Decided to throw my hat in the game translation ring and give a crack at translating Rune Jade. Managed to make some good progress in a week or so. Here's a video preview.
Update:
pcwzrd13 wrote:Well I think I've accomplished most of what I wanted to with this translation. The majority of the items, menus, mission titles, spells, spell descriptions, and shopkeeper dialog are translated. I say majority as there's always a possibility I missed some as I haven't played through the entire game yet. As far as character dialog is concerned, only a small percentage has been translated and mostly for the Knight class. The dialog for the first (four?) missions is done. I also translated the first mission dialog for the Mage class as well.
One thing to note is that I reverted the ranks or "A.K.A.'s" as the game calls them back to Japanese. Translating them just wasn't feasible as in English, they're way too long to fit in the small box the game has them in. Four Japanese characters would end up translating to entire sentences in English. lol Even just Japanese words in English text were way too long. In addition, the rank isn't just based on your character's class and level. It takes into account your actions in the game and your equipment to determine the rank, which means there are hundreds and hundreds of possible ranks across all the classes. One could possibly make up new, shorter ranks but that would be a huge undertaking on its own.
This is a far more ambitious project than I initially expected. There are 120 missions in the game and each new mission means new dialog for everyone in the town. In addition, each of the four classes has their own unique dialog so times that by 4. So yeah, I won't be doing that. As I said before, this was really just a fun project for me, just to learn and see if I could do it. I'm happy with what I accomplished here even though it's not a 100% complete translation. As is though, it's infinitely more playable now than it was before. The untranslated dialog is easy to get past. Basically just talk to all four people in the town and then go to the reception desk to start the mission. Rinse and repeat 120 times.
So yeah, I'm basically finished with it but I'll try and fix any issues that anyone might encounter. You're definitely going to still see some Japanese sprinkled around here and there but nothing really that important. Anyway, download link is below. Enjoy!
Note: The translation is currently only available as a GDI as I have no idea how to make CDI. If anyone wants to volunteer to make a CDI, feel free.
Re: Rune Jade Translation W.I.P.
Posted: Wed Mar 17, 2021 2:40 pm
by Ian Micheal
I have been wanting this since it first came out hehe thank you for your work on this
Re: Rune Jade Translation W.I.P.
Posted: Wed Mar 17, 2021 2:48 pm
by The-Amazing-Mr_V
This looks awesome!
Re: Rune Jade Translation W.I.P.
Posted: Wed Mar 17, 2021 2:50 pm
by Rolly
Is this the official start of the project or just test-translated pieces of the game? Maybe you looking for help? I'll add it to the list of projects on DC-Talk, and it's worth spreading the news.
Most of the text is packed in the RUNE.EXE file, you can use English characters, but unfortunately it plays a limited number of characters that can be mixed up in the dialog using the standard font.
All interested users will find the script in the topic: https://www.dreamcast-talk.com/forum/vi ... 74#p144074
Re: Rune Jade Translation W.I.P.
Posted: Wed Mar 17, 2021 3:03 pm
by pcwzrd13
Rolly wrote:Is this the official start of the project or just test-translated pieces of the game? Maybe you looking for help?
Official start. No guarantees I'll be able to translate the entire thing but I'll do everything I can. As you said, it's hard to work with the limited space and the font the game uses so dialog will likely be tricky. At the very least all the menus are just about done and I'm confident I can do all the items and descriptions.
Rolly wrote:Maybe you looking for help?
Not at the moment. If I hit a brick wall at some point I may look for help but I'm doing well solo so far.
Re: Rune Jade Translation W.I.P.
Posted: Wed Mar 17, 2021 6:02 pm
by dubcity
very cool pcwzrd13. I'm loving the push to translate more games everyone is on. keep it up.
Re: Rune Jade Translation W.I.P.
Posted: Thu Mar 18, 2021 12:03 pm
by Nico0020
Very awesome. I love all the translation projects that have been popping up. I know nothing of programming, but if you run into anything incomprehensible in Japanese I'd gladly offer some assistance. Good luck on this!
Re: Rune Jade Translation W.I.P.
Posted: Fri Mar 19, 2021 12:46 am
by Ragfish
Looks great. Even if you can't get the whole thing translated, just having the menus, stats screens, and item names would make it infinitely more playable.
Re: Rune Jade Translation W.I.P.
Posted: Fri Mar 19, 2021 12:13 pm
by pcwzrd13
Worked on some of the starting dialog over the last couple days just to see how it would work out. It's not as much of a problem as I thought it might be. They're pretty generous with space in the dialog boxes so I could pretty easily fit what I needed in them. It's a bit wonky with the text wrapping and weird font but works nonetheless.
Re: Rune Jade Translation W.I.P.
Posted: Fri Mar 19, 2021 1:30 pm
by ateam
Assuming you're using a hexeditor for these initial tests, you can probably use hex value "0A" to do a newline or carriage return, or perhaps "0D 0A 09", or just "0D 0A". You'll have to experiment.
I'm also curious why it's changing the color of the first character. If you post some samples, I may be able to provide some insight.
As I said before, this was really just a fun project for me, just to learn and see if I could do it. I'm happy with what I accomplished here even though it's not a 100% complete translation. As is though, it's infinitely more playable now than it was before. The untranslated dialog is easy to get past. Basically just talk to all four people in the town and then go to the reception desk to start the mission. Rinse and repeat 120 times.
