[FragmentalStew]

I made a look up table for Loretta No Shouzou: Sherlock Holmes.  I checked every byte from 00-FF, so I think it's complete. 00 is space.  FF and FE are both carriage return, but I'm not sure what the difference is between them.  I found A,B,C,D and S,L,E but no other Latin characters.  There are a few other english words in the game like start, and holmes, but I think those must be unique, and not part of the game's text parser.
79 is wait for input
7A is an arrow used in conjunction with wait for input

I'm not sure how these are used:
8B looks kind of like a colon and might be part of 8C
8C is sort of a weird shape like half a 3
88-8A and 8D and 8E look like they're part of a box or a border
93 and 94 are the diacritical marks but with a sort of line above them.

The parser uses 3E and 3F to modify the previous character with a diacritical mark.  This means that every time you see a mark, that actually gives you an extra byte to use.

I'm new to this, so I might not be using the right terms.  Hopefully what I've said is clear, but feel free to ask me to clarify.

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1nztZ_Twj_QJWf7DKU4CV1ar_wD7mD52t

I might come back and use machine translation to translate and insert the translations into the rom, but I'm putting it on hold for now, so I'm posting what I have so far to ensure that that the table I made doesn't end up going to waste.

I think this game is technically sg-1000 but ends up being classified as Sega Master System(Mark III) in some lists.

I wasn't sure which forum to post this in.

[goldenband]

As one of the only SG-1000 translators on this site (or anywhere), let me say: YES!

This game has been in limbo for quite some time, and it'd be great to see it cross over. There are so few SG-1000 and Master System games left to translate, so either way you'll be making a huge dent in the untranslated library of a console.

Have you checked over at SMS Power? They may have additional technical info buried somewhere on the boards, if you need any, or perhaps someone has taken a stab at translating it in the past (I seem to recall that they had, but I don't remember what progress was made).

[cccmar]

I'd go to SMS Power, you will surely be able to find help there if you need a prod in the right direction. Also, one comment - I wouldn't machine-translate this game, the script won't make any sense at all. Even with kanji machine translation is usually not accurate enough, and I assume (this being an SG-1000 game) this game has no kanji. Better ask around for a translator, you can even do it in the Help Wanted section here. It's probably not a huge script in terms of size, so a skilled translator could deal with it fairly quickly.

[FragmentalStew]

As one of the only SG-1000 translators on this site (or anywhere), let me say: YES!

This game has been in limbo for quite some time, and it'd be great to see it cross over. There are so few SG-1000 and Master System games left to translate, so either way you'll be making a huge dent in the untranslated library of a console.

Have you checked over at SMS Power? They may have additional technical info buried somewhere on the boards, if you need any, or perhaps someone has taken a stab at translating it in the past (I seem to recall that they had, but I don't remember what progress was made).

This thread? https://www.smspower.org/forums/14012-EditingGraphicsOnSG1000Games?highlight=sherlock  I saw it before, but I thought I saw it here.  They made a new title, but that seems to be about it.

I'd go to SMS Power, you will surely be able to find help there if you need a prod in the right direction. Also, one comment - I wouldn't machine-translate this game, the script won't make any sense at all. Even with kanji machine translation is usually not accurate enough, and I assume (this being an SG-1000 game) this game has no kanji. Better ask around for a translator, you can even do it in the Help Wanted section here. It's probably not a huge script in terms of size, so a skilled translator could deal with it fairly quickly.

The script is probably a lot bigger than you would guess.  It's the the "largest SG-1000 game ever, with a ROM size of 128kB or 1-Megabit".  I'd guess that most of that is text.  When I started the table I was under the false impression the script was smaller, and that all of it had been translated in the walkthrough, but the walkthrough only contains a small portion of the text. 

I had also never actually played through the game.  After playing through it with help of the walkthrough, and also some ai translation, I both like the game more and less.  I love the art and the atmosphere, but there's some particular areas that seem like they would be impossible without some sort of assistance.  In particular, there's a part where you have to pixel hunt for an object that you don't know you're supposed to be looking for.  I mean, can you see a shoe in this picture?


It's very possible there there are hints within the game that I could find if I could read the text, but even if there are game design flaws, I still think the game is worthy of being translated for its other merits.

I'm mainly putting it on hold, because the script is a lot bigger than I thought it was, and there's a lot less translated than I thought there was.  My method of machine translations involves using multiple translators to make sense of the text and then rewriting it according to what I think it means.  It's a slow and tedious process, but it's better than simply copying a machine translation.  It's still not as good as a manual translation by someone who really knows both languages.  Because of the fixed length, most things will need to be rewritten, and abbreviations will probably need to be used regardless.

Posting in SMSPower,and the help wanted section here, seem like good ideas.

[MochiHime]

Hello! I'm very interested in translating this title (I've already started work on an English script with the intention to release subtitled youtube videos) although I lack the technical know-how to make a patch (and I'm slightly worried about legal troubles). If anyone could possibly advise me I'd really appreciate it!

[BZXGCS]

interesting.

[FragmentalStew]

Hello! I'm very interested in translating this title (I've already started work on an English script with the intention to release subtitled youtube videos) although I lack the technical know-how to make a patch (and I'm slightly worried about legal troubles). If anyone could possibly advise me I'd really appreciate it!

Did you get my e-mail?  I sent it from a different address, because the one you sent to is just a forwarding address.

[tashi]

Looks really cool, Sega makes me feel very nostalgic. Did you dump the script? I just used WindHex and your table, with a few modifications. I added a couple of control codes, though I have no idea if they're accurate:

Code: [Select]

79=<wait>
7a=<wait2>
FF=<end>
FE=<nl>
The largest chunk of text seemed to be at $1c000 and it only has ~380 strings. Partial script dump
There were several menu-related strings earlier in the ROM, plus at least one smaller chunk that looked like dialogue.

Good luck with this effort!