Greck all over the deck

[Greck]

What a journey.

It was more than 10 years ago when I started my adventure in this game. Times when only FireRed was available, and not even finished as many "near to end" game scripts were not implemented. I have spend 5000+ hours in-game between main and alt accounts, and as much as twice of this time sharing with this wonderful community.

 

This post is kinda a "remembering the good old times" type of content, and also gratitude to all the special persons I shared the most, and the game developers who made it possible.

 

So, with no further ado, as once a wise hobbit said:

"I don't know half of you half as well as I should like; and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve."

 

 

 

Chapter 0: The beginning.

 

It was the year 2013, over January I was looking for some new time killer, I was researching if it's possible to play emulated Pokemon games over Hamachi, something that could fill the spare time I had plenty of, as at this time I was ending my IT support grade, I had no more obligations that study and spend time with my friends (and get back home alive before the day ended), It was the pinnacle of my teenagers existence.

The discovery of the game was pure luck, as I was using the search engine to spit out something similar to "Pokemon game online emulation trades", then in one of the search results a wild PokeMMO appeared!

Instantly I've download the game, and got baffled by what I have just witnessed. The same Pokemon game that I have played for so many hours when I was a kid, but with real persons all around the world to interact with, It was like discovering the Internet for the first time, but better because of the game-ing background around the experience.

This is where one of my best game experiences of all time, and for sure the game that I played the most at this moment. The only thing that I regret from this time, is my lack of English (in all written and spoken form), but about this issue I will dedicate a whole chapter later.

 

 

 

Chapter 1: Let's learn the basics once again.

 

The first thing to point out, my Pokemon experience was limited to emulation (I've owned a GameBoy when I was a kid, but getting games in Poland, where I lived at this time, was a major issue, to say I only owned Super Mario Land 2 (best GameBoy Mario), and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles as the only 2 games). So playing FireRed on Emu became a thing, but the lack of knowledge (and my null English) limited the the experience to just getting all badges and the Elite 4. I had no idea about the Trainer Tower even!

 

So with PokeMMO on the board now, and a bit more understanding of guides (reading this forum), I have learned about so many things in this game, that IVs and EVs existed, that the correct nature was a thing, that moves can have priorities, how breeding works, that pokemons can be shiny! And I got my first shiny in this game! It was a Paras but hell a Paras, competitive and all!

 

The first thanks: to the community for teaching the basic mechanics, so great guides and helpful folks. Thanks to PokeMMO I had a chance to actually understand and squeeze out all potential of my pokemon dreamteam.

 

Of course over time there were major changes to adjust the game, and suit it better for MMO standards, like breeding and farming, kudos to the developers for this too!

 

 

 

Chapter 2: Dipping into the community (the events, the teams, the glory)

 

After 2 months of playing the game, and reading the forums as a simple viewer, I've created my own forum account. As I was ready to start playing competitive, I have enrolled for a tournament, and yes, back in the days leaving your IGN in the post was the only way to let the organizer know you want to join, and the order was established by the "first post, first in" rule.

Spoiler alert, I did not win that one, nor any following tournaments, but can you imagine for example being the team captain of:

 

 

What a time to be alive.

 

Mentioning this image I should get back in time a bit, and put context on teams. My first team to join in-game, named [Kult] (Cult in english, but I have the feeling that the origin of this is a music band from Poland, not confirmed, weight my words), was the biggest Polish team. Created by Syde, and later handed down to Bearminator. I have made so many friends there, even meeting some of them IRL when I was on a trip around Poland (cheers ZiomPL).

 

The things that happened there were worthy of a telenovela. We had romances, love triangles, family secrets. We literally only missed somebody in coma. The teams are a world, and I'm sure anybody that is a part of a team can relate, and have much fun meeting new people!

 

After that I've joined so many teams, and even build one myself that actually worked out pretty well, called [Mr]. But remember, AURA#1

 

Once I was done with competitive team builds, and noticing that this actually is harder than expected (respect for the PRO comp players), I've had to find something else to do, I still wanted to input with something to the community. Bring joy to the new generations, help the needy, fight against hunger in the worl... Wait, I think I've messed the speeches.

The idea was, as many players helped me to understand the game, I wanted to create guides, make the players experience much more rich. So I started at the end of the year for example creating the first client translation to Polish, and creating custom themes for best visual.

 

Actually I ended up with several projects on my back:

Unofficial Tournaments Archive

A Signature Shop

An Event Calendar (alongside SirGaryOak) that later became an official thing

A Twitch channel recording battles and tournaments

An In-Game Shop

 

And other 2 points that will feature it's own chapters.

Obviously the greatest, unique and beloved PokeDaily Tournament series. ❤️

And an "unofficial but staff blessed" standalone forum in Polish for the game (drama story).

 

 

 

Chapter 3: PokeDaily Tournament it's here

 

So, as mentioned before my future as a PRO comp player was not a thing, but still enjoyed all PvP related content, the issue that we had at that time was the lack of official events (staff shortages) and the unofficial events lacking good organization (bro, I attended a tournament where the lvl50 cap was missing, we played with random level pokemons).

I knew there was something that I could do, as a person with still much spare time, and the desire to provide input, an idea of a daily tournament have appear. At first the prizes were, umm, poor-ish, like held items for pokemons, my unused competitive pokemons (gonna miss you sparky) and donations (mainly by SirGaryOak), later once we gained popularity people even started donating shinys! And for days with prize shortages, we agreed with the community on a minimum entry fee, that (the totality) would end in winners hands.

 

We adjusted the time of the tournament to suit best all timezones, and on weekends we even had a 32-players brackets, as standard. This experience have teach myself a lot of things, about competitive culture, bracket organization, refereeing, and even more PvP tricks that I was not aware at that time. I must say that I have enjoyed creating this tournaments even more than competing in any other. (PSL season V was fun too, cheers to all Unexpected Flying Octillery members out there).

 

If you want to have a peak, this is not the original post, as I can't find the first PokeDaily topic, but, the comeback:

 

Once I left the game / got less active, there were attempts to still host the tournament (kudos to Noad, jayfeatskydd, Kaerodactyl), the spinoffs:

 

 

 

Chapter 4: The forum

 

Gotta make this quick, and leave all names out of the story (for the sake of integrity).

 

Back in 2014, as team [Kult] was a big thing (we had 100% of the rooster active), I've decided to put some of my coding skills into motion, as I was at this time a newbie web developer (with enough knowledge to pull out a MyBB simple forum), we created with our members, that fueled the topics with very good guides and awesome content itself, a forum about PokeMMO in Polish, so any member that had no idea how to speak English could still enjoy the game, like myself when I started, but with much more convenient source.

We had guides, we had contests, tournaments and hydepark section to talk even about any other games and hobbies, it was a dream of mine coming true, in one hand helping all new players to get into the game much easier, and also getting my coding skills better alongside. In the first months we got 200 active members easily, and on the peak of popularity surpassed 500 active members. We had new teams arrive and cool features implemented. But after somewhat of 2-3 years of existence, and as I was already losing the spare time because of work, I had been leaving the game bit by bit, and the game started to decline in popularity, I decided to turn the subject of the forum to something more Pokemon official games related, in order to rescue the content that was already there.

It did not turn out very well, no new users came to check on the forums, and later on, one of the contributors had the brilliant idea of starting his own forum, copy pasting all the content, but for luck I realized this in time, and it lead to the shutdown of the forum completely (rip dream).

 

However I regret nothing, It was a fun experience, and probably I was not going further with the project, because of the lack of time.

 

 

 

Chapter 5: This tongue is not mine

 

Now, a subject I want to comment, and that was mentioned several times in this... book? Can we call this a book? Well, it have chapters, it may be. And is the English language issue, something that was still on my back during all the adventures, almost always ending my forum posts with "Sorry for my english" phrase. It was an issue, a big one for a while, and everything changed one day, when I got rejected.

You may ask yourself at this point, "Greck, you are soooo cool, you done so many things, you are so smart and handsome, why did you not ended up as one of the staff members?", many of the players also asked this back in the days. And one day I got up with a "why not?" in my head, so I applied as a moderator, with the strong points on knowing perfectly Polish and Spanish, having long time history playing the game and knowing all of it mechanics, even knowing technical details as I was a studying Java development at the time. But the problem was my English, making for me so hard to communicate with others, and you may imagine, it's a basic thing to count on while moderating the game... So I did not make it, but I ended up with a new goal, actually a goal that will help to develop myself in a personal level too. I started studying English like crazy, maybe today my level is not perfect, but I managed to get a C2 certification, and I've read all LOTR books in original version, so, I feel fulfilled. I even ended up working for a company that operates in 13 countries, and English is my daily driver.

 

 

Chapter 6: Are you back?

 

Johto was released, thanks Akshit for letting me know! Really appreciated.

Kudos to the developers, I can't count the amount of memes surrounding Johto at this point! It will be a hell of a journey from now on for sure!

I will test the game over the weekend, but at this point of my life, gaming it's not even close to be the 1st time killer, and I can't dedicate it much time a day (nor contribute to the community as before).

As I have a daughter now! And she is the love of my life, I have to spend with her all time possible. For sure I will introduce her to the Pokemon world, and tell her about how great a community can grow, and the impact of a person can make.

 

That being said, will see you guys in Johto soon, and for sure we will enjoy the game once more together! Cheers to all the players I knew from back in the days, and welcome to all newcomers that probably have more hours than me in-game at this point!

 

I will not end this post with a sorry for my English, I will just say saludos! Learn a new language by yourself!

(This post was sponsor'd by Duolin... Just kidding!)

Edited August 16, 2023 by Greck
spelling

[RysPicz]

Good to see you back nerd 🙂

[Shadow]

HE'S FROM KULT WITAM WELCOME BACK!

[Darkshade]

10 hours ago, Greck said:

As I have a daughter now! And she is the love of my life, I have to spend with her all time possible. For sure I will introduce her to the Pokemon world, and tell her about how great a community can grow, and the impact of a person can make.

Hey man, congratulations!

[Kryso]

Hello there, it's been a while

[zhxq]

Nice

[Bestfriends]

Hello @Greck, it has been a while since we spoke. I am thrilled that you were able to find the love of your life and bring a wonderful life into this world!

 

All the best with your future pursuits and if there are any questions that you have pertaining to PokeMMO, then feel free to contact me.

[KaynineXL]

It is good to see you back sir.

 

"you are soooo cool, you done so many things, you are so smart and handsome, why did you not ended up as one of the staff members?"

 

This is basically how I ended up on the staff team

[Alfalow]

Great post man!! 💪
You gave me the inspiration to make my own introduction post after 11 years playing too!
Is so strange to find players who have spend so much time and hours invested on this awesome game, across so many periods of our lives 💖

I wish you the best in your future adventures on the beautiful Johto and on this amazing MMO game 🥰

Pd. sorry for my english too 😅
Saludos!

[Bearminator]

19 hours ago, Greck said:

Chapter 2: Dipping into the community (the events, the teams, the glory)

 

Spoiler alert, I did not win that one, nor any following tournaments, but can you imagine for example being the team captain of:

 

 

What a time to be alive.

 

Mentioning this image I should get back in time a bit, and put context on teams. My first team to join in-game, named [Kult] (Cult in english, but I have the feeling that the origin of this is a music band from Poland, not confirmed, weight my words), was the biggest Polish team. Created by Syde, and later handed down to Bearminator. I have made so many friends there, even meeting some of them IRL when I was on a trip around Poland (cheers ZiomPL).

 

 

The things that happened there were worthy of a telenovela. We had romances, love triangles, family secrets. We literally only missed somebody in coma. The teams are a world, and I'm sure anybody that is a part of a team can relate, and have much fun meeting new people!

 

First of all, welcome back Greck.

 

A bit of history is that after me, when I left Kult for GM team, Quave took over the team, then Slimmatt, Robombol, and then Sceptilemaniac, then the guy you wouldn't know iirc, as he was the newest I believe - Topielec. Earlier this year Kult split into two teams, older players left Kult due to disagreements, and currently the community is quite split. Older guys like Kryso, Slimmatt, Robombol. Ziom has left Kult and formed a new team. So you can say not a lot has changed in terms of team things lol.

 

Some of the older names are still in Kult, dunno if Galoss logged in recently but he comes back once a year or so. Rest is offline for years, outside the group I've mentioned and a few guys that I probably can't recall. Pretty sure Redinis has stayed in Kult as well but I dunno how often he plays. 

 

If you will want to join either team Im sure its fine. If you will want to talk with us, I can shoot you a discord link.

 

19 hours ago, Greck said:

 

 

. (PSL season V was fun too, cheers to all Unexpected Flying Octillery members out there).

AYY

19 hours ago, Greck said:

 

 

As I have a daughter now! And she is the love of my life, I have to spend with her all time possible. For sure I will introduce her to the Pokemon world, and tell her about how great a community can grow, and the impact of a person can make.

 

Congratulations, man! Im glad to hear you have found happiness in your life, well deserved.

[Greck]

Hey! In first place thanks all for the warm welcoming! Missed you guys too! 🙂
 

22 hours ago, RysPicz said:

Good to see you back nerd 🙂

You are the nerdiest nerd! For sure you have more than 20k hours in-game 😄 

 

21 hours ago, Shadow said:

HE'S FROM KULT WITAM WELCOME BACK!

¡Muchas gracias jefe! ¡A vuestra disposición como siempre!

 

13 hours ago, Darkshade said:

Hey man, congratulations!

Thanks Darkshade!

 

13 hours ago, Kryso said:

Hello there, it's been a while

In adulthood yet? 😄 

 

11 hours ago, zhxq said:

Nice

Did not expect it the other way.

 

11 hours ago, Bestfriends said:

Hello @Greck, it has been a while since we spoke. I am thrilled that you were able to find the love of your life and bring a wonderful life into this world!

 

All the best with your future pursuits and if there are any questions that you have pertaining to PokeMMO, then feel free to contact me.

Bro! I hope you still do that YouTube videos! I remember watching this back in the days, with all news about updates and guides! Great work as always, you are the best mayor!

 

10 hours ago, KaynineXL said:

It is good to see you back sir.

 

"you are soooo cool, you done so many things, you are so smart and handsome, why did you not ended up as one of the staff members?"

 

This is basically how I ended up on the staff team

It was a while Kay! You have come so far! I'm sure it was because of the handsome part.

 

8 hours ago, Alfalow said:

Great post man!! 💪
You gave me the inspiration to make my own introduction post after 11 years playing too!
Is so strange to find players who have spend so much time and hours invested on this awesome game, across so many periods of our lives 💖

I wish you the best in your future adventures on the beautiful Johto and on this amazing MMO game 🥰

Pd. sorry for my english too 😅
Saludos!

Being an inspiration is key. I hope to see you in Johto soon! Best years of my life ❤️ 

 

4 hours ago, Bearminator said:

 

First of all, welcome back Greck.

 

A bit of history is that after me, when I left Kult for GM team, Quave took over the team, then Slimmatt, Robombol, and then Sceptilemaniac, then the guy you wouldn't know iirc, as he was the newest I believe - Topielec. Earlier this year Kult split into two teams, older players left Kult due to disagreements, and currently the community is quite split. Older guys like Kryso, Slimmatt, Robombol. Ziom has left Kult and formed a new team. So you can say not a lot has changed in terms of team things lol.

 

Some of the older names are still in Kult, dunno if Galoss logged in recently but he comes back once a year or so. Rest is offline for years, outside the group I've mentioned and a few guys that I probably can't recall. Pretty sure Redinis has stayed in Kult as well but I dunno how often he plays. 

 

If you will want to join either team Im sure its fine. If you will want to talk with us, I can shoot you a discord link.

 

AYY

 

Congratulations, man! Im glad to hear you have found happiness in your life, well deserved.

And the big bear's still around, couldn't be the other way 😄 Are you still writing stories and poetry? You had a gift for that.

I hope we can bury the hatchet once for all. 😘 You can shoot me that discord for sure.

Edited August 17, 2023 by Greck

[RysPicz]

1 hour ago, Greck said:

You are the nerdiest nerd! For sure you have more than 20k hours in-game 😄 

Surprise, not yet, I had a long break (like 1.5 year I think) sooo...

 

we're getting there 😛

[Greck]

2 minutes ago, RysPicz said:

Surprise, not yet, I had a long break (like 1.5 year I think) sooo...

 

we're getting there 😛

God so close! I can now go play The Price is Right!

[Bestfriends]

10 hours ago, Greck said:

 

Bro! I hope you still do that YouTube videos! I remember watching this back in the days, with all news about updates and guides! Great work as always, you are the best mayor!

 

I am still doing videos, although for now it is a Johto Walkthrough Series.