes you're here to work. If you don't have the outfit on, the manager will assume you're just there to shop.
The store could be a discount store, with at least 2 or 3 items available in other stores, but at a limited time discount at this store. The items could change weekly.
Edit 2: Erased the " ''' "s. I thought those would make the letters bold. I guess that's only on TV Tropes. :sweatlol:
Added emoticons.
One of the people working there could be Nancy or Curtis, as a nod to B2W2. Their accomplishment would be basically being the Hannah Montana of the Pokemon universe. ;-)

 

[LadySasaki]

ANIMAL CROSSING DOESN'T EVEN HAVE CUSTOMIZATION ON THE PLAYER!!!

Yes it does. In Wild World you can choose your gender, facial features (eyebrows, nose shape etc) and hair style/colour. The method of doing so is hidden (the outcome depends on which answers you give while the cabbie drives you to your new town) but present, and thanks to the internet there are websites you can go where people have cracked the code, so if you want a certain look to your player you can answer the questions accordingly.

Arguably even if it didn't have this feature I'd say that allowing you to buy and change clothes, hairstyle and accessories (glasses etc) for your character could be called 'player customisation'.

But enough about animal crossing! I think your idea about the clothes store is not just plausible, it actually sounds like just the kind of thing GF would do. My feeling, however, remains that the focus should remain on the 'mons and not the trainer. Now, being able to go into a clothing store and accessorize your pokes outside of a contest/musical environment and have them actually go out into battle wearing bows on their tails or sunglasses would be AWESOME!!! <3

 

[CorpseFlower]

I'm getting tired of saying customization would make it like the Sims. Have you people even played it? The only way Pokemon could end up like the Sims is if you had

Alterations of facial features
Hair
Accessories
Clothing
Personality
Familial relations
Aspirations
A customizable neighborhood/town
A customizable house/secret base
AND
customizable pokemon

Sunglasses and blue hair are not going to ruin the game.

 

[Ninja-Mage]

The problem is you guys are pretty much saying no to free candy. Which is fine, candy isn't for everyone, some people are diabetic. But ontop of saying no to free candy for yourself you're saying no to free candy for the entire class.

As I've said before, Gamefreak has a very long history of adding new features. Some that have little to nothing to do with the Pokemon. If you don't want to do them, don't do them. But there will be several people who will want to use these new features to their fullest cause it gives their game more playability. And again as I've said, there is virtually no way GF can screw up the Pokemon formula. Your ability to catch and train pokemon will be safe. So it doesn't matter what so ever to you if I want to spend 20 hours in game getting every outfit and playing around with my avatar. It doesn't mean i'm not going to catch and EV train the hell out of my pokemon too. It just means i'm going to be damn stylish while I do lol. In the end you're buying Pokemon, I know what i'm getting my hands into when I pick up the game, I just want some added sprinkles to make my game that much better for me. And if you don't want sprinkles, spoon around them or somethin.

Back onto the trainer customization topic. Clothing wise I'd love it if certain clothes gave bonuses for battling, breeding, and what have you. Like maybe a crown you get after beating the poke champ that doubles your Pokemon's EXP gain. Or gloves that act like the "Warm Body" ability for Pokemon so eggs hatch quicker. I'd like my trainer to seem necessary to the way my Pokemon grow past handing them items and barking orders.

 

[Akromatic]

ANIMAL CROSSING DOESN'T EVEN HAVE CUSTOMIZATION ON THE PLAYER!!!

Yes it does. In Wild World you can choose your gender, facial features (eyebrows, nose shape etc) and hair style/colour. The method of doing so is hidden (the outcome depends on which answers you give while the cabbie drives you to your new town) but present, and thanks to the internet there are websites you can go where people have cracked the code, so if you want a certain look to your player you can answer the questions accordingly.

Arguably even if it didn't have this feature I'd say that allowing you to buy and change clothes, hairstyle and accessories (glasses etc) for your character could be called 'player customisation'.

But enough about animal crossing! I think your idea about the clothes store is not just plausible, it actually sounds like just the kind of thing GF would do. My feeling, however, remains that the focus should remain on the 'mons and not the trainer. Now, being able to go into a clothing store and accessorize your pokes outside of a contest/musical environment and have them actually go out into battle wearing bows on their tails or sunglasses would be AWESOME!!! <3

1. Oh. Um... awkward silence.
...
...
...
...
BREAKINGTHESILENCEBREAKINGTHESILENCEBREAKINGTHESILENCE

Why are people saying Pokemon would become the Sims? By that logic, half of all games today are exactly like Sims, because you can change your appearance.
Saying Pokemon would become the Sims if there were facial features is like saying Pokemon would be like Mario if there was a Tanooki based Pokemon.
...
OK, bad connection.
Edit:

The problem is you guys are pretty much saying no to free candy. Which is fine, candy isn't for everyone, some people are diabetic. But ontop of saying no to free candy for yourself you're saying no to free candy for the entire class.

As I've said before, Gamefreak has a very long history of adding new features. Some that have little to nothing to do with the Pokemon. If you don't want to do them, don't do them. But there will be several people who will want to use these new features to their fullest cause it gives their game more playability. And again as I've said, there is virtually no way GF can screw up the Pokemon formula. Your ability to catch and train pokemon will be safe. So it doesn't matter what so ever to you if I want to spend 20 hours in game getting every outfit and playing around with my avatar. It doesn't mean i'm not going to catch and EV train the hell out of my pokemon too. It just means i'm going to be damn stylish while I do lol. In the end you're buying Pokemon, I know what i'm getting my hands into when I pick up the game, I just want some added sprinkles to make my game that much better for me. And if you don't want sprinkles, spoon around them or somethin.

Back onto the trainer customization topic. Clothing wise I'd love it if certain clothes gave bonuses for battling, breeding, and what have you. Like maybe a crown you get after beating the poke champ that doubles your Pokemon's EXP gain. Or gloves that act like the "Warm Body" ability for Pokemon so eggs hatch quicker. I'd like my trainer to seem necessary to the way my Pokemon grow past handing them items and barking orders.

Ok... weird connection (don't know what it's called). Weirder than mine.
Didn't I say that defeating the Champion would give you a special outfit? Your crown idea could fit into that.
Now about the gloves. Why would you be holding your egg when you can just fit it into a tennis ball?

Edit 2: Added the word "Edit" before the quote.

Edit 3: Added a space between Edit 2 and the end of Edit 1.

Edit 4: Realized I accidentally clicked Reply instead of Edit and now I have double posts. Sorry.

Edit 5: Deleted the other post and added a colon to Edit 4. Realized all this editing might be against a rule. Going to check.

 

[Ninja-Mage]

I don't know fuzzy warm body gloves sounded better then back pack with a built in insulator lol.

 

[LadySasaki]

I'm not saying no to free candy. I'm...well, standing in a candy store accepting free cake and saying 'hey, this tastes good, but what's it doing in a candy store? If I wanted cake I'd go to the cake store'. Or something like that, idk.

If we can just change hair/eye colour that'd be cool. I wanna be a brunette because...uh, I am a brunette. Customisation will be great if they do it in moderation. And they probably will do it in moderation, because like everyone else is saying they'd have to put in a hell of a lot to make it like The Sims. So likely I'll have no problem with it whatsoever. If it is implemented at all.

...Can I go eat cake now? Talking about it made me hungry.

back pack with a built in insulator.

THIS IS MY NEW FAVOURITE IDEA EVER. Oh god I die just imagining the cuteness of the PC tramping around with a special heated backpack with a wittle eggy inside!!! I'm a breeder at heart, can you tell?

 

[Ninja-Mage]

I'm not saying no to free candy. I'm...well, standing in a candy store accepting free cake and saying 'hey, this tastes good, but what's it doing in a candy store? If I wanted cake I'd go to the cake store'. Or something like that, idk.

If we can just change hair/eye colour that'd be cool. I wanna be a brunette because...uh, I am a brunette. Customisation will be great if they do it in moderation. And they probably will do it in moderation, because like everyone else is saying they'd have to put in a hell of a lot to make it like The Sims. So likely I'll have no problem with it whatsoever. If it is implemented at all.

...Can I go eat cake now? Talking about it made me hungry.

back pack with a built in insulator.

THIS IS MY NEW FAVOURITE IDEA EVER. Oh god I die just imagining the cuteness of the PC tramping around with a special heated backpack with a wittle eggy inside!!! I'm a breeder at heart, can you tell?

Now I know you're insane! actually idk, are we talking like a see-through backpack with an egg all toasty warm inside and lights shining on it? I really didn't think out the back pack insulator idea.

Also I think a lot of candy stores sell baked goods these days. (I'm nitpicking)