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In 2002, Cory Arcangel “hacked” a physical cartridge of Super Mario Brothers, the original version of the Nintendo’s blockbuster videogame (released in the United States in 1985). Initially presented as an installation piece, the artist ostensibly erased all of the sound and visual elements except the iconic scrolling clouds. Arcangel’s Super Mario Clouds has proven to be one of the most popular and enduring videogame hacks (and perhaps pieces of videogame art) in academic and popular discourses, having been featured in museums, books, and videos.

Nearly 20 years after the release of Super Mario Clouds, Michael “Hyperbound” Iantorno presents a loving parody of the famous art piece. Super Mario: Clouds is an aesthetic hack of Super Mario Bros with a strong emphasis on visible masses of condensed water - particularly those with a sunny disposition. Although the game remains mechanically unchanged, nearly every block and enemy has either been turned into a cloud or taken on some cloud-like attributes.

A frivolous endeavour? Perhaps. But maybe the world can take some joy in the hordes of smiling clouds that greet Mario as he traipses across the mushroom kingdom.

The Translation Quest team is delighted to share Dragon Quest Monsters: Delocalized for Gameboy Color with the world.

While much can be said about the deficiencies of the original localization, and how this new retranslated version offers substantial improvements, it was thought that a single comparison may demonstrate the difference most clearly.

An original localization excerpt from the king’s right jester:

The Starry Night comes after every 47th full moon. Hundreds of thousands of stars fall and fill the sky. Fragments of light cover the world. That’s the Starry Night. The night when countless lives shower down. To celebrate the night, the tournament is held. This is the tournament of the Starry Night.

The new Delocalized translation of the same text:

The Night of the Shooting Stars comes every 47th full moon. Hundreds of thousands of falling stars fill the sky. The entire world is enveloped in a tapestry of light. When the ancient poets looked upon this starlight, they compared it to the radiance of life itself. A great tournament is held to celebrate the night. We call it the Shooting Star Tournament.

This is just one of many examples of how much the text has improved. The authors hope you will take the time to get to know all of the people of GreatTree and experience their colorful personalities in a far more complete way!

Three years after his translation of Xenogears, Helsionium tackled Baten Kaitos Origins, another text-heavy game by Monolith Soft. Together with Sephie, who had previously worked on German translations of older Fire Emblem titles, they managed to finish this large project (comprising over 260,000 German words) in just under one year.

Baten Kaitos Origins is a late-generation Nintendo GameCube RPG and prequel to Baten Kaitos: Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean. Unlike the first game, it was never released in Europe as it wouldn’t have been possible to localise it for Europe before the Wii’s launch. The Baten Kaitos series is particularly noteworthy for its detailed, vividly coloured and animated map backgrounds, painted by series director and art director Yasuyuki Honne, as well as Motoi Sakuraba’s soundtrack.

By default, the translation’s title is based on the Japanese title (German: “Baten Kaitos II: Die Schwingen des Ursprungs und der Erbe der Götter”), though the user of the patch can choose to keep the American name instead.

The patcher might even be useful to non-German-speaking users, because it provides several options that can be used independently of the German translation:

• both patches previously released as part of the “Uncensor patch” ( https://www.romhacking.net/hacks/5547 )
• an option to change which game unlocks Georg’s sidequest (by default a save of the US version of Baten Kaitos 1 unlocks it)
• an option to enable Japanese voice acting for a single sidequest event that was not voiced at all in the US version
• an option to merge the 2-disc-game into a single, fully-working image, particularly useful for patch development and debugging
• a way to decompress all of the game’s files that use a proprietary RLE compression method

The patcher’s UI will be in English if the system language is not set to German. Java 8 or higher is required.

Please see the project page for additional details: https://www.romhacking.net/translations/6044/

Even more details and screenshots are available at: https://bko.helsionium.eu/deutsch/ (German only)

For years people have been yearning for an Arcade mod of NBA Jam TE, and those people will have to keep waiting. But user Ponlork is bringing that dream one step closer to reality with his NBA Jam 21 mod for the PlayStation 1 which is the closest you’ll get to the Arcade experience at home. Other than the Arcade version of course.

Rather than being stuck in development hell for years, Ponlork opted to go for the incremental approach of releasing updates periodically until the ultimate goal of replacing the entire roster with today’s NBA Players is complete. Version 1.1 adds 15 new players into the mix (10 active, 2 legends, and 3 secret characters).

These players consist of Lebron James, Nikola Jokic, Kawhi Leonard, Kyrie Irving, Bradley Beal, Giannis Antetokounmpo, Joel Embiid, Luka Doncic, Stephen Curry, Kevin Durant, Kobe Bryant, Michael Jordan, The Incredible Hulk, Cyberpunk and Snoop Dogg. The full 2021 NBA All-Star starting lineup is featured!

What separates this mod from other NBA Jam mods before it is that all the players have distinction. Every player has their own unique head sprites and the resolution is large enough to recognize the faces. The announcer calls each player by name, there’s varying skin tone palettes, and there’s a sprite scaling feature that is able to resize the players which gives it a extra level of depth.

In addition to that, NBA Jam 21 restores a lost feature that was disabled due to pressure from Congress to minimize videogame violence in the early 90s. If you’re familiar with the slang term “Posterized”, it’s a term used for when a player gets dunked on so emphatically that he is sent tumbling to the floor. This falling effect along with the backboard shattering were originally in the game but were eventually removed.

The Posterized feature is fully restored and the author is hopeful to one day restore the backboard glass shattering effect too. Although it’s still early, it’s exciting to see what’s coming down the pipeline. Boom Shakalaka!

Visit the project page here: https://www.romhacking.net/hacks/5700/

There’s also a trailer that slaps. Peep game: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TQYOx-gd00s

After a whole afternoon in the making, the ‘Dragon Warrior 1 & 2 - Spell Name Update’ ROM hack for the Gameboy Color versions of Dragon Warrior 1 and 2 is finally out!

The patch replaces the older styled spell names (Firebal, Firebane, Explodet, etc.) with the new(er) names used by the series in English localisations since Dragon Quest VIII on the Playstation 2 (Sizz, Sizzle, Kaboom, etc.). Nothing else in the ROM is changed except spell names so all existing saves should continue to work.

Find out what happened to Mr. Ghost as you progress through the game. Great music, graphics and level design await. Do you stand a ghost of a chance to reach Enma while going through 7 levels full of frightening creatures? Only one way to find out. Say “I ain’t afraid of no ghost” and download the translation patch, which includes amongst other things:

- Full translation of the game, title and level names

- Turbo mode

- Reinstated extra bonus level which wasn’t accessible

- Improved screen splits

- Minor other improvements

- Details on how to access easy mode

“Power of the Hired” is the first Strategy RPG that Dynamic-Designs has released in quite some time, but its style departs from several typical conventions that players encountered in “Feda: The Emblem of Justice” and the “Shining Force” series. Similar to how Arc the Lad on Playstation worked, one departure from typical SRPG game play is the lack of town functionalities, wherein characters may walk around, visit shops, speak to NPCs, and so forth. This game is divided into 18 scenarios, all of which must be cleared in order to keep advancing forward. Party composition selections occur in between scenarios, then game play resumes. Another sometimes disconcerting development is to have waves of fresh enemy replacements keep pouring onto the battlefield until the player satisfies a previously stated objective.

The game features a party of four playable heroes called “Beast Mages” that the player must use to fight off overwhelming waves of enemies. The characters are each able to summon two beasts to help in battle and with the help of these beasts, the player is able to tactically conquer each of the game’s scenarios. Depending on the beasts summoned, the characters’ magic will change and their spell composition will differ. Several scenarios require that the player acts quickly to avoid various dangers, such as a burning bridge that the characters need to quickly vacate in order to survive. Whereas other scenarios require the player to protect NPCs while they are escaping from danger themselves.

After the request of one of my subscribers, here you have a revised and improved version of this hack that turns a game based on a Japanese TV show cloned from Miami Vice, into the videogame that many fans were waiting for.

The biggest novelty of this ver.1.2 is the inclusion of an additional patch in the rar file with the hack translated 100% into Spanish. Now all Spanish speakers can enjoy the story and dialogues easily. Some extra work is done too to fix some grammatical inconsistencies in the dialogues of the English version. And of course, there’s much more!

For more information you can check the README files, available in both languages.

I hope You enjoy it!

Last year, Polinym released the most up-to-date version of his hack EightBound, which turns EarthBound into a Final Fantasy game. It combines elements of all of the first nine games to create an epic Final Fantasy adventure. Players can check out the original hack here: https://www.romhacking.net/hacks/4874/, or see its trailer in the related link.

EightBound was intended to be a very challenging hack that was still accessible to less skilled players. However, Polinym received many complaints about the difficulty. In response, Polinym has created a brand new edition of EightBound that caters to casual gamers.

Why Regal? Because this hack gives you the royal treatment!

Introducing EightBound Regal! Regal creates a whole new experience for players of all skill levels to be able to beat. Even a beginner who has never played an RPG before can reach an ending! Features of EightBound Regal include:

- Cheat protection has been removed!

- Significantly lowered encounter rates!

- A faster adventure that doesn’t waste more of your oh-so precious time!

- A never-before-seen story arc!

- New characters!

- New abilities!

- New bosses!

- A revamped interface!

The creator of the hack also wishes to make this statement: To all those who thought that EightBound was too difficult, Polinym is so sorry for all the pain my hack has put you through. He never realised that you have to cheat past the struggles you encounter in lif-,er, games. He is now a changed man. Now Polinym says that if your situation ever becomes too painful to endure, remember: it’s okay for you to escape your problem. He doesn’t want a single one of you players to think that an unfair reality you’ve been forced into is the only one that you have to live. Your ability to play EarthBound hacks on your computer is an amazing miracle. You deserve to spend your days in happiness.

Dreams can come true! No more tears!

Finally, Polinym wishes to reiterate that live reactions are the most helpful form of feedback for improving ROMHacks. The uploading of video playthroughs with commentary is highly encouraged. Also, he requests that commenters and reviewers refrain from posting spoilers for this hack’s new story.

Mizzurna Falls is a 1998 PlayStation adventure game developed by Human Entertainment. Heavily inspired by cult classic TV show Twin Peaks, the game follows high schooler Matthew Williams as he searches for his close friend, Emma Roland, who has gone missing. Notable for its unique blend of open-world gameplay, a real-time clock that sees NPCs and events following their own schedules, emphasis on exploration, and elaborate action sequences, Mizzurna Falls is considered a forerunner to later titles such as Deadly Premonition, Shenmue, and Majora’s Mask. However, Mizzurna Falls was on the bleeding edge of technology at the time, and its ambitious open-world was ultimately too much for the PlayStation to handle, resulting in a number of bugs.

Many efforts have been made to translate Mizzurna Falls into English, the most notable of which involved professional translator Resident Evie and PlayStation hacker Gemini. While Evie produced a full translation of the game’s enormous script, the effort ultimately fizzled out. The primary obstacle was that, when translated into English, the game’s script was simply too large to fit on a PlayStation disk. However, Evie released her translated script in the hopes that another hacking group could one day use it to develop a working patch.

This project, developed by nikita600 and Cirosan, does exactly that, using Evie’s script as a base. Nikita, a professional mobile game developer, and Cirosan, a professional translator and localization editor, collaborated over the course of several months to finally develop a working translation patch for Mizzurna Falls. Nikita developed a tool specifically for use with Mizzurna Falls that used a new compression algorithm to fit more text onto the disk than was ever possible before. Despite that, the game’s script was still too large to fit, which is where Cirosan came in. Fundamentally rewriting and editing a majority of Evie’s script (with her blessing), Cirosan produced a script for Mizzurna Falls that was able to fit onto the disk without sacrificing coherence, quality, or significant plot points. The result is a full localization of Mizzurna Falls that helps dialogue sound more natural and conversational, in addition to altering certain characters and elements to be more effective with Western audiences. Most of the work on the patch was done under quarantine during the Covid-19 pandemic; Nikita and Cirosan communicated via Discord to develop the patch.

This patch represents a supreme effort by Evie, Nikita, and Cirosan, across three countries and over a period of many months and years, to bring this revolutionary game to Western audiences. Welcome to Mizzurna Falls - we’ve been waiting for you.