First things first, never figured that this game would get a proper retranslation for a while since the original one, while relatively poor quality nowadays, did the job for most people who might try this title. I’m happy to say that compared to the earlier version I had tried this one did a much better job in communicating the particular mechanics of the game without having a translated manual or a guide to go by. For the most part all the translated text makes sense with the moves they are associated with (and any sort of miscommunication is probably chalked up more to the game mechanics being rather vague rather than on part of the hacking team). The English-translated original graphics for the Vs screens are also appreciated and blend in appropriately well with the rest of the game.

That all being said, there are some quibbles. The most important is the move list for the Left + A moves seems to be bugged: all three pages show the move as Claw attack despite these three moves being different: 0xB Left + A on Page 1 is a move that simply makes Gamera move backward to a further position, while 1xB Left + A on Page 2 is a move that makes Gamera fly back in a similar fashion and function. Only 2xB Left + A on Page 3 is accurately labeled as being the Claw attack. Interestingly this seems to carry into Battle Mode with other monsters so I wonder if this is the work of a glitch rather than simply translation.

The other quibbles I have are relatively minor: in the West the monster Giron is usually translated as “Guiron” rather than “Guilon”. Of course, this appellation is also unsurprising due to Guilon sounding fairly natural (and has been used in some translations) and the lack of of distinction between “l” and “r” so it can be said to be more due to a personal preference and consistency than anything. There also seems to be some odd glitches with palettes/text in Battle Mode, such as Viras’s move-list on the third page ending with garbled graphics rather than its Right + A attack graphic (which was seemingly followed by a crash on SameBoy trying to use the move, though I cannot say they were related with a lack of information). Also unsure about the the win text of “It Wins/Loses” rather than “Gamera Wins/Loses” unless the win/lose text is shared between all monsters, to which I can understand translating it this way.

Criticisms aside I’m happy with all the things I’ve seen so far in this version of the translation. I hope that at least an update that fixes some of these minor details could come in the future if time or resources allotted for this relatively obscure and odd game. I’m not a programmer by trade and more talented in the artistic sense, but I’m honestly curious about what this game must look like under the hood with its odd game mechanics and the like; translating for all of the possible events/actions that can happen in this game probably took some effort on the teams part, and I’ll heartily recommend this to people who may want to give this game a whirl even with some of the minor issues and the unusual nature of the game itself.