Might and Magic: Book One NEC PC-Engine CD Translation

[TiCo.KH]

Oh god! I should  needed a good japanese translator. I work with the google and babylon translate, but if I work alone every maps translation takes a week minimum. The towns and castles 2 or 3 weeks. I translated 5 maps  (55 maps had in the game) and harder things its a found good translation to the lots of additional texts.  (80% texts not pointer based, assambely code load the string directly, but not too hard found this. (Exp. A9xx85yyA9zz85ww  zzxx load to wwyy)


http://ticokh.atw.hu/42.png

http://ticokh.atw.hu/29.png

[TiCo.KH]

Hi!

Some guy ask me how the translation on going.

I need a realized if I do the translation only myself it takes too long, because not enough time the translate the text with google and babylon and editing the rom. Plus this translation is in this form is lame because my english is lame, and the game have lots of additional scripts which is missing from other english releases. (And someone complained my previous SNES version wizardry 6 translation because I use only the PC version text in there translation). I released "in progress" translation in Underground Gamer torrent site a weeks ago maybe help found someone good japanese-english translator.
If you wait some hour I can upload one filehost site the this file (with configured mednafen and rom and in progress riped  texts). I know maybe break some forum rules but not too easy make the iso patch, because most emulator works correctly with bin/cue + .wav or .mp3. I don't want convert back to full is to make patch after every inserted sentence. And translation useless without 8x12 font hacked PCE-CD System.rom.
November 29, 2011, 08:45:41 AM - (Auto Merged - Double Posts are not allowed before 7 days.)
I add the link to the first post.

[TiCo.KH]

I planing to resurrect my projects (this and Wizardry 6 SNES translation).
I needed to realize translating into good english in not fitting on me. So I worked to extract text from this games.
Here I sharing now the japanese scripts from the game, translating these with help the google Translate will be easy somebody how is expert or native english speaker. And also easy can get the english script from the DOS version of the game. But PC-E version have more clues in the inns, and some other minor changing in the scripts and quests.
If you interested to help the translation pm to me and I will share with you the in-progress ROM (all towns and some of dungeons and outside areas is already translated but I sure it's have tons of error in a text).
If I got a full translation one of the area I easy can put into the ROM in one weekend or less, because I already revers-enginered the needed part of assembly.
I planed the make a tool for this but I wanted something more universal what every translation project can use. (Someting like good old SNESedit with good text encode-decode ability like Kruptar, with in modern desktop application.)

So here is the link for the scripts:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/15KNyROaMpHyWJy0HBP6jZOcR4kx8k0V6/view?usp=sharing

[TiCo.KH]

I know it look like I abandoned this project long time ago, but few weeks ago i found this:

https://github.com/dshadoff/SYSCARD_Translatefont

It is a great SysCard patch to support 8x16 and 8x12 ASCII font.

When I successfuly patched 3.0 SysCard image (it should be a headerless version), now is much easier work on PC-Engine CD translation.
Maybe some extra graphic char will be missed because just basic ASCII suported.
I already translated the intro texts, and work on full reverese enginering the first town.

Only stepback I should rework texts again on all dungeons, but now thanks to reverse egineering maybe I can get more spaces to bigger dungeons (mostly towns).

But as you see, I'm still not on native level english, and I use translations from online translator tools. Thankfully, these tools is developed lot in the past 10 years  , but if anybody like to help, review the english text, would be great.
Repointering is not as easy like most of NES and SNES games, mostly small asm code load every pointer, maybe just 20-30% came from pointer tables.

If my english will be crappy, is a bit hard rework all asm part to fix texts. 

Thank you Guys!

[Ponch]

This is amazing! Love the PCE and M&M, so I'll be the first in line when this project is released. Thanks for your efforts!

[TiCo.KH]

Hi!

I can't decide, please vote

[TiCo.KH]

55 maps in this game. I hope I start to translate the last one today.
I am sure my translation is not the best but playable in English.
Lots of menu modifications still waiting but the major part is done now.
Also, I found lots of alterations compared to the original game not just fixed characters but some quest modified battle is not that hard plus all Silver and Gold message is gone (it sometimes remained in the code but not used).
I also found traces of the character generation (text data to player race and gender) but maybe the fixed player is decided in middle to development in this port.
Plus would be great to subtitle the intro too. Or dub the whole game to English but this is over my one-person project.

[TiCo.KH]

I know this translation should be released now. I finished the last map months ago, so what I am waiting.

I trying to hack the 11 character limitation in 8x8 texts.
Thanks to my in-development Huc6280 Ghidra processor, and quick python script what is translate VCE palette RAM dump to yy.chr rgb palette file, I found the way how hiragana and katakana compressed to same tile in 4bit 8x8 tilemap.
 


But the biggest challenge still before me. I like to keep asci form to all texts in the game, if possible. I need hack kana loading to process every two pairs 4x8 tile to one 8x8 and need temporary free space in RAM and VRAM to place this temp tiles, plus few bytes free in WRAM to bookkeeping the whole process.

So any PCEngine programming expert in here, please help me.
 

[Kallisto]

Never thought I see the day this port of MM1 will get translated, its the best graphical version out of the bunch minus the smaller window compared to the others.

HardcoreGaming101 probably would love this to update their article too. Does it still follow the same continuity by the way? I thought I read somewhere the Japanese MM1-3 followed a slightly different path.

The only best version left out there now to translate is MM3 for Sega CD (not the Turbo CD version), there some interesting differences between the two.

[Sanedan56]

As far as I've looked, the game is its own story. The game has original characters as the party, some events I've seen so far were changed,
and even the ending is different.

[Magma MK-II]

So no Sheltem posing as King Alamar?

[KingMike]

I think 4x8 is an awful, barely legible font size that should be avoided if possible. M, N, H and W look practically identical.
Shame on GameFreak for using that hideous font several generations more than they should have.

[turboxray]

I know this translation should be released now. I finished the last map months ago, so what I am waiting.

I trying to hack the 11 character limitation in 8x8 texts.
Thanks to my in-development Huc6280 Ghidra processor, and quick python script what is translate VCE palette RAM dump to yy.chr rgb palette file, I found the way how hiragana and katakana compressed to same tile in 4bit 8x8 tilemap.
 


But the biggest challenge still before me. I like to keep asci form to all texts in the game, if possible. I need hack kana loading to process every two pairs 4x8 tile to one 8x8 and need temporary free space in RAM and VRAM to place this temp tiles, plus few bytes free in WRAM to bookkeeping the whole process.

So any PCEngine programming expert in here, please help me.

You mentioned ram, wram, and vram. What are you calling wram?? That's not something the dev scene uses; that's a snes term.. do you mean 8k system ram? Or do you mean CDRAM? Or do you mean BRAM (backup ram)?

If you're looking for guaranteed usable space then I recommend the end of the stack. Games aren't going to go that far down into to the stack. Though that's typically only needed for hucard hacking projects, if can be useful for CD games too (a local area for all hooks in different banks can access without remapping stuff in). Since this is a CD game you have CDRAM - you can take advantage of 'static' default values (and persistent values) AND self-modifying code. If you need address registers (i.e. zero page indirection), just push a few pair of zp values on the stack and use those temporarily. The tricky part is making sure whatever free space you found in CDRAM.. remains free. Sometimes CD games will switch things up as the game progresses. If you can compress the replacement text with a smaller foot print, you can use the free space there for code/variables.

Another thing you could do, is upgrade the game to Arcade Card. If you place most/all the text in the AC ram, then you'll have the original area for your new code/print routine/etc.

I have proposed over the years that we make a new system card that has 512k of ram instead of 192k.. or at least a full 256k of ram (this part of the base unit 64k CD RAM). That way the game wouldn't know to use it, and it's free to use for whatever translations/hacks. We already have such a system card for the Turbo Everdrive and mednafen emulator supports something similar as well.

[TiCo.KH]

I think 4x8 is an awful, barely legible font size that should be avoided if possible. M, N, H and W look practically identical.
Shame on GameFreak for using that hideous font several generations more than they should have.

Yes I know, but fortunately I need to use them only in a status screen and in a spell names. Maybe in item names too because in backpack view is also breaks the 11 character (12 if I could rewrite the break line logic) barrier. But maybe I can redesign backpack view to two lines/item.

I tried shortened spell names to something close what in an original manual but many looked awful. So I try to use full names from the manual.

I want approximate the game play to original, maybe I could drop all spell names and use numbers instead. 
(But this also will be fixed my parallel project, MM1 and MM2 engine support in SCUMMVM.)

In monster names game switched to 18 character wide window and if I remember right no longer monster name in a game.
April 07, 2022, 06:54:19 AM - (Auto Merged - Double Posts are not allowed before 7 days.)

You mentioned ram, wram, and vram. What are you calling wram?? That's not something the dev scene uses; that's a snes term.. do you mean 8k system ram? Or do you mean CDRAM? Or do you mean BRAM (backup ram)?

If you're looking for guaranteed usable space then I recommend the end of the stack. Games aren't going to go that far down into to the stack. Though that's typically only needed for hucard hacking projects, if can be useful for CD games too (a local area for all hooks in different banks can access without remapping stuff in). Since this is a CD game you have CDRAM - you can take advantage of 'static' default values (and persistent values) AND self-modifying code. If you need address registers (i.e. zero page indirection), just push a few pair of zp values on the stack and use those temporarily. The tricky part is making sure whatever free space you found in CDRAM.. remains free. Sometimes CD games will switch things up as the game progresses. If you can compress the replacement text with a smaller foot print, you can use the free space there for code/variables.

Thanks is a good idea. I need 32byte for one generated tile, if stack don't go deeper than 67 is will be enough for sure.

MRP2-4 is used 'static' game logic functions and data, but now 8x12 Shift-JIS string duplications unnecessary because same as 8x8 ASCI, I hope I will have space to extra code, with longer spell names too.

Last question is VRAM, I thing this will be hit-and-miss process where I can put the extra tiles.

[LightAcolyte]

This is such amazing work and progress on the translation! Thank you!

1. Do you have an update on your game script so that I could go through for you and clean up the English/grammar or help with condensing things down to be said with less characters?  The Google Docs link to the scripts from 2015 no longer works.

2. I may be able to help with spell and item names too across the different MM versions: to clarify, you need them all to be 11 character strings including spaces/dashes/separators, right? I want to make sure that's 11 total characters and that you aren't meaning that it is really 13 such as with a number (1 to 8 ) and then a separator in front of each spell name. If you had those, you don't need a number in front for each spell level's spells (i.e.: like in the NES version there are no spell numbers). I will post right here in the forum for you a re-mapped list of names using the MM series for the spells/items to the best 11 character fits I can think if you want and can confirm that.

3. For the monster names: I'm trying to understand what is exactly the issue and what parameters you need. You need them shorter than 18 characters because they disappear when displayed if you use the full 18 characters, right? If so, how many characters can be safely displayed for monster names in all the menus/display locations so that you do not have disappearing text? I can work on shorter characters for all those if you can confirm.

[TiCo.KH]

I updated the link to quest text. 95% I used these translations what you found here. I made this with online translation services (Systran, DeepL, Jisho), and also my english is far from good, so I will be polite when I get the critics on that
https://drive.google.com/file/d/15KNyROaMpHyWJy0HBP6jZOcR4kx8k0V6/view?usp=sharing

Looks like I need to drop the 4x8 text plan. It's to much overhead, what is over my 8bit programming skill. I found these tiles kept is only in VRAM, it's is overwritten in a CD-Card RAM, so I should menage to load from CD every time when used, or need read back from VRAM with two VDC register. I think any of these makes this text display slow, plus sure I can't implement properly in HuC6280 assembly  .

But I learn lot about screen composition in this game (and on PCEngine), I found 3 window layout is used: main, interaction and battle.



So when is possible I try use two lines/entry logic. For that I need much simpler "space" to "break line" logic if I want to keep same strings for 8x8 and 8x12 names. Or revert to separate strings, like in original, but I'm saves a lot space in a main code area on same strings.
Small longest names statistic from original game (MS-DOS, AppleII):
Items: 14
Monsters: 15
Spells: 27 (from the manual)

And the redesign the game windows is an option too. Anyway this status window is ridiculous in the original.

[LightAcolyte]

OK, I have the files and have started working on the English for you to get a feel for where things are on these translations. There are five main problems right now with the text as-is: (1) way too many words or too long of words when fewer and/or shorter words would capture it to display in the same character space; (2) incorrect verb tenses; (3) incorrect subject-verb agreement; (4) missing prepositions; and, (5) awkward grammatical structure or capitalization.

To resolve these, I will: (1) re-translate manually anything too verbose or using an exceptionally long word; (2) correct verb tenses for the situation described using the game scripts for the Apple II and NES as references; (3) correct subject-verb agreement for the situation described using the game scripts as mentioned for (2); (4) add prepositions as needed with preference for generic, shorter prepositions to save space except where longer prepositions will clearly change meaning; and, (5) conform grammar and capitalization to expected English standards in each situation from the player perspective.

Following these conventions, I should be able to keep translations at the same character length or less you have now in most cases. Do you have a limit for the respective files as to how much text can fit so I know if there are cases in which I'll need to be more or less aggressive in shortening the number of characters to fit properly? For example, in the "interaction" screenshot you provided showing the man in a leather apron: it appears the character limit for this would be 120 characters with 30 characters per line. If all of the text boxes besides items/spells/monsters need to be 30 characters per line (...possibly in a 2 line set of 60 total characters with the second line always indented by a space if I'm understanding you correctly?) and 120 total characters per text box, I should easily be able to work with that.

Once you let me know this is acceptable for me to proceed, I can re-pack the same way and keep the separate files as given to return to you an updated ZIP package.

As for the names of both items and monsters, if you don't want to modify the UI at all: then, it looks like you've got 12 characters available for both item and monster names. However, looking at the "main" screenshots where "status" is displayed, it is clear that in some cases the original designers already left only a single-wide border in between instead of a double-wide border while always preserving borders all around the outside of the screen. Therefore, if you wanted to extend the UI for monsters and items one tile over to the left to eliminate the double border in the interface there, it would still have a one tile border between it and the main or combat interfaces and yet allow for one additional character space for a 13 character limit while still maintaining the existing designer aesthetics. This would be much easier to conform everything to what you seem to be wanting.

So for items, it looks like you've got 12 or 13 characters to work with and I believe using the Apple II and NES versions of this game and MM2-3 SNES versions of the games as references I can conform all item names to 12 or 13 characters by using the naming conventions of these games. Does that sound acceptable and can you confirm if you'd prefer 12 or 13? Once you've determined what's acceptable, do you have the list of items in the order they appear in the code for this version of the game for me to present back to you? As an aside, some item names already translated may just need some touch up, but are otherwise OK to fit in the 12 or 13 characters (for instance, in the screenshot of item names you have "DRAGONS TOOT" when in the same space "DRAGON TOOTH" would be the preferred description as it is already implied possessive and TOOT is something entirely different in English, while with 13 characters this would be a non-issue beyond there being no apostrophe in "DRAGONS" as "DRAGONS TOOTH" would be displayed).

One simplification for character space in item names that is a common theme in the game would be to make the "+" sign smaller and put it to the top right of the space of that character cell in the font tile character for that sign to eliminate the need for a full extra character space and then also a full space for just a "+" sign. Another simplification to fit everything in even less characters could be to use lower case letters after the first in the item names, and eliminate the extra character space. With both space-saving modifications, "SPLINT MAIL +3" would then become "SplintMail+3" with the lower and upper cases forming an inherent divide in the words and the "+" shifted to the top right and made smaller in the tile inherently inferring a space between the "l" in "Mail" and the "+3" after it. This would prevent having to use abbreviations like "SPLINT ML +3" in such a case or renaming it entirely. Assuming the lower case letters take up slightly less space in each tile than the upper case versions, this would include an inherent space inferred between the "t" and "M" in such a case as well without the need for a full character space.

As for monster names, since we have 12 or 13 characters to work with as well: I think I'd be able to do the same for those. Again, I'd need to know if the same methodology used for items above would be alright with the monster naming conventions for you? In addition, do you have the monster names in the order they appear in code for this version of the game for me to provide back to you in that same order?

For the spell names, I do not see a reference in your screenshots for how long those should be? Can you please clarify what you are dealing with right now in consideration of the spell name character limit you would like to use (i.e.: what the spell selection menus look like in and out of battle)?

In addition, getting back to the status display, it honestly does not look too bad to clean up. This looks pretty much like the mini-menus in the NES version with the same information. I'm not sure time spent re-doing the whole status menu would be worth it versus just fixing the spacing and changing some of the abbreviations.

[TiCo.KH]

To resolve these, I will: (1) re-translate manually anything too verbose or using an exceptionally long word; (2) correct verb tenses for the situation described using the game scripts for the Apple II and NES as references; (3) correct subject-verb agreement for the situation described using the game scripts as mentioned for (2); (4) add prepositions as needed with preference for generic, shorter prepositions to save space except where longer prepositions will clearly change meaning; and, (5) conform grammar and capitalization to expected English standards in each situation from the player perspective.

Following these conventions, I should be able to keep translations at the same character length or less you have now in most cases. Do you have a limit for the respective files as to how much text can fit so I know if there are cases in which I'll need to be more or less aggressive in shortening the number of characters to fit properly? For example, in the "interaction" screenshot you provided showing the man in a leather apron: it appears the character limit for this would be 120 characters with 30 characters per line. If all of the text boxes besides items/spells/monsters need to be 30 characters per line (...possibly in a 2 line set of 60 total characters with the second line always indented by a space if I'm understanding you correctly?) and 120 total characters per text box, I should easily be able to work with that.

Thanks for your help.

About using the Apple2 and NES as reference. I used this too, but game quest is modified, altered a bit in this version and when I found a difference I tired to keep the PCengine names. An example in original always used going up/down in stairs, but in this game is what is on a picture is a ladder so I needed to use that word. Just keep in mind, text difference is related some this change.
Anyway it's true when I found better newer online translation utilities (google->systran->deepl), same thing could be altered different english text by my mistake too.
But sometimes the original text is used many different form for some simple phrases as 'Thank you' (maybe text mimic dialects).

In a game is auto-breakline logic when reach the max character value in a window, and if is this character is 'space' that will be the first char in a next line. (good example on a screenshot.) In this case I need remove 'space' or put manual break line somewhere else. The break line is also count to max char limit so if this is a 30th character the result will be a empty next line.
The 8x8 char works same, every window have a max char/line value, if this is bigger then a window size, character overwrite the border. And one of my problem 8x8 use same auto breakline logic as 8x12 so if the last char is a breakline this also overwrite the border. I need redesign this because that is the reason why I can use 11 character text only, in a 12char wide window.
But in a 8x8 char window every line have fixed start position so leftover char from previous line will be overwritten. (That's why you can see DRAGONS TOOT on a screenshot.)
These line start position works like a ring buffer in a window, leftover char in a last line will be seen in a first line top of the window.
 
By limitation: text is mixed with code and every map is around 3k max space to own data, but every common data (names, item, common menu texts...)  is on separate space. This is also could be extended to next 2k border (next bank page), but in this case too text is mixed with code so needed massive re-pointering. If I start this project with the my Ghidra processor module the whole process would be much easier and faster. One year ago I noted every branches in a code on paper and rewrite one by one. Now I could do everything into Ghidra UI from the memory dump.  

[LightAcolyte]

Yeah, I believe not only graphical elements but also plot elements were changed in this version of the game. I do not intend to change any of these nouns. Instead: phrasing, prepositions, verb tenses and subject-verb agreement I can conform based on the script I have from the other games. For example, "All too suddenly" is a verbose way to say instead, "Abruptly" which would translate the intent and intensity of language by nuance without changing anything about what has been said or altering plot details. By contrast, I'm not going to be changing "ladder" to "stair" or "leader" to "king" as the nouns are conveying the bulk of intent on the plot of the game. I apologize if what I wrote to you was in any way misinterpreted as conforming plot rather than contextual agreement to what I have now in terms of the game script. If you have a source for translation of this game already I could use that as reference. Otherwise, I think we'd need to proceed in this way and review by play-testing the translation in the game that everything makes sense with the graphics and story.

Here's an example of how I'd re-translate something for the Inn at Algary to shorten it from the current translation:
Current Translation:
"If you don't sign into the
guestbook, can't stay here."
My Translation Based on Scripted Context of the Situation (i.e.: Innkeeper is shown and is speaking to you):
"You can't stay until you sign
in our guestbook."

I'm unclear still on how you'd like to proceed for the limit on item names, monster names, spell names and if you want to use two-line 59 character limit text boxes for 118 characters total with a space beginning the next line of each two-line pair or not. I understand if you have not yet had time to fully respond to all that yet, but what I'm gathering is you may not have decided yet what limit you want to commit to at this point?

If so, here's something that may help in that case as an example: I've reviewed some of what would be required to conform item names just using a 12 character limit as an example. If you can allow an additional character in the UI by extending the background of the items and monsters UI panel one to the left (as occurs with the "main" screen when the "status" display is brought up with its similar precedent of only a one border separator), then for 12 characters here is an example of what weapon names might look like that must be changed (weapon names that can be left alone with 12 characters and maintain what I see as acceptable uniformity for that item type are not listed) with my reasoning for translating to the shorter version listed on the right in brackets (usually this series of games keeps the same items as recurring elements by and large which makes this easy to conform to successor game terms):

SHORT SWORD    > SHORTSWORD
BOARD SWORD    > BROADSWORD
SHORT SWORD +1 > SHORTSWORD+1
BROAD SWORD +1 > BROADSWORD+1
BATTLE AXE +1  > BATTLE AXE+1
LONG SWORD +1  > LONG SWORD+1
CLUB OF NOISE  > SONIC CLUB   [MM3 ITEM]
SHORT SWORD +2 > SHORTSWORD+2
BROAD SWORD +2 > BROADSWORD+2
BATTLE AXE +2  > BATTLE AXE+2
LONG SWORD +2  > LONG SWORD+2
DAGGER OF MIND > SAGE DAGGER  [MM2 & MM3 ITEM]
DIAMOND DAGGER > DIAMOND DIRK [SYNONYM]
ELECTRIC SPEAR > DYNA SPEAR   [MM2 PREFIX & MM3 ITEM]
FLAIL OF FEAR  > TERROR FLAIL [MM3 PREFIX]
LUCKY SCIMITAR > LUCKY SABRE  [MM3 ITEM]
MACE OF UNDEAD > UNDEAD MACE  [REMOVE PREPOSITION]
ELECTRIC SWORD > DYNA SWORD   [MM2 PREFIX & MM3 ITEM]
FLAMING SWORD  > FIERY SWORD  [MM2 PREFIX & MM3 ITEM]
SWORD OF MIGHT > MIGHTY SWORD [MM2 PREFIX]
SWORD OF SPEED > SPEEDY SWORD [MM2 ITEM]
ACCURATE SWORD > ACCURATE SWD [MM2 ABBREVIATION]
SWORD OF MAGIC > MAGIC SWORD  [MM2 ITEM]
IMMORTAL SWORD > IMMORTAL SWD [MM2 ABBREVIATION]
AXE PROTECTOR  > AX PROTECTOR [AX VARIANT SPELLING OF AXE]
AXE DESTROYER  > AX DESTROYER [AX VARIANT SPELLING OF AXE]
X!XX!X'S SWORD > X!XX!X'S SWD [MM2 ABBREVIATION]
ADAMANTINE AXE > ADAMANT AXE  [SYNONYM]
ULTIMATE SWORD > ULTIMATE SWD [MM2 ABBREVIATION]
ELEMENT SWORD  > ELEMENT SWD  [MM2 ABBREVIATION]
CROSSBOW LUCK  > LUCKY X-BOW  [MM1 ABBREVIATION & MM3 ITEM]
CROSSBOW SPEED > SPEEDY X-BOW [MM1 ABBREVIATION & MM2 PREFIX]
LIGHTNING BOW  > DYNA BOW     [MM2 PREFIX & MM3 ITEM]
THE MAGIC BOW  > MAGIC BOW    [REMOVE PREPOSITION]
ROBBER'S X-BOW > ROBBER X-BOW [POSSESSIVE IMPLICIT]
ARCHER'S X-BOW > ARCHER X-BOW [POSSESSIVE IMPLICIT]
GREAT HAMMER   > WAR HAMMER   [CORRECTED ENGLISH AS "GREAT HAMMER" IS NOT ACTUALLY AN ENGLISH WORD; ALSO "WAR HAMMER" IS BOTH AN ENGLISH WORD AND A MM2 ITEM]
GREAT HAMMER+1 > WAR HAMMER+1 [AS ABOVE]
GREAT HAMMER+2 > WAR HAMMER+2 [AS ABOVE]
STAFF OF LIGHT > LIGHT STAFF  [REMOVE PREPOSITION]
MINOTAUR'S AXE > MINOTAUR AXE [POSSESSIVE IMPLICIT]
THUNDER HAMMER > DYNA HAMMER  [MM2 PREFIX & MM3 ITEM]
SORCERER STAFF > WIZARD STAFF [MM2 ITEM]
STAFF OF MAGIC > MAGIC STAFF  [REMOVE PREPOSITION]
DEMON'S GLAIVE > DEMON GLAIVE [POSSESSIVE IMPLICIT]
DEVIL'S GLAIVE > DEVIL GLAIVE [POSSESSIVE IMPLICIT]
THE FLAMBERGE  > THE FLOBERGE [FLOBERGE VARIANT SPELLING OF FLAMBERGE]
HOLY FLAMBERGE > SKY FLOBERGE [AS ABOVE PLUS "SKY" IS SYNONYM FOR HEAVEN AS RELATED TO HOLY]
EVIL FLAMBERGE > PIT FLOBERGE [AS ABOVE PLUS "PIT" IS SYNONYM FOR HELL AS RELATED TO EVIL]

So, 12 characters makes all of the weapons work descriptively fairly well in my opinion. This should give you an idea if you see my line of reasoning as to how to shorten names to fit. I could take it down to 11, but not without substantively swapping synonyms (as it is, I only needed to use a synonym without precedent in three cases). One could argue whether or not all instances of "AXE" should be made "AX" or "FLAMBERGE" into "FLOBERGE" for uniformity, but I don't really feel that's necessary as either way is a recognized English spelling of the word, so it's up to you. This is still your project after all. (smile)

[TiCo.KH]

Thanks for proofreading. It true my english knowledge is far away from what is look like naturally. I used few spellcheck tools in end of the project but this not enough.

I can send you a in-progress package to test text in-game. All quest map is translated just the 8x8 menus and text is needed to fix, but the game is playable.

Now I keep the original item and monster names, and see what I can reach with redesigned windows. By the way, I found all of game arts is missing two columns in game, because of borders. Now I try redesign to make it visible. One columns is will be easy, but for to both I should remove window borders completely or add 8 pixel to whole game screen width. I don't think it's possible, as I know just a 256p or 512p is supported.