Phantasy Star 20 Years Past English and Japanese Translation

Discuss/post fan stuff (images, fictions, games...)

Phantasy Star 20 Years Past English and Japanese Translation

Postby Oresama » Thu Nov 02, 2017 2:11 pm

I got the files today so I am officially in and this will be done. Eventually. Estimated release date: sometime before 2050. I don't know how long it will take yet and may need time to get acclimated with RMXP as I've only played around with 2000, 2003 and MV. Progress on the translations will be posted in this thread.

Currently working through a snafu in trying to get RMXP to open the project file. I am using English RMXP 1.02a and it claims it is too new to open the Russian RMXP project. I sent an email to Di.H about it, but if anyone has an idea of something to try (or if I need some kind of Russian patch?) to open the project, by all means chime in.

How you can help:
-Add New Game+ functionality, which I am told is not that hard if you know a little about RPG Maker. I can send you a link for what needs to be done, it just looks like Greek to me because I don't know enough about how everything works on the backend yet.
-I need to know which personal pronoun Hahn and Pike (Gryz) use in the Japanese version of PS4 (ore, boku, watashi, in third person etc.). This will save me a few hours I can put into the actual translation of the game. Pictures/videos of the Japanese cut scenes work too. If no one helps me out on this I'm going to have to put time into playing PS4 until Pike refers to himself that could go into translating the game.
-There are several enemies borrowed from PS4. Just replace the Russian by the picture you recognize with the English name. This will save me time and you can do it with the English version of RMXP without worrying about any of the problems mentioned in this thread.
-Figuring out where all of the menu button names are in RMXP (you just have to find it) so I can translate it. I haven't found them yet. Should only take a few mouse clicks if you know about RMXP than I do, which is close to nothing at this point.
Last edited by Oresama on Sat Nov 11, 2017 3:23 am, edited 5 times in total.
Oresama
Locusta
Locusta
 
Posts: 54
Joined: Sat Apr 02, 2011 11:41 pm

Re: Phantasy Star 20 Years Past English and Japanese Transla

Postby Oresama » Thu Nov 02, 2017 3:05 pm

Steam didn't update my RMXP so that was the problem with opening it, however most of the Russian text is being displayed as random gibberish characters. See pictures.
_1.jpg
Error example
_1.jpg (380.25 KiB) Viewed 31955 times
_2.jpg
_2.jpg (378.02 KiB) Viewed 31955 times


Poking through the files there doesn't appear to be nearly as much text/dialogue as the anime and visual novels I'm accustomed to translating, so I'm cautiously optimistic that this might not take too long.

I'll probably continue to post updates like this, as it will keep me accountable to myself and push me to get it done faster.
Oresama
Locusta
Locusta
 
Posts: 54
Joined: Sat Apr 02, 2011 11:41 pm

Re: Phantasy Star 20 Years Past English and Japanese Transla

Postby Oresama » Thu Nov 02, 2017 5:50 pm

Found out they used a Russian-hacked version of RMXP 1.04 that is somehow unique due to the Russian hacking. My thought was that it was dependent on the Russian modifications for all of the text to display, but when running it I got the same problem. It clearly works for the Russians running Russian Windows, so maybe that's the problem. (I'm running US Server 2008 R2 that is otherwise set up to think it's in Japan for Japanese software compatibility with the Russian MUI pack installed.) I'm off to see if I can get Russian Windows 7 from my Visual Studio subscription. Will set that up in a VM and hopefully all of the text will be there. On the bright side, the actual translating is going to be a lot easier than making the game's database readable. :lol:

I have nothing going on today and was hoping to get a lot done, but so far I'm just spinning my wheels and not getting anywhere. My secret plan to use this translation project as step 1 in seducing Nyasha is quickly blowing up in my face.

Image

At this rate I'll never collect them all... :cry:
Oresama
Locusta
Locusta
 
Posts: 54
Joined: Sat Apr 02, 2011 11:41 pm

Re: Phantasy Star 20 Years Past English and Japanese Transla

Postby Oresama » Thu Nov 02, 2017 9:57 pm

I FINALLY have something semi-workable. Confirmed that the Russian RMXP 1.04 ONLY runs properly in Russian Windows. Unfortunately for me, the Japanese MUI doesn't want to install, so I can't type in Japanese within the VM. I'll probably have to do the English version on the Russian VM, then do the Japanese version on the host OS later. A pain in the ass and more work than I planned on doing, but it is workable for now.

Found another fun bug - unzipping the Russian file in US Windows results in several image files getting the same name, all of which were wrong. It does unzip properly in Russian Windows. It's especially weird since all of the filenames use only Latin characters. The files were just nonsensically and arbitrarily renamed when not unzipped in Russian Windows. Beyond weird.

My whole day went down the drain getting this far. So I could at least have something tangible completed, the character names are in English (I think they're right, the new characters have rather unique names) and the opening cut scene is done. Added two tasks I could outsource to someone without Russian language skills in the OP that will save me time if anyone is willing.
Oresama
Locusta
Locusta
 
Posts: 54
Joined: Sat Apr 02, 2011 11:41 pm

Re: Phantasy Star 20 Years Past English and Japanese Transla

Postby Di.H » Fri Nov 03, 2017 12:23 pm

I can not express in words how grateful I am to you. This project was my dream. And you're helping this dream to be accessible to all.
Thank you so much!!!
Di.H
Locusta
Locusta
 
Posts: 61
Joined: Mon Jul 16, 2012 10:49 am

Re: Phantasy Star 20 Years Past English and Japanese Transla

Postby Oresama » Fri Nov 03, 2017 9:31 pm

Did the next set of maps that appear sequentially in RMXP, which was a dungeon with a long cutscene at the end. The ending is super long (at least it looks long in the editor) so I'm doing the last dungeon next to get that out of the way. Somehow doing these longer cutscenes takes more out of me than doing the same amount of lines on simple NPCs, simple events, treasure chests, etc. even though it's the same amount of work.

Sometimes Emma (one of the new characters) will say something that doesn't seem to belong in the conversation at all, and I don't know what to do with it yet. I'm thinking it will make more sense to me when I play the game back before releasing RC1 or beta or whatever it ends up getting called, and when I do I'm thinking/hoping it will be more clear to me than it is staring at the editor.

I asked about adding New Game+ on an RPG Maker forum. The guy who answered the post made it sound simple enough, but it involves doing a lot things I don't actually know how to do in RPG Maker. I sent the link to Di.H to see if he is open to adding NG+. I saw a guy on Youtube made a script for to do it in RMXP, but his website is gone and I couldn't find a copy of it. If anyone happens to have that and knows what I'm talking about, please share. :D
Oresama
Locusta
Locusta
 
Posts: 54
Joined: Sat Apr 02, 2011 11:41 pm

Re: Phantasy Star 20 Years Past English and Japanese Transla

Postby Oresama » Sat Nov 04, 2017 7:21 pm

Finished the last dungeon and am working on the ending, which is suuuuuuuuper long. At least it feels like it is at speed I translate Russian anyway, it's fine from a player's perspective. I work, and work, and work and am barely scrolling down the giant text box. It's a little demotivating. I wanted to finish the ending today, but there don't appear to be that many hours in the day. Will do some more on it later, and should finish it tomorrow. All progress is a victory.

Sometimes Russian confuses me. 1 out of every 20-25 lines will seem like gibberish. Even looking up the words one at a time to make sure I understand what is going on doesn't make a difference. I have some placeholder translations in place, but it's more that will need to be worked out and hopefully fall into place once I play the first draft.

I'm also afraid that I might have to make two English versions, one with a more accurate translation and another "localized" version. I'm trying to keep the feel of the original Russian, but I'm afraid people that don't understand the Russian context will think of it as flat and lifeless when it isn't supposed to be. If I do make a localization it would be after the Japanese version is finished.
Oresama
Locusta
Locusta
 
Posts: 54
Joined: Sat Apr 02, 2011 11:41 pm

Re: Phantasy Star 20 Years Past English and Japanese Transla

Postby Oresama » Sun Nov 05, 2017 9:22 pm

Got the ending translated, and am working on one of the cities now. I'm going to avoid mentioning specific city/dungeon names when making these updates to avoid spoilers.
Oresama
Locusta
Locusta
 
Posts: 54
Joined: Sat Apr 02, 2011 11:41 pm

Re: Phantasy Star 20 Years Past English and Japanese Transla

Postby Oresama » Mon Nov 06, 2017 9:51 pm

I finished the town I was working on. While not a perfect measure of progress, there about 30 sets of maps, and I have the first draft for 5 of them done. For the most part each town/dungeon is a set of maps. Some have more words than others, but with how long everything in the last dungeon was that's somewhere in the 20-25% of the game script first draft being done.
Oresama
Locusta
Locusta
 
Posts: 54
Joined: Sat Apr 02, 2011 11:41 pm

Re: Phantasy Star 20 Years Past English and Japanese Transla

Postby Oresama » Tue Nov 07, 2017 11:41 pm

It went faster today, and got two sets of maps done. Also opened it up a bit last night and did a few things in the database. I am making good, steady progress.
Oresama
Locusta
Locusta
 
Posts: 54
Joined: Sat Apr 02, 2011 11:41 pm

Re: Phantasy Star 20 Years Past English and Japanese Transla

Postby Oresama » Thu Nov 09, 2017 10:31 pm

I got a town done yesterday, and am making progress on another one today. It's not going to get done today, there is just a ton of text all over the place. I'm hopeful that it will be finished tomorrow.
Oresama
Locusta
Locusta
 
Posts: 54
Joined: Sat Apr 02, 2011 11:41 pm

Re: Phantasy Star 20 Years Past English and Japanese Transla

Postby guru2 » Sat Nov 11, 2017 2:41 am

Seriously...thank you so much for doing this! Can't even express how hyped I am to hear that you are translating this.
guru2
Xanafalgue
Xanafalgue
 
Posts: 17
Joined: Wed Nov 30, 2016 3:14 am

Re: Phantasy Star 20 Years Past English and Japanese Transla

Postby Oresama » Sat Nov 11, 2017 9:53 pm

It's good to know that someone here appreciates it and is looking forward to it. So far people on the RPG Maker forum have been more excited about a Phantasy Star game getting translated into English than people on an actual Phantasy Star forum. lol

I am FINALLY done with that ****ing town. I hate Motavians, I have furries, I hate their stupid love of garbage, I hate their stupid blue fur, I hate how they babble on endlessly about garbage and other stupid things, I hate them, I hate them, I HATE THEM AAAAAAALL!!!! This is why man invented black magic.

Profound Darkness who is darker than twilight
Profound Darkness who is redder than flowing blood
Buried in the flow of time
In thy great name,
I hereby pledge myself to darkness
Those Motavian bastards stand before us in our way
All those garbage loving fools
Merge thy power and mine
To grant destruction equally to them all!!

HADOOOOOOOOOUKEN!!!!!

Motavians go boom. Despite that not being the least bit productive, I feel better now. Back to the grind tomorrow.

And a friendly reminder for all of the good Palmans reading this:

Image
Oresama
Locusta
Locusta
 
Posts: 54
Joined: Sat Apr 02, 2011 11:41 pm

Re: Phantasy Star 20 Years Past English and Japanese Transla

Postby Di.H » Sat Nov 11, 2017 10:31 pm

Great job!
Di.H
Locusta
Locusta
 
Posts: 61
Joined: Mon Jul 16, 2012 10:49 am

Re: Phantasy Star 20 Years Past English and Japanese Transla

Postby Oresama » Sun Nov 12, 2017 10:10 pm

Three dungeons were completed today, plus I made a little headway into the database (items, weapons, armor, etc.). It's hard to tell as some maps have a deceptively high amount of text, but I think I'm about halfway done with the first draft.
Oresama
Locusta
Locusta
 
Posts: 54
Joined: Sat Apr 02, 2011 11:41 pm

Next

Return to Fan stuff

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 17 guests

cron