Startling Odyssey 2 translation patch released!

[spenoza]

I don't know if rpgs weren't as popular in america or game companies just thought they weren't as popular, marketable, etc. I grew up playing rpgs and all of my friends who played video games did too.

By raw sales they were not as popular.

[nat]

I can only speak for myself, but I didn't play RPGs at all back in the day. As a matter of fact, I didn't start playing RPGs until the 2000s.

The closest I got to RPGs in the early 90s was Dungeon Explorer.

[SignOfZeta]

Its probably pretty close to the same. RPGs were the most popular genre in the early 90s (with fighting and, of course, sports) and the PCE did just as good of a job as the SFC (although in a completely different style).

according to some people here, RPGs weren't very popular at all.

Since we are talking about PCE I didn't specify, but yeah, I meant in Japan. RPGs were dominant in Japan, so much so that they would put "RPG elements" in games like World Court Tennis and Final Lap.

In the early 90s people really did NOT want to do in-game reading in the US. That has changed a lot, obviously. There is now 10x as much text during the unskipable tutorial in your average bullshit FPS than there is in the entirety of Dragon Warrior 1.

My friends and I either bought or rented literally every single RPG released in the US for TG-16, SNES, and Genesis. It...wasn't a lot. This is why I got into playing import RPGs. Americans only got one every three months during the 16-bit era, and if it was crap like 7th Saga or Secret of Evermore you just had to either learn to like crap or wait for the next one. I'd rather play Starling Odyssey 2 in Japanese than 7th Saga in English, which is exactly what I did. When I got stuck once I literally called Rayforce (number on the back of the box) and they helped me. This was back before internet FAQs. There were "help lines" back then for US releases, but they were usually 900 numbers ($1+ per minute). The US game industry really sucked dick back then, come to think of it.

[shubibiman]

Its probably pretty close to the same. RPGs were the most popular genre in the early 90s (with fighting and, of course, sports) and the PCE did just as good of a job as the SFC (although in a completely different style).

according to some people here, RPGs weren't very popular at all.

We're talking of japanese market here. Tengai Makyou II is the best sold game for the PCE.

[incrediblehark]

well if there was more marketing behind rpgs in america like they had for street fighter, mortal kombat, nba jam, or FMV games (ugh) then maybe sales would have gone up.

[SignOfZeta]

I doubt it.

[Black Tiger]

Just read this thread and all I have to say is wow! I'm glad we are getting a few more rpgs translated, but its still a small list compared to how many super famicom games that have been translated by fan groups. It would be kind of interesting to see how many rpgs are on the super famicom vs the pce engine cd.

I've gone through lists in the past and there are slightly more of both RPG and RPG-ish games for PCE than SFC. Many PCE RPGs aren't on CD though.

[turbofan1]

America blows.

If we didn't, you would have been released in the US!

Not even sure what that comment is supposed to mean?.I`ll just leave it at that.Does anybody no what happened to the Cosmic Fantasy 1 translation that Dave Shadoff was doing?.He posted A progress video on youtube A few years ago,but it hasn't been updated since.

[BigusSchmuck]

America blows.

If we didn't, you would have been released in the US!

Not even sure what that comment is supposed to mean?.I`ll just leave it at that.Does anybody no what happened to the Cosmic Fantasy 1 translation that Dave Shadoff was doing?.He posted A progress video on youtube A few years ago,but it hasn't been updated since.

Sounds a lot like other projects I know of... I call it the davanci syndrome. Start a bunch of projects all at once and get next to little done. Happens all the time in the scene.

[Necromancer]

Sounds a lot like other projects I know of... I call it the davanci syndrome. Start a bunch of projects all at once and get next to little done. Happens all the time in the scene.

Since Shadoff's completed a half dozen translations thus far, I'd say he's done infinitely more in this scene than most.

[BigusSchmuck]

Sounds a lot like other projects I know of... I call it the davanci syndrome. Start a bunch of projects all at once and get next to little done. Happens all the time in the scene.

Since Shadoff's completed a half dozen translations thus far, I'd say he's done infinitely more in this scene than most.

Indeed he has. Again, I'm thankful for what we got, but if we had half the amount of fan translations that rom hackers have done for the super famicom over the years we would be seeing a heck of a lot more rpgs being translated for the pce. I would wager some of them can even be directly lifted from official translations from other systems as well (Snatcher, Popful Mail comes into mind), but in reality time will tell. In the meantime, I'll use gamefaqs for now at least... Anyway, Starling Odyssey 2= hours of fun.

[HercTNT]

I understand what he's getting at. If we could get just a fraction of that talent to go towards a few pc-engine games it would be unreal. Maybe a few platformers, action rpg's, one or two really involved rpg's. 

[Arkhan]

America blows.

If we didn't, you would have been released in the US!

Not even sure what that comment is supposed to mean?.I`ll just leave it at that.Does anybody no what happened to the Cosmic Fantasy 1 translation that Dave Shadoff was doing?.He posted A progress video on youtube A few years ago,but it hasn't been updated since.

It was directed at Necromancer! 

Since, if USA didn't suck, Necromancer for PCE would have been released on the TG-16....   Necromancer is an amazing game.  One of the better HuCards in general to me.  The music is creepy.

I think most of the serious RPG players back in that era were sitting on Commodore 64s.  Alot of CRPG players back then said they tried NES and were like "what is the point, Legacy of the Ancients is better.  This game is too linear!", and went back to the c64.  There were some that dug into Dragon Quest, and revisited Wizardry, but the C64 and DOS offered far more in the RPG department. 

Though, so many comments in old video game magazines have people ranting and raving about how great they thought RPGs were.  They loved the adventure of the games like Dragon Quest, Ultima Exodus, Scherehazade, etc.

So, it sucks we didn't get more.  We should've.  but like Zeta said, the majority in the US didn't want to read.   They still don't want to read.  They want to click and flail and watch kabooms and shinies.



and, for the record, 7th Saga is legit.  It's a weird friggin game, but it's legit.  same with Brainlord. 

I'd love to see more translations for the pce, but most things for the PCE never get completed.

It goes:

Announcement--->Demo of some of it---->dwindling effort------>the end.

[nat]

The "dwindling effort" phase is always the best. Nothing actually happens during this phase except regularly scheduled public service announcements over the course of a year or two that "work is proceeding, albeit at a slowed pace" but everyone should "rest assured, the project WILL be completed!" Everybody knows deep down this phase is just the precursor to "the end," but this phase still manages to drum up cries of encouragement from the community.

A good percentage of folks seem genuinely dismayed when it's finally announced that "after months of inactivity, this patch is being released as-is," which ultimately really baffles me since it's the same thing every single time.

If you look at all the released patches for Duo games, how many can claim 100% completion? Two? Maybe three? The rest sit at "90%" or in some cases, even less, since that last paragraph of text just proved too befuddling for the translators or that last menu was just too difficult for the hackers to re-insert.

Unfortunately, although not at all surprisingly, this is the phase the current Legend of Xanadu II translation effort is currently dwelling in. In a few more months, maybe a year, it'll get released as-is.... At 90% (or less) completion.

[Arkhan]

dwindling effort is why I stopped caring about translations.  I just fumble through them myself with a book in my lap.  I mean its an RPG.  Reading is part of the game either way.  Who knows if I read shit right.  I get by decent enough.