Sunday, December 28, 2025

Game/mod/ROM hack walkthroughs

It really does suck that we have lost the GBAHacks site. I guess due to the inactivities, broken links, and possible strikes, it had to happen. And I did have a number of walkthroughs for ROM hacks submitted to Knuckle San so that they can be of help to those who can't understand the crypticness of certain ROM hacks. In that case, I'll just have to post them on PokeCommunity and here. This post will of course be updated accordingly whenever I finish a walkthrough and a ROM hack.

Just to be clear, these are links to walkthroughs. I'm not here to distribute ROMs.

Full walkthroughs:

Pokemon Adventure Yellow Chapter + Blue Chapter + Gold Chapter + Green Chapter

Pokemon Altair and Pokemon Sirius

Pokemon Ash Gray

Pokemon Dark Cry: The Legend of Giratina

Pokemon Dark Crystal

Pokemon Dark Rising 2

Pokemon Dark Rising: Order Destroyed

Pokemon Dark Violet

Pokemon Gold & Silver '97 Reforged

Pokemon Grass Jewel

Pokemon Grass Jewel 2

Pokemon Hyetology

Pokemon Luria

Pokemon Metal Red

Pokemon Nameless

Pokemon Polka Aqua

Pokemon Polka Aqua 2

Pokemon Prism 

Pokemon Saiph  

Pokemon Scorching Scarlet

Pokemon Sky Twilight

Pokemon Snakewood

Pokemon Stigma

Pokemon Sweet

Pokemon TDT

Pokemon Ultra Fire Sun 

Pokemon Vega

Pokemon Victory Fire

Pokemon Voda Red

Touhoumon Cirno 

The Wooper Who Saved Christmas 1 + 2 

Partial walkthroughs/Pokedexs/Other stuff

Pokemon Emerald Seaglass (general walkthrough only)

Pokemon Liquid Crystal

Pokemon Mega Power

Pokemon Nameless (battle arenas/department guide)

Pokemon Resolute

Pokemon Sapphire in Reverse 

Pokemon Ultra Fire Sun 

And now for a new and additional bonus. I'm playing through ROM hacks of other games as well and will be writing walkhroughs of official games! Check the categories below:

Official game walkthroughs:

Turbo Turtle Adventures 

Legend of Zelda (NES) ROM hack walkthroughs

Timecrisis: Fall of the Moon

Zelda Challenge: Outlands (1st Quest)

Zelda Challenge: Outlands (2nd Quest)

Sunday, December 21, 2025

A look back at: Curse of the Azure Bonds

Yeah, gonna be going through quite a lot of D&D Gold Box games for a while. Luckily, they aren't that long in length, and the bonus of importing characters is a huge plus! Meaning I don't need to over-customize on things, and the going is easier. Slightly, easier. Of course, it's not all set in stone, despite a whole lot of the game already being similar than Pool of Radiance. The sidequests are actually tough this time around, and the game is a lot more linear as some of those quests are more mandatory than I once thought. And woo, we got some additional grub, two new character classes as well as more monsters that are far more dangerous. Otyughs, yuck! And don't get me started on those truly annoying phase spiders who's poison bites are lethal. That and the more human enemies and their classes show a little bit more intelligence overall, actually casting some annoying spells like the holding ones and such. So yeah, it was a tougher game despite importing my characters.

Aside from this, well I am a bit intrigued by the plot. How your characters get cursed with these accursed Azure Bonds is interesting, you don't remember what happened, you just know you got ambushed somehow and then the bonds are on all your characters. Ironically this kind of "ambush while you are sleeping" mechanic is in the games overall, it's just that this happens before the game starts and is "special", I guess. And having to remove the bonds one by one by defeating evil factions tied to those bonds, well, it is considered original at the time. I feel like Tyranthraxus returning as a different beast and being able to mind control the party feels like a small Deus Ex Machina. And then there's Nameless? Is this the same Nameless One I hear from other games? I will certainly keep an eye out. 

Tuesday, December 9, 2025

A look back at: Pool of Radiance


Yes, even way back in the primitive days of video gaming, or at least when the Dungeons & Dragons series decided to be ported to game consoles and PCs, there existed nonlinear sandbox-style gameplay. And so I start combing through another franchise mostly on the computers, though with many different types of titles and sub-franchises under its belt, starting with the Forgotten Realms series and Pool of Radiance in particular.

We have Might and Magic-style navigation, Might & Magic-style character creation, standard dialogue that isn't too different from those games, but the main draw is the nonlinear quests you can do and the battle system. The main quest is as simple as "go to the last castle of the game and beat the dragon" and that's all there's to it, but of course with a beginner party this isn't feasible until you get more stuff. Gotta get that gold, gotta get that experience, gotta keep your characters' skills and spells up to snuff, and the difficulty is actually quite varied. Early on, goblins and kobolds shouldn't actually give you trouble, even though you're bound to miss a lot, so shall they. The quests do involve usual monster killing in general, or some other things. One quest in particular basically is a trap too.

The battle system is a nice blend of tactical RPG with some nice sprites (that you set yourself) and enemies always approach in hordes. Weak enemies however will miss your experienced fighters and die quickly, however you of course meet the stronger suits who will take up more than one tile. Spells are really really good in this game though, the stinking cloud spell and the hold spell render units helpless and VERY easy to kill, then there's the awesome fireball spell with high power and AOE. Some of the battles will be long just cause there's so many targets to take down, and then you have to manually end battle which is annoying. Oh, and the loot? There's often lots of it, but with the correct walkthrough and all I basically had to get what I truly wanted in these cases. Another fun fact to this game's overall nonlinearity is that it's not over after you beat the main quest, you can go and do other sidequests any time afterwards.