Blood Gear?

[shawnji]

I've been playing through this recently and it's kind of a surprise that it hasn't been brought up more often.  Has anyone ever looked at working on hacking and translating it?

[cjameslv]

I've been playing through this recently and it's kind of a surprise that it hasn't been brought up more often.  Has anyone ever looked at working on hacking and translating it?

This game is talked about and fairly easy to play without needing to read moon runes. There seems to be alot more translation action revolving around rpg's currently.

[SignOfZeta]

Yeah, aside from a few stumbling points I think this game is pretty easy in Japanese.

I agree though, it's f*cking weird how rarely this game is brought up around here. It's a AAA game all the way.

[Keith Courage]

I played through this game without knowing any Japanese and it was fun. However, I'm sure it would have been 10 times better if it were in english. One can only imagine how awesome this game would have been if I new what was going on.

[toymachine78]

This is an excellent game. I started a thread last year singing its praises.

[BigusSchmuck]

I'm beginning to wish I didn't trade it off... It really does deserve a translation for crying out loud!

[jtucci31]

This is an excellent game. I started a thread last year singing its praises.

Your thread is what made me buy it! I haven't had time to play it yet though. I don't want to play random half hour installments when i get free time. I've been looking forward to playing it for awhile.

[SamIAm]

I started playing this today. Right away, I think the biggest problem is going to be that so many major story events happen in cutscenes that don't have text subtitling in them. If the whole game is like the beginning, this really makes things difficult.

By the way, what the hell is with it refusing to load unless you have enough space for two saves? And the saves are huge!

The gameplay is pretty fun, especially once you upgrade the mech a bit. It ain't easy, but that's probably a good thing.

[SignOfZeta]

I played through this game without knowing any Japanese and it was fun. However, I'm sure it would have been 10 times better if it were in english. One can only imagine how awesome this game would have been if I new what was going on.

See, that's an all too common misconception, IMO. You only *think* the plot is amazing because you can't read it. If you could read it you'd probably find that the storyline and voice acting are as lame as every other video game out there. You can probably make some shit up as you go along that's better than the real thing.

IMO what makes 8/16-bit RPGs more fun than the new stuff is how there is a lot of room for player interpretation. When someone says "Die!" in Dragon Quest III it's pretty much up to you to invent what those voices sound like, the exact actions they take when they stab the guy with their sword, etc. With a modern FF RPG virtually nothing is left to the imagination, they do everything for you, and they don't do it as well as I can in my head.

For years I always wanted games from my favorite strategy series, Super Robot Wars, in English. I can read Japanese well enough to clear the game but I miss a lot of the story. Then, when translations started coming out, like for the two GBA OG games or the fan translation of J, I realized upon playing them that...I'd rather not be burdened reading hundreds of pages or pure crap.

[SamIAm]

See, that's an all too common misconception, IMO. You only *think* the plot is amazing because you can't read it. If you could read it you'd probably find that the storyline and voice acting are as lame as every other video game out there. You can probably make some shit up as you go along that's better than the real thing.

Spot on. A woman in a skirt can look sexier than she does in pants because there are a lot of details that you actually can't see. Your imagination fills in the blanks in with maximum optimism.

On that note, you know what else I think people have misconceptions about in Japanese games? Voice acting quality. Every non-Japanese person seems to think every single goddamn game is a voice performance masterpiece. Most couldn't name one Japanese game that has bad voice acting. And of course they couldn't - they can't judge it at all. Do you think someone who has never had a conversation in English in his entire life could tell that US Dragon Slayer has bad voice acting?

For years I always wanted games from my favorite strategy series, Super Robot Wars, in English. I can read Japanese well enough to clear the game but I miss a lot of the story. Then, when translations started coming out, like for the two GBA OG games or the fan translation of J, I realized upon playing them that...I'd rather not be burdened reading hundreds of pages or pure crap.

Yep. I played Witch and the Hundred Knight in Japanese before it came out in English. Some people on English forums kept saying how amazing the story was. I on the other hand have never seen a game that needed its word count halved more in my life. Funny, people mostly stopped talking about the "amazing story" after it came out in English.

I don't think Americans are perfect or that all scripts should follow one pattern or anything like that, but one thing I have noticed is that Japanese people aren't hard enough on themselves about length, and there's a greater tendency for their stuff to have too many words.

I really like this scene from A River Runs Through It. Who was it who said "I didn't have time to write a short letter, so I wrote a long one."? That was a great thing about old games - the size limits pretty much prevented this from happening.

I'm doing various translation projects for PCE games now, and I think they'll all be better for being in English in a sense. However, while I won't say which, there is at least one that I have to admit doesn't have a great story or writing.

[cjameslv]

...On that note, you know what else I think people have misconceptions about in Japanese games? Voice acting quality. Every non-Japanese person seems to think every single goddamn game is a voice performance masterpiece. Most couldn't name one Japanese game that has bad voice acting. And of course they couldn't - they can't judge it at all. Do you think someone who has never had a conversation in English in his entire life could tell that US Dragon Slayer has bad voice acting?...

Truth

[BigusSchmuck]

...On that note, you know what else I think people have misconceptions about in Japanese games? Voice acting quality. Every non-Japanese person seems to think every single goddamn game is a voice performance masterpiece. Most couldn't name one Japanese game that has bad voice acting. And of course they couldn't - they can't judge it at all. Do you think someone who has never had a conversation in English in his entire life could tell that US Dragon Slayer has bad voice acting?...

Truth

I dunno, the voice acting in the Japanese version of the original Metal Gear Solid was pretty horrid me thinks. Roy Campbell anyone? Yick.

[technozombie]

See, that's an all too common misconception, IMO. You only *think* the plot is amazing because you can't read it. If you could read it you'd probably find that the storyline and voice acting are as lame as every other video game out there. You can probably make some shit up as you go along that's better than the real thing.

It's kind of like reading a book, then they go and make a movie and the casting is complete shit, with characters nothing like you imagined them to be. It's better when you make it up yourself.

[shubibiman]

See, that's an all too common misconception, IMO. You only *think* the plot is amazing because you can't read it. If you could read it you'd probably find that the storyline and voice acting are as lame as every other video game out there. You can probably make some shit up as you go along that's better than the real thing.

IMO what makes 8/16-bit RPGs more fun than the new stuff is how there is a lot of room for player interpretation. When someone says "Die!" in Dragon Quest III it's pretty much up to you to invent what those voices sound like, the exact actions they take when they stab the guy with their sword, etc. With a modern FF RPG virtually nothing is left to the imagination, they do everything for you, and they don't do it as well as I can in my head.

For years I always wanted games from my favorite strategy series, Super Robot Wars, in English. I can read Japanese well enough to clear the game but I miss a lot of the story. Then, when translations started coming out, like for the two GBA OG games or the fan translation of J, I realized upon playing them that...I'd rather not be burdened reading hundreds of pages or pure crap.

It's not a misconception : in Japan, 95% of the seiyus have always been professionel voice actors. When I listen to most of the voice acting of Turbo CD games, it really sounds like the voice of amateurs.

Nowadays, things have changed and you just have to compare english voice acting now and english voice acting 25 years ago. Now, the voice acting is made by professionnals.

[Necromancer]

It's not a misconception : in Japan, 95% of the seiyus have always been professionel voice actors. When I listen to most of the voice acting of Turbo CD games, it really sounds like the voice of amateurs.

Even if the voice acting were top notch by the most talented people in the world, it wouldn't fix a crappy script or a trite story line, and that's applicable to both PCE games and stuff out today.

Nowadays, things have changed and you just have to compare english voice acting now and english voice acting 25 years ago. Now, the voice acting is made by professionnals.

They might be voice by professionals by definition (they get paid for their work), but that doesn't mean they're all that talented.  Many games I've played have people speaking haltingly, in annoying pitches to sound ominous or like a kid, or with horribly fake accents.