[Quirino]

I never talked about rushing, it's sorta just working on my own pace with a deadline. I think we have enough time and if we don't have I can still work on it next year, but not as fast. I won't rush things, I promise

[ballsiml]

I'm really thrilled that you guys are putting all this work into getting the original NES version translated.  A long time ago, I used to hack around with NES and SNES games, and Fire Emblem was the first game I ever worked on.  Never got much done besides translating the weapons and items and trying to expand the menu boxes, but it was a blast.  Way to go on what you've gotten done already.  Can't wait to see what's coming!

[Rai]

Is DTE + shortened translations good for you dude? I really just don't have time to figure out how to successfully implement an MTE.

Could take weeks before I do it successfully.

So if DTE is okay for you, especially since you want to start inserting stuff now, tell me.

I mean I understand MTE is possible, but at the same time, hacking isn't my whole life. Thus it would probably be a very long time before I successfully implemented anything.

I doubt MTE would that much anyway.

[tummai]

Is DTE + shortened translations good for you dude? I really just don't have time to figure out how to successfully implement an MTE.

Could take weeks before I do it successfully.

So if DTE is okay for you, especially since you want to start inserting stuff now, tell me.

I mean I understand MTE is possible, but at the same time, hacking isn't my whole life. Thus it would probably be a very long time before I successfully implemented anything.

I doubt MTE would that much anyway.

Don't give up.  You can do it.  You've got help

[Quirino]

DTE + Shortened translation is very fine to me. If you learned MTE/Pseudo Dictionary Compression and have enough time and you want to, you can always insert that as well
I will just play around with the translation until I find something I like and that fits. Don't worry about that people My English is not perfect, so if you see any grammar mistakes in the screens/patch when there's one, please report it to me.

Will you send me the rom + the explanation how I should insert things? I don't understand right now how I should insert things, I guess ASM is not my cup of tea

[hanhnn]

either if you want to be proud of your patch or you want it to be the biggest shame of your whole life ?
it's your choice

1 or 2 years is not that long

[Quirino]

either if you want to be proud of your patch or you want it to be the biggest shame of your whole life ?
it's your choice

Excuse me?

Listen up, I decide what I will do to the patch, because I started it. I clearly made my point now, so people can go on with complaining about it, or just be happy that someone takes the effort to translate this game.

I'm done now with people only complaining about this. My choice is DTE and because I started this project, my choice is what will happen. So stop now complaining about this! I'm always open for suggestions, but I clearly made my point about this subject now! If you don't like it, don't play it!

I'm sorry for reacting so strongly, but I don't want to keep saying the same things over and over.

edit: something else, would you like me to change the intro text 'at first there are, Dark Dragon, Falcion and...' to 'First there were the Dark Dragon, the Falchion and the...'? It looks better English, doesn't it? Or should I leave 'the' away?

edit2:
What do you think about it?

[DarknessSavior]

I think if you're going to mess with the title screen, you should make the subtitle text bigger.

~DS

[Tauwasser]

I think you should make it a real subtitle and not some overlay,

cYa,

Tauwasser

[DarknessSavior]

I think you should make it a real subtitle and not some overlay,

cYa,

Tauwasser

He did it that way because that's how the Japanese title is: it has ファイアエムブラム on top of the English letters.

~DS

[Quirino]

Yes, that's right.
The reason I did not make it so big is because it was a long name and I was not sure it would fit in length. Now I know it will, so I can make it bigger.

edit: hmm, to make it bigger will be tough, first of all the length... I also have limited space over each character: I can't use the highest and lowest tiles, because some are used for more spots, so I have to use the middle three. The only way I can make it bigger is by doing everything in uppercase...

edit2: then it will look something like this (I should move the characters a bit to the right):

[DarknessSavior]

I would move them all up to the middle of the word -and- use both upper and lower case letters.

~DS

[Quirino]

Ok, I will do that.

And Rai, I don't know why you don't respond to my PM, but I was wondering if you could send me the patch with the DTE implemented + the explanation how I should input text

[Nightcrawler]

You guys know we have DTE analysis utilities available, right? Maybe you've used them already for your table. If you're going to use DTE, it makes sense to get maximum use from it. An optimized table could save significant space over something a human comes up with arbitrarily.

[Gil Galad]

It sounds like you guys are still in the early stages of the hack. Just to tell you, I have some experience in hacking RPGs. You're more than likely going to find that several pieces of text using different display routines and using different banks. For example, the items may have a couple routines, the dialog text may use different code routines. You may find yourself redoing the hack again later on unless you get a good grasp of the location of text blocks and assembly code routines, and making a solid plan to accommodate all the English text based on the limited space that you have.

DTE would be fine for item names, weapons, armor, etc. You can also use the current Dakuten/Handukuten code for the DTE code. Try not to use the free space at the end of the fixed bank. You need it for a possible MTE table for the dialog. As far as the space is concerned for the item names, try to use that space instead. You can possibly fit it all in there with DTE.

MTE would be fine for the dialog. Preferably one byte entry because you can also use DTE. The advantages of using two byte entry is that you can have a much larger table for MTE, it's disadvantages is that you can only use 3 or more letter pairs with it. You can place the table in the hardwired bank along with the pointer table to the MTE table. There is also another alternative; if you have dialog in several banks, you can place each small MTE table at the end of the bank (if you have enough space) or where the text currently is. However, the drawback to that is that to be efficient, you need the text in each bank to be nearly at the same address range.

Huffman would even be good for the dialog. That compression is really not for a beginner though.

All in all, I can't really say exactly what to do. Just that you need to plan and be clever about how to get all the text in there or you're going to find yourself between a rock and a hard place later on. If I were you guys, I'd try to avoid ROM expansion unless there is no other choice. And even then, ROM expansion may not help you if the text you want to move already takes up most of the bank it already exists in. Also, in ROM expansion, you can run into other issues with interrupts and other odd glitches and sometimes you can crash the game by loading the wrong bank, or returning the wrong bank.

You guys decide what you want to do and then have fun. I'm sure you'll learn something as you go a long in the project.

[Rai]

Well good news dude, we can know fit in DTE + 5 byte characters. This should help input some more text.

And the issue of item names, isn't that we can't fit them. Most of the items can be fit by changing pointers. But to exactly fit them you need to expand menus.

And I've tried that before and that the results weren't pretty.

Also, FE uses different text routines for dialogue and items, so I would only implement a DTE into that if it was completely necessary.

But yes, now I'm looking through the script to find the best values.

Now we can fit "Marth" in 1 byte.

But I need a couple things from you before I start coding.

First, I need more of the translated script.

Secondly, I need the translated script edited. Unless of course you want to use the DS script.

Basically, the translation needs to be on the level of the DS script.

The script also needs to be updated with the official Shadow Dragon names. I'm fine with making a "Caeda/Sheeda" patch, but "Talis" should be "Talys" and "Garuda" should be "Galder". "Master Sheeda" was officially localized as "Princess Caeda", which makes a lot more sense.

So I'll wait for more stuff to be translated until I start inserting.

Only then can I decide the best compressed values.

I'm wondering, do you even know to rip the Japanese text? The script would be more readable if it was in the form of:

Japanese line...

English translation...

Rather than have all the English text that person says there all at once.

[Jorgur]

Is this still alive?

[Quirino]

Most definitely Still working on it.

[Kunio]

Fantastic game. I will try it after being compatible with FCEUX. This game is worthy enough to have a high quality translation patch. 

[Quirino]

OK, after a half year of not showing up, I thought it was time to leave a message.

The project is still alive! I haven't worked on it for all this time, because I was so frustrated about not being able to translate the hard-coded parts, and I could never find the spirit to go on with the project. However, with the help of Artemis251, I managed to find a solution which I'm content with. My excuse to everyone who has been waiting on it all the time and thought the project was dead.

What has been done in that half year:
-The intro is now fully translated
-Chapter 3 is translated

Don't worry, in christmas holiday I'll work on it with turbo speed. I will complete it!

Check the first post for a complete progress log