What happens in a night... (September 4th, 2007)

[Cless]

Oh my. It's finally over. The main menu is also now 100% hacked. All together, man that whole thing was a LOT of work. I slaved all last night tying up all the loose ends I'm aware of, and Habilain fixed the rest of the things beyond my ability as well.

The fruits of our labors: perhaps the last screens for awhile...?


The Cless in Stuffed Cless is tied to the name variable btw. It may spill into the next item name if you do something stupid like give him a full name of numbers. I don't consider it a bug. Spacing things out to compensate dumb things like that is already annoying.


Statue of Friendship-- the longest item name in the menu, now fits in the Collector's Book!

Although it wasn't necessary there, the column widening done here was also applied to the Valuables menu shown above. The code they use is basically identical, so I applied it for consistency.









And the final two, my favorite. Yes, you're really seeing that. We've added another option to the menu. You will now be able to reload a saved game without resetting!

And technically, the menu items are now being rendered with the actual 8x8 font variable width font, not 12x12 squish tiles or graphically-stored text. Centering effect also added.

Naming was covered in the previous thread, but the awesome had to be posted again.

Habilain is working on the skits now, and so far it's coming along very well.

[Demon000]

Every update puts a smile on my face 
The Load Option is really amazing.

[Cheetah]

This is such amazing progress. At the rate you are going you will be done with the skits in no time. And frankly a lot of the stuff you are doing looks better than many official translations. Are there anyother new options you are thinking about adding? The load one is a great idea.

[Saikyo]

Wonderfull job Cless.Keep the good job, even if is going to take two or more years lol, because a good done translation is better remembered than a rushed work...

See Ya!

[LenaAndreia]

 Wooooooooow~ Man, this is so great! Awesome job, guys!

[Cless]

This is such amazing progress. At the rate you are going you will be done with the skits in no time. And frankly a lot of the stuff you are doing looks better than many official translations. Are there anyother new options you are thinking about adding? The load one is a great idea.

Well, Habilain is making great progress on figuring out the skit routines, though there's nothing to show visually yet as there's still a little more left to figure out before being able to hook a text routine to it.

As for other options, I don't know. There isn't really anything else suitable for the main menu. The Load hack is mainly just allowing the cursor access the spot directly after save (i.e. it's always been there, but the game caps the cursor position on Save), adding data to recognize text for it, and changing the vertical spacing between the text of the options so it all fits in the window. A couple of small hacks are also needed to make it work seamlessly.

I would still very much *love* to implement multiplayer and manual control without requiring the wasting of accessory slots. But that may be altering the game a little too much. I've even fumbled with the idea of replacing an early, worthless treasure box item with a Technical Ring, since I really dislike the fact that you can't get one for at least 8-10 hours into the game. Even ToD1 let you have a Tech Ring just a couple hours in (But it was really crappy in that game because it still wouldn't let you jump manually). But even that may be pushing things too far. I *could* still release a separate patch to use on top of our translation for this stuff, however...

I did this for my own amusement, at least...

"these are a common find in forests these days..."

[Kajitani-Eizan]

make the flamberge equippable as a shield

[Cyllya]

Yay for load option. Using a swap disk to play games that don't have a load option is stinky.

I would still very much *love* to implement multiplayer and manual control without requiring the wasting of accessory slots. But that may be altering the game a little too much.

If Tales of Symphonia is any indication, that would create balance issues. Imagine both Cless and Suzu in manual mode simultaneously. The game gives you a second Tech Ring (I think? Or do you only get the one from Graham if you missed out on getting the one in The Past?), but playing a second character on manual means they can't get any of the various kick-ass effects of other accessories.

If you want to add in an early technical ring, how about from Maria in addition to the Apple Gels? Or can you do that without removing the Apple Gels?

make the flamberge equippable as a shield

Still adding attack power? So Lloyd was right after all...

[Tsukimoon]

Love to the project! All my favorite games are being translated! And they're all making amazing progress! This really must be the greatest year of my life.

This looks amazing and seriously better than even some official Tales translations. Now if only Tales of the Tempest had some help...
Anyways, I hope you have no more troubles, even though that's crazily unlikely. Hacking is a crazy business... and you know that, too.

[Cless Aileron]

Man, those screens are looking sweet!  You are making some really serious progress!

"these are a common find in forests these days..."

If that's the case, I better go to a forest and find one!  Maybe I can use it to prevent some awful games from being made.  *glares at two certain fighting games from the 16-bit era and runs off*

[Cless]

Perhaps I should have made this clear, but this is really a milestone for the project. All the hacking up to this point means... aside from skits, there is very little left to do anymore. There's a couple small, non-fatal glitches left that I recently noticed, and I'm sure it won't be long until they are fixed.

The project will certainly be ready for beta testing the instant the script has gone through all the hoops (translation, quality check, editing, quality check). Here's hoping Shinhoshi will find the time to finish up the translation relatively soon, but it still has quite a ways to go.

I would love to have this out by year's end or early '08. Eight years to finish... hopefully everyone will find that it was worth the time.

P.S.: Don't ask to be a beta tester. I will hand pick them personally. If I know you enough, you might be lucky...

If that's the case, I better go to a forest and find one!  Maybe I can use it to prevent some awful games from being made.  *glares at two certain fighting games from the 16-bit era and runs off*

Shaq Fu and... Pit Fighter?

[Julian]

It's really great seeing all the progress being done, but just out of curiosity (I know you don't own a psp yet, but I'm still curious because I plan on playing this on my psp)

Since the hacks are working on the regular playstation now, do you think they'd be runnable on the PSP using Sony's POPStation psx emulator?

[habilain]

Almost certainly. There's no guarantee (not yet tested), but I'd guess that it should run on a PSP.

Yeah, I'll get back to subtitling skits. I've just finished identifying all the functions needed, and the actual hacking starts soon.

[leon.dx]

Superb work as always Cless and the rest of Phantasian Productions! :3

[Jose260]

Almost certainly. There's no guarantee (not yet tested), but I'd guess that it should run on a PSP.

Yeah, I'll get back to subtitling skits. I've just finished identifying all the functions needed, and the actual hacking starts soon.

Congrats Habilain. You look really put on it.

Is something wonderful look all this sudden work on almost 15 days.

Darn, Cless shut my mouth before i can speak. 

[raigan]

*sniffle* It's... it's so beautiful! *breaks down crying* Maybe now my ToP PSX will finally see some use beyond "Yup, still works." *cradles ToP CD*