Hard-working hackers = AWESOME
Woo! Finally got some sweet, sweet progress to update about!
First, as I mentioned last time, we recently brought on a VERY cool hacker. He has hacking skills flowing through his veins. His name is byuu, and if you’ve ever followed ROM translation or emulation sites/communities, more than likely you’ve heard of him. For the last few years he’s been working on an emulator called bsnes. The goal of his emulator was to emulate the Super Nintendo as incredibly accurately as possible, and the work he’s done on it has been absolutely awesome. Anyway, he’s been helping out with stuff that I’ll explain later.
We’ve also picked up a couple extremely awesome people to help with side translation and editing. By side translation I mean stuff that’s non-script stuff, like menus, names, etc, etc. There’s a good deal of that, probably a hundred KB or more. That’s being handled by Chewy, Starmen.Net regular/former staffer whose Japanese skills are awesome. She’ll also be helping with editing/testing. I know it sounds like the project team’s getting super huge, but we’re all very focused and detail-oriented people. Just the kind of people that’ll be needed to try to make our November-ish goal.
OK, status update. There’s the main script routine that we’ve been struggling with for weeks now. But it turns out there are other routines that use script text but don’t use the MAIN script routine. So that’s even more work to do. This applies usually to flyover text and the like, so those routines have to be hacked seperately. What a pain. Over the weekend, sblur took a stab at the very first one. He managed to 8-bit-ify it, and give it a variable width font. Yay! That’s definitely no easy task, so if you happen to know him personally, shake his hand and treat him to dinner or something!
Next, byuu showed up and jumped right onto the most difficult part of hacking so far: the main script routine. Like I’ve mentioned many times, the problem is that the Japanese text was in 16-bit format, but we need the English script to be in 8-bit format so that the whole script can fit in the ROM. But this is no easy task. Well, for byuu it is π He didn’t have any GBA hacking experience at all and already kicked that programming hurdle to the curb in no time flat. He and Jeffman teamed up to iron out some issues and managed to get the script inserted right. All of which means…
The script is now working in the game. Yeehaw!
There are of course still little things to iron out, but the fact the script now works in 8-bit format is one of the hugest hurdles of all. *TECHNICALLY*, the game is playable all the way through in English now, but there’s so much work still left to do. In fact, the game will crash horribly if you’re not careful. Plus nothing is really formatted yet. So the game isn’t really in playable mode at all. For example, selecting an Antidote in the main item menu will result in scary freaky crashing aaaaaa (someday I’ll include a video). Also talking to some people will reset the game/crash the game totally right now. But even so, this is a huge step forward.
Anyway, if I had to put a percentage on the entire project, I’d say we’re looking at 40%. That might not seem like very much. And that’s what I’m trying to say — there’s still that much work left to do. So wish us luck, for these next three months are gonna be tough.
Like I said the other day, first draft script is 92-93%. Should be finished with it late this week though. Anyway, hopefully I didn’t forget to mention anything here. Cool stuff’s happening!
Anyway, here are more pics! Hurray! Thank sblur and jeffman and byuu! They all deserve thanks x 5000!
Wow! That’s so great to hear! Thanks for the update on the project. Things seems to be progressing quite well. I hope all continues to go well, and that you meet whatever goals you have set. My many thanks to all working on this project. Even though it’s months away, and still very much a mystery, I am grateful that this is all being given such a great deal of attention. To say that USers aren’t serious about Mother? Ha! They don’t know you all and your followers very well do they!? Again, thanks for checking in and best of luck to each and every one you that is helping to make this project a reality. November can’t come soon enough.
Oops… It’s great to see too! Very nice screenshots indeed.
Nice progress, Im surpised to see its advanced this far already hacking gba is no easy task.
Β‘Excelentes noticias!
EstarΓ© al tanto de lo nuevo π
Sweet mercy! 40% already? This is fantastic!
OH MY GOD IT LOOKS AWESOME! I’M SO PUMPED! I LOVE YOU GUYS SO FREAKING MUCH!
I wish I could say I could shake your hands personally. But sadly I can’t, I’d buy you ALL dinner.
It’d be the dollar menu though. π I’m sorry, I’m a poor intern.
You guys are doing great! ::man hugs to the team::
Hell yeah! Keep up the good work guys
Oh wow! I’m so glad to hear that you made it over such a hurdle. I really admire programmers.. I took some Computer Programming in highschool and never got past making simple buttons. You guys are all amazing!
It’s so nice to finally get to read descriptions of items and things like that. I think spookychee’s faq missed a lot of NPCs too (or at least, for talking to them at certain times), and since I can’t read any kana I couldn’t figure out who was saying what most of the time. So, this is exciting!
Good luck on your goal, guys. To celebrate, I think I’ll play through it again soon, to cheer you on in the background!
Very awesome stuff, hopefully the rest of the hurdles that come along can be overcome easily. The very bottom of the lowercase Gs and Ys kinda bug me a bit, but eh, I’m just nitpicky like that. Can’t wait to see the final product, and keep up the awesome work. π
Oh my pork, does these screens look awesome. Even in my wildest dreams, i never anticipated that you guys would have come so far. Lets hope that the troubles ahead won’t be anything too much harder than what you’ve already completed.
γΏγͺγγγγγγγ¨γγγγγΎγοΌ γγγ―γγ¨γ¦γγ¨γγ΅γ€γγ£γ³γ°γ§γγοΌ I appreciate all of your hard work on the project and also letting us know what’s going on with frequent updates (nice site design, too, by the way). I can’t wait to play the game in English. I’ve already played it in Japanese, but my knowledge of the language at this time is only enough to understand the menus and a tiny bit of the dialog.
Also, good luck with the assembly language programming. I know for a fact that this stuff can be a headache…
Excellent job! Considering the hacker(s) probably had to re-write parts of the script engine, it’s amazing that it’s not crashing every second. Good luck on the bug hunt!
BTW, is anyone going to Penny Arcade Expo (PAX)? I’d love to meet up with any Mother-philes, although you gotta promise not to spoiler Mother 3 for me π I should probably post this in the Starmen forums too.
Awesome job so far! The names attached to this project leave me with no doubt to the quality. Tomato is one of the most awesome translators I can think of (I miss dejap…but I understand why it died) and to hear byuu is working on this too..! With the talent and effort going into this project, I wouldn’t be shocked if you guys finished in october (course, no pressure). I’m normally the lurker type, but I just had to stop in and say how much I appreciate the work you guys are doing.
40%!?! I had expected like maybe 25%…but wow…the screens look great…
Great news! I can’t wait to play this. Why are some letters cut off at the bottom, though?
Hooray! It’s so awesome to finally see English in Mother 3 screenshots. π
Super mega awesome thanks to everyone working on this!
Very good.
Things are really starting to take shape.
I’m rooting for you guys.
Nice Job!
You are all my heroes
brilliant! can’t wait to play it, it’s looking damn good… now if only i hadn’t spoiled half of the game for myself π
40%!? Wow…! I’m with Count Orlok, but I thought it was about 10-15% (which was incredible enough to me already)!
I can’t say it enough – I am continually astonished at the progress you guys are making! Is there any way for the common man to help you guys in this process?
I tossed the current build on my flash cart and played it on my DS… it’s easily 50x awesomer than emu screenshots :O It’s seriously… wow. I can’t even find the right words for it.
Anyway, about the ys and gs and stuff… that’s been a constant problem so far because of how the game acts. But I’m assuming it’ll be fairly trivial to fix. Also, if you haven’t noticed, the tops of really high-up stuff get cut off too. But for now it’s more than enough π
Only problem is that right now most of the lines freak out because they’re not formatted/don’t do line breaks when they always should. And as a result memory sometimes gets garbled up and bad stuff happens. Worst bug is when the game freezes when you go into battle.
I’ll see about making a video later in the week, but so many lines are all garbly that it might not even be worth it π
Holy moses, good job! It looks really, really cool. I’m glad Mr. Super Hacker figured out the main script stuff. Good luck guys, and thanks for all the screenshots and stuff!
Oh also, I’m very happy to hear that it’ll run on a flashcart – I bought an EZFlash IV about six months ago exclusively for this translation.
*drools*
Way down the the line, are you guys going to post instructions for the different kinds of ways one can implement this translation/patch? I’d love to know what I’ll need and have the equipment ahead of time, so I can jump right in to some English Mother 3 goodness!
UGH this sucks that i wont be able to get the patch for a while, among the fact is:
1)its not done yet
2) im going back to school thursday, and thats aLL my time right there =[
Amazing work guys! If I had stayed with programming throughout college, I would certainly be lending a hand… but I’m way too rusty and have no time on my hands. Thanks for all your hard work!!
“Live is too short to act gravely”
For a pun, that turned out really nicely. Excellent job! π
Big progress is big progress, and it’s good to see the patch moving along so nicely.
Once again, you guys are all KINDS of awesome.
Whoot!
Awesome!!! I can’t believe how much this project has progressed lately! You have no clue how much we appreciate these frequent updates!!!
THANK YOU!!!
just a question. the types that have descendent parts (such as ‘g’ or ‘y’ look quite wonky. is it because of the screencaps (i hope so, those types looked great on the battle images), or they aren’t implemented correctly yet?
ab: Answered in a comment above π
You guys seem to amaze me on every update on how much progress is being made,you guys are on good pace to finish this by November.
This is some awesome news! π Great work, everybody!
Unfortunately, though, I can’t see any of the screenshots. π I’m missing ouuuuut!
You guys are Earth’s greatest heroes. π
So progress is at 40%. But is the hardest part over? Or is the hardest stuff yet to come?
OH MY GOD THIS IS AMAZING!
sblur, jeffman, and byuu…you guys are incredible!
Wow. In one week of progress, it’s like you’ve completely transformed the project by leaps and bounds. It looks like its almost done, even (but I’ll take your word about the 40%). I can’t wait to play it. Thank you all for your Jefflike inginuity.
Excellent progress this has to be one of the greatest teams ever to attempt a translation.
Roll on November(ish)!
Ah, you guys have once again given me a small dose of hope in this cold, cynical body of mine. I had already given up on such a translation taking place two preivious times.
Though I wonder about certain technical translations like “Welcome to Mother 3 World” and (A certain pink-haired character’s) name. I really don’t want to start any new debates with ’em, but I’d like to know what your stance on localization would be with these examples….Whether it should it be Mother 3 or Earthbound 2, that sorta thing.
Perhaps it’s still too early to ponder over. I dunno.
“Welcome to MOTHER3 World” will be changed to the correct “Welcome to the World of MOTHER 3” of course. As for your character you mention, I’m still unsure of what to do with it. There’s always a chance she’ll be a trophy or something in Smash Bros Brawl so I don’t want to go and mess with stuff.
There are/will be some name changes of stuff here and there though. After all EarthBound had lots of changed names when compared to Mother 2. But I don’t want to go TOO crazy with stuff.
Wow! You guys were hard at work! Awesome update–the 8-bit text is working!!!! Amazing job, byuu and Jeffman! And of course, nice going for the rest of you… :p Obviously I’m just messin’ around. Keep up the great work, all!
Oh my goodness! That byuu guy just dived right into the hardest part and got it working nearly flawlessly (the one on the left at the very bottom is a bit messed up). This is looking really impressive. Shame that the Antidote item bug, talking to people, and other bugs are messed up. Strange how just changing the text ends up messing up items. I guess it needs a bit of work adjusting to 8-bit font.
Really impressive stuff, and a very valuable addition.
I approve of people who know ARM well and can do ridiculous deadlines…
…then again, I also approve of anything that gets me delicious Mother 3 faster.
Here’s to you, guys.
*raises glass*
I want a complete list of everyone involved with this process, so when the translation is complete… I can send everyone a thank you note and a gift card or something.
I’ve been looking at this little red box with MOTHER 3 written on it for FAR TOO LONG. I’m ready to play it!
What you’re doing is truly phenomenal.
I patiently await the next update.
*bows*
Is they figured to hack the titlescreen for a earthbound 2 logo?
Excellent work guys, keep it up. I can’t thank you enough for what you’re doing. Looking forward to seeing the translation patch/translated ROM. ^_^
Thats is incredible news. I really hope you guys make the November deadline, I’m all prepared to finally play this.
Wow! This thing’s really looking good! I’m glad such a fine team could form together to make this happen.
KICK.
AWESOME.
I’ll be waiting for November (ish) with bated breath, then. I finally managed to make the ROM work on my Mac (I was using a Windows version of VBA, har har,) and, well… Looking back and forth from game to translation guide and back again certainly takes a lot out of it. XD
Personally, I don’t think many people would raise too much of a fuss if that pink-haired tomboy’s name (is it a spoiler to say her name or something?) stayed the same… But then again, you’d have to add another two slots to the naming screen, so maybe it’s for the best if she IS translated. The Starmen.Net community might appreciate a name like “Kumato” and what a funny coincidence it is, but the bulk of the gaming community might not get it. XD
Best of luck on the other 60%. Make all haste, brave warriors!
I’m just wondering will the names of the NPC’s still be in japanese?
Shield: You mean the text in those little gray boxes? They’ll be in English too. In fact I think we already have those working, or at least semi-working, I just hadn’t inserted the files for that.
Everything that’s in Japanese will be translated, that’s the plan.
Miek: I think we made it so characters can technically have 9 letters, but it hasn’t been tested much really, plus the naming screen stuff is buggy right now.
Very impressive work you all. Keep these screenshots coming, you’ve got me really excited to play Mother 3 again. Everyone appreciates all your hard work.
Much love.
Woo! This looks so awesome! You’re doing a great job, everyone!
THIS KICKS MAJOR ASS GUYS GOOD JOB! even tho you still got allot to do you have done an insane amount of work and made allot of progress kudos!
Looks like you guys are doing good on the project. I’ve never played this series but once this is done I plan on playing this.
All this amazing progress only leads me to believe we can see the patch much sooner then november. But thats just me being optmistic.
Keep it up guys! I’ve been waiting over ten years to play this game- but I’d rather play it in a language I’m familiar with so thanks so much for doing this!
excellent work! i really appreciate what you guys are doing. will the final product be call mother 3 or earthbound 2?
I sort of want to have the title stay as “Mother 3” personally. Plus, I feel the Logo is significant, because of what it symbolizes.
For now I want to keep the title the same for many reasons, technical, logistical, and other such-cal reasons.
At the very least we’ll probably call the patch something like MOTHER3_EarthBound2_English.zip or something so that it’ll catch the eyes of people unaware of any of this. And in the readme too.
You know you guys really have done your work, I am very glad. It’s been a long time since I last heard any news of Mother Three, but I am glad that there is progress. I can’t belive it, this November Mother Three might actually be released. Well good luck staff members and translators, you are doing a fine job.
It’s been almost two years, but its going to be worth the wait!
i just wanna say thanks for the hard work… u guys are doing great stuff… i wish i could buy u guys a drink… i hope everything goes smoothly…thanks again
For those of us who have had their love for this game stretched over decades, abused, and then stretched again, this is truly an amazing moment in time. The undertaking you are on is nearly at an end, you hackers, you programmers, you translators, and the completion of it is so much more important to the world than you can even possibly comprehend. In a very real sense, your journey will change the face of the world as we know it, forever. So ever onward, noble and legendary hero’s, till your work is done! The nations of the world rejoice at your efforts, and will praise your names in the ledgers of history!
I wish they made Mother 3 ties.
I’ve been watching this translation evolve since the very beginnings of Mother3.org and it is safe to say that it is on it’s way to becoming the most legendary translation project ever. I can’t wait until November(ish) when this comes out, I have already beaten the game in Japanese, but I’m just as excited at the prospect of playing it in English. To all involved with the project your efforts are well appreciated.
I can’t wait to play it!!! Will the FAQs explain how to patch the translation on my GBA cartridge of the game.
Congrats, guys!
This is going to be one of the most epic of fan translations.
Let me just take this time to say you have no idea how much I appreciate you doing this for us, the fans of Mother. I am very looking forward to the completion of this project, no matter how long it takes. π
Thanks guys,
HR
I have just died of epicness.
THIS IS INCRDIBLE.
Great job!
This is making me very exited about the release.
w00t I can’t wait until this comes out! keep up the work π
YAY good job guys. I cant wait to play it
Will the final version have the clipped off y’s and j’s?
You probably have it on your to-do list. π Looks great. Just started playing the japanese version. It’s sweet! I’ve only translated an NES game into French (EB0). I could never do what you guys do, though. Keep up the good work!
How will you get to play the game? On your computer? On your DS?