Localization and Customization
I’ve been working on the hacking the last few days when I’ve had the time, but there were getting to be too many mini-updates and that last post was already filled to the brim with comments, so this is like a big-mini-update so we can start fresh π
Basically, see this to see what problems I was having the other day with battle text. Fixing this basically required a special custom control code to be put in place, and luckily that was one of the things we were planning to do anyway, so that sort of combined two things on the to-do list into one.
Anyway, after a lot of blah blah technical stuff, I managed to get the groundwork laid for battle text custom control codes. Many lines of text are stuck in Japanese word order, which doesn’t always work well in English, so this custom control code system will give us the flexibility we need to make the text sound like normal English. Anyway blah blah, here’s a before and after pic, for example.
Before 
After
First, while I’m talking about this stuff, I should mention that this means we’ve finished another thing on the to-do list, “Try to hack things so the intro text doesnβt sound so convoluted, as the Japanese version always assumes the enemy name comes first.” So that’s another thing scratched off. Getting ever closer π
And of course, by setting up the control code system, a lot of progress has been made on “Add control codes for he, she, it, a, an, the, they, cohort, cohorts, etc.” for battle text. What’s more, this will all tie in and share some code with the main script thing, “Add in new control codes for things like a, an, the, some, he, she, it, they, them, etc.” So not only did we cross one thing off, we’re well on our way to crossing off two others along the way.
So for now, now that things are set up for custom control codes, the next step is to actually implement each and every one. I inserted a block of custom text that will eventually contain things like he/she/it/a/an/the/his/her/its, etc. so that the custom CCs will be able to make everything sound natural in context. One of the things that really impressed me with EarthBound’s localization was the attention to details such as this. For instance, did you ever give thought to the fact the game knows what gender pronouns to use for Ness, Paula, Jeff, and Poo? Most games would avoid pronouns altogether. Or that some enemies will have “The” printed in front of their names in battle, while others wont? Or that if you have two people in your party and touch a butterfly, it’ll say both their names, but if you have three or more it’ll say something different? Or that the localizers tried to avoid having item names that start with vowels, because of a/an problems? They added a lot of little touches in there you might never have noticed π
Anyway, there’s tons and tons of other such little things the localizers did to make EarthBound’s text flow naturally, and my goal is to do just as good, if not better for MOTHER 3. I’ll show more pics and examples and such later as I finish each custom CC. And in some cases, these custom CCs are needed to print data that the game won’t do normally with normal control codes for some reason, like I showed in that mini-update.
Anyway, the first control code I implemented was one that prints the current enemy’s name, important for particular lines of text. The second CC I did was one that prints “and cohort”, “and cohorts”, or nothing at all, depending on the # of enemies at the start of a battle. The Japanese language (usually) doesn’t specify between plural and singular (unless you go out of your way to specify a number + a counter), so this wasn’t an issue in the Japanese version. But in English and other languages plural and singular are everywhere. So here you can see it finally working, only took an hour to get it working π
One 
Two 
Three 
zap
You can only fight 3 enemies at a time in the game, though in some rare instances, if there are any more, they’ll fly in to replace enemies you’ve defeated. So I still need to test with those cases. As you can see in the pics above, the new control code works great, though I just noticed that pre-programmed boss fights with multiple enemies act slightly differently, so I gotta look into that quickly.
Incidentally, I mentioned other languages earlier, but as we’ve been hacking the game, I’ve always considered translations of MOTHER 3 into other languages, so many of our hacks, such as this stuff, is designed openly enough to make it easy to support quirks of each language, like gender and number-based articles, such as el/la/los/las in Spanish, for example. So hopefully after the English version is released, we’ll be able to help people translate it into other languages too, without too much trouble π
Whew, that was a lot of stuff π― Happy bedtime, you folks who are up late like me.
Good job, Mato. :3
Hey Mato!
I’ve been following the progress of this thing for the longest time and I gotta say that it’s looking better and better with each update! The wait is annoying, but I’m just gonna bear with it, since that’s all I can do.
So It’s not like Earthbound, where you have lines of four enemies in one battle, just three?
Great work by the way, I’ve been following this since September!
You guys really are amazing. I look forward to not only a finished translation, but a quality translation. Thank you for putting so much time and effort into this project.
suh-WEEEEEET!
That stuff is all incredibly cool. I want to hear the special scary story.
Aw, only three enemies at a time? There goes my plans of finding a Fobby-like monster to suck exp out of from 6+ enemy battles. π
Hmm, something seems off. Would an “its” in front of “cohort” sound more natural?
Keep on truckin!
I would second the “and *its* cohorts” idea if it didn’t sound a bit unnatural with human enemies (IE “Encountered new-age retro hippie and its cohorts”)… And I know you don’t want to put in more control codes inside your existing control codes to change “its” to “he” or “she.” Anyway, thanks for detailing all the boring technical stuff, it makes it feel more like you’re making progress! π
Very cool. Keep up the good work.
well Mato binging on Methamphetamine Do Excellent work for Mother Translation Project again..
Good Work Mato my Boy
WOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!
I really appreciate the extra effort you’ve put in. Mother 3 is so different from the other Mother games in my opinion, and very unique, so it’s great that you’re trying to make the dialogue resemble EarthBound’s as much as possible. It will really help tie the “spirit” of the games together.
I can’t wait! Nice work!
Is anybody else tickled pink because of the Potatobug screens?
Maybe it’s just a Michigander thing, but I’d have to say that 99.9% of all beetles ’round here are mistaken for potatobugs. My mom, for example, insists that Elder beetles, June bugs, and Flour beetles are all the same species. If you have ever seen the previously mentioned bugs before, you would notice that they do not resemble each other at all. It’s always amused me why so many people think that ever bug they see is a “potato bug”.
… That, of course, has absolutely nothing to do with Mother 3. You may carry on with the relevant Mother discussion.
Woo! guys I appreciate this translation so much! All the work you’re putting in deserves like.. a Nobel Peace Prize or something. Keep up the great work!!
Y’know, I’m actually thinking about maybe a Spanish translation myself… Although I do prefer English 100% of the time, there’s plenty of people in the world who don’t speak English and do like Mother… π
Then again, maybe Kitsune Sniper would do it… IDK… Does he even care about Mother? Bleh, MATO, MATO, MATO, MATO, MATO. I feel… good.
Anyhow, yay for CC working! I hope boss battles don’t give you too much of a problem though.
Awesome!
It’s funny because when you look at the screenshots on the right of the website, it feels like everything’s done already. It gives a good idea of what to expect.
Moving along faster. Mato, promise me that you guys won’t localize every single dumb thing like they did in EB (I read your Mother 2 to EarthBound and back again thing) like red crosses n’ stuff like that.
“Their” might also be suitable for Pigtunia, now that I think about it. Wow, this project’s got panache! Well done, Tomato! π
Amazing work!
Also, I have to agree with the “it’s” thing. And if there is any way I can help in a future Spanish translation, please contact me. I’m 101% chilean- I’ve lived here in Chile my whole life, so spanish is actually my first tongue.
Again, kudos on the update!
I am in favor of the “its” as well, just so long as everyone remembers the possessive form does not have an apostrophe. π
Earthbound doesn’t have an “its,” does it? I can’t really remember, but I don’t think it does. And the goal of this is to pretty much look and feel like Earthbound, right?
EarthBound does use “its”. Also, I knew people would suggest “its”, but if you look, that’s already one of the things on the to-do list, in fact, it’s the pronoun stuff I was talking about! So too bad, I already beat you all to it!
Actually, EB uses only “its” for every single instance. But I’m planning to make it use his/her/its depending on context. So in that sense, it’ll do more than what EB does. I just need to create a table that says what gender every enemy is now, which I needed to do anyway π
Actually, while I’m on the subject, I’d just like to say that, though I don’t know how well humor translates from Japanese to English, judging by the screenshots, you guys look like you’re doing a great job capturing that weird kind of subtle humor that drew a lot of people into Earthbound.
Damn, Mato. 16/38 things off the list. Almost half man. Good work, good work.
If you are trying to get the game to feel as much like EarthBound as possible then please, go ahead. There was just one thing that always bothered me about EB, and I hope you might consider changing it. I’m referring to the plural use of “cohorts”. A cohort actually means “a company of companions or supporters” (or enemies), so “cohorts” used to describe just two enemies, is a bit wrong. I know you guys are going for accuracy and professionalism, and that one thing always niggled a bit in the original game. Either way, I think you’re doing a fantastic job, and I’m amazed to see how far it’s come on from the first shots.
Looking very good. By the way, you might be interested to know that you now have followers in Mumbai, India tracking the progress of the patch!
Just droppin’ in to say I appreciate that you’re trying to make the text flow naturally, rather than just settling for merely acceptable. Keep up the good work, Mato.
π Hooray!!!
@Loz:
coΒ·hort /ΛkoΚhΙrt/ Pronunciation Key – Show Spelled Pronunciation[koh-hawrt] Pronunciation Key – Show IPA Pronunciation
βnoun
1. a group or company: She has a cohort of admirers.
2. a companion or associate.
Definition 2 is the one used for the game, looks like it makes perfect sense to me.
Alright, got the game to count the # of enemies right, even for pre-programmed boss battles. That was pretty easy, the programmer did it the way I was hoping. It’s nice when that happens π
It’s also crazy to think how much work from so many different hacks was put in to make the above work as it appears. I think that’s what’s fun about hacking as a hobby, the feeling of slowly building things up piece by piece.
Anyway, now to move on to some other CCs.
Tomato, is there a fixed link to the to-do list somewhere?
This is seriously so cool.
Dusty: http://mother3.fobby.net/faqs/project-to-do-list/ it’s linked to from the FAQ page.
Mato does the Before/After shot mean that the “face-to-face” line has been totally replaced by “You encountered X” ? The face to face line is hilarious. Is that the transliteration?
“You meet Cattlesnake face to face!”
or “You meet Cattlesnake, head-on!”
Hahahaha. Please do that somewhere!
Bawesome.
I CAN TASTE THE TRANSLATION TO BE DONE…SOON! >:)
Fruitpunch: hmmm… why is that particularly funny? *scratches head in confusion*
Waw… no more than 3 enemies at a time? that seems kind of…odd…. i wonder why its like that… i wish there were more….
Anywhoo… so there’s no such thing as “Mr. Batty A, and its cohorts Mr. Batty B and Mr. Batty C” and stuff.. with the letter labeling?
— And each enemy is a certain gender? are there different genders for a given type of enemy? or is one enemy type always a certain gender?
just curious is all.
And thanks so much again for working on this… man, Mato… DO you honestly realize the scope of what you’re doing, and how many people are looking forward to this all over this planet?
Personally, I think it would sound better with ‘and its cohorts’. But I guess that’s just a preference.
Thank you for all the work you have done and will be doing. You rock!
Mato its great that you have been working on the control code system of mother 3 and trying to make it as great if not better than earthbound battle text.It really shows how much detail and hard work you are putting into making this mother 3 translation as great as possible,also its great that many of your hacks support many languages.
Fruitpunch: The “face to face” thing was an old m3.org thing that was a workaround to the “enemy names always come first” problem. “Encountered” is what it should be.
Rod: There aren’t “rows” either, like how EarthBound had. So things like PK Fire attack all enemies. Even so, I personally feel MOTHER 3 is harder. Also, there aren’t labels like Mr. Batty A, B, C, etc. in this game. They all have the same name. Also, the enemies don’t have genders, I’m adding that in now so that things will be better in English and other languages.
I’m sorry, but I have to do this:
Go team-o, go team-o, it’s your birthday, it’s your birthday…!
I just finished Earthbound last night for the first time. It took me 5 days of work. The problem is, I hate RPGs pretty much in general. But something about Earthbound made me love it so much, I’m now finding myself playing Mother 1, and hopefully in the future I will play Mother 3 with your translation patch. I have been sitting here reading the site for days, gathering all information possible about this, and all I can say is that every time I see the RSS feed on my homepage (Even when unupdated), I get giddy. I am extremely excited for this, and I fully support you and your team. I guess I should get down to my real point, though. I really love what you are doing, the constant updates. While it seems like an unfair thing to do and makes us yearn for more every day, it’s extremely smart and I love it. Keep them up, even if it is something subtle, I think I speak for us all when I say we must know every tidbit of information concerning development. It’s the only thing that will quiet the masses (Or at least me)!
Awesome work Mato!!! If the recent increase in speed keeps up (or better yet, increases) I think this could be finished by the end of june or sooner, so long as nothing extra and more complicated rears its ugly head.
Also, I have two questions:
1. Why is the ROM for Mother 3 32 Mb, when most GBA ROMS are only 5-18 Mb?
2. Would somebody please recommend me a good Earthbound hack!?!?
Again, incredible work Mato.
SAM-E-BOI: Nah, not gonna be that soon. I’m still not even sure if we’ll finish the hacking by May or not. The editing + testing will certainly take more than a month, too.
Anyway: 1. because there’s so much stuff in the game. Lots of animations and text and data and all that.
2. I haven’t played many EB hacks to be honest. I thought EB Girl’s christmas hack was pretty kickass, and although I haven’t played it, I hear Hat Quest is really really good.
———-
Anyway, I just realized that hacking while Ride of the Valkyries is playing is awesome π―
Nothing but glory!
Thank you, I’ll go look for those now.
Good work man. I just looked over the to do list and I just wanted to know what :”Add in extra little stuff (like that silver star thing) if we feel up to it and if it doesnβt take much time. This has very low priority though and should be saved for last.” is all about?
You can read about it here. I should probably add a link to it on the to-do list so newer-ish people will know what it is π
Anyway, long story short, there’s an item you can get that lets you fight every enemy you’ve ever fought before. The silver star hack Jeffman made adds a silver star on the enemy listing screen if you’ve fought every enemy there is in the game. People’ve been doing that as personal sidequests/goals since the Japanese version came out, but it’s a pain having to count all the enemies to see if you got them all.
As others have said before the professionalism you are putting into this hack is nothing short of amazing. This recent post as well as the longer names post made me giddy as ever (I can finally stop using my friend’s middle names now! =] ). Anyway we all really appreciate the work you all are doing and the quality and pride you have in your work, Thank You!
Impressive!
Hey Mato:)
One thing I have to say is I’m very impressed with the way your doing this ^__^ Keep up the great Work!
The fact that you can hack the game to show the right pronoun/pluralization or the star thing is amazing to me. This stuff is all crazy awesome.
you guys are heroes!
Thanks again, Mato. If ever I can repay you… with pizza or iced cream or beer… just say the word.
I’ve been following this for absolutely ages, since mother3.org were doing it, and you make the wait not only bearable, but exciting. You, sir, are awesome.
I’ll help with a Spanish translation if the need arises π
I just started a few days ago and I think what you are doing is pretty awesome. I was wondering, though, how many people are helping out with this. Also, I know you say you don’t have an estimated release date, but do you think it’ll be done within a year?
Keep up your Amazing work! If there’s anything your fans can do to help just say the word!
Awesome job! It really looks like it’s coming together nicely. I’ve been checking for updates here more often since I got Brawl and I can really see how much is getting done in a short amount of time.
I was just kind of curious, but are you going to change the title of the game to Earthbound 2 or just leave it as Mother 3?
Keep it up you guys. I’ll wait as long as it takes.
You all constantly impress me- it seems every time I check back there is some other obstacle you passed. You are all my heroes.
keep it up, it looks great so far. And I think people are probably wanting a beta of some kind, it always happens.
Not quite done yet with this stuff, very close though. But as you can (hopefully) see in the pics above, I got several new control codes up and running. Many cool things going on here π
I thought I posted already, but I guess not. Great job as always!
Also, what are these EB hacks? Are those hacks essentially fan-made games or quests using the original EB assets??
at first me think Oh wow Mother 3 Going be Good
but now the More I see of it The More Met hink “Wow Just a Bunch of Bad pixel Art and Some Crap Jap Plot!” but the Truth is.. I will play this Turd of Video Game anyway.. Why?? Not because Game Look Good.. but because Wonder “Mato” Put So Much Great Effort into Translating.. I Respect That ! Cannot Wait to See Your Results
@whatwhat
ow, harsh man. take it easy.
I’d help with a Spanish (or portuguese) translation, but I have NO idea how
but yeah, amazing work.
I didn’t even notice it when playing EB, but now that you mention it, those linguistic aspects of the localization are pretty outstanding, and it’s awesome that you’re incorporating it into M3 also.
btw, Mato, speaking of localization, have there been any other aspects of the game or game script (w/o revealing spoilers) that defied North American localization? Like, some aspects of Japanese culture/language just aren’t familiar to an english speaking audience. How are you handling such things (if they exist) in M3?
I hope that’s not an inappropriate question.
@Whatwhat
If you’re going to criticize this project, the least you could do is take the time to formulate an intelligent sentence. π
Mato’s next hack was inexplicable!
(Seriously though, this is awesome! You got an entire section of the list marked off already. You deserve over 9000 gold medals.)
lol, (at above post)
(make that 2 posts above….. man there’s always someone posting on here eh π )
WHAT NINE THOUSAND?
THAT’S IMPOSSIBLE!
…But yeah. Mato’s text hacking and custom control codes make the battle text look A LOT like EB’s narration.
Oh man, once this translation is done I’m going to translate it into French just for the heck of it.
The only problem with that, though, is what would be lost in the translation through two different languages, rather than directly from one. I’m wondering, Mato, how much stuff would you expect to be lost through indirect translations, like Japanese -> English -> French?
isn’t the gray box for the mouse a bit too long?
Mato,will you rest after finishing or will you go alredy for the ebzero remake hack?
Hey Mato, when this is all said and done, you should make an Engrish hack! I would love to play that! “A Ostrelephant made battle with much fastness!”
Actually, EB did use gendered pronouns…
π Wow I’m a nerd.
http://pics.livejournal.com/nutsjesmoar/pic/0007rfgb
It’s wonderful you guys are working so hard on this, for all of us. I guess it sounds a wee bit corny (and probably is), but for a lot of us, Earthbound is almost like a living part of our lives – something very special and dear – especially for those of us who first experienced it as kids. And finally getting to experience the next step is almost as emotionally exciting as it is as just a great game.
You all are doing a wonderful thing, and bless you for it.
@Dr. Hobo:
I laughed! I cried! I lost fifteen pounds!
I highly recommend an Engrish hack… even if it was only posted as a video on April Fool’s day or somethin’…
What’s incredible is the fact that hacks are now coming in spurts of hours when Tomato is working on them– like.. 6 hours later, new stuff! Three hours later.. more development! IT’s like watching an event unfolding.
Seriously, Tomato– you’re an event now 8)
RDRR.
Great work! At least some characters will have obvious genders <:)
You make me so much happier with every update. You are awesome.
Mato, you deserve a franklin badge. But a very large one. One that reflects the apocolypse.
wow..
thats gettin pretty fine now..keep the awesome work menz
Nutsjesmoar: That was actually hard-coded in, seeing as only one enemy ever uses that attack, there was no need for them to do any dynamic gender control code gizmo stuff. In fact, I don’t think enemies in EarthBound have gender stuff programmed in, only the main characters.
I would love to see an Engrish version of this or ANY classic videogame. And with the hacks that the team has set in place, it shouldn’t be too hard to make other translations. And it doesn’t mean you can’t still make a direct translation from Japanese to French, unless, of course, you don’t speak both languages.
It very well may be, though, that all the Mother-related material in SSBB may instigate a localization. Lucas is quite the popular character, and there are also a host of beautifully-arranged Mother scores you can listen to. I think the menu-patch downloads are testament to the fact that Mother 3 is going to be the next Fire Emblem.