ROM Hack [WIP] Persona Q2 English Translation

[Lomeli12]

As Atlus hasn't said anything about releasing the game outside Japan, I decided to give it a go so I don't have to open Google Translate every time I open the game.

Please note that at this point in time, I am only planning on translating non story aspects of the game (menu, skills, Persona names, etc) to make actually playing the game easier. I have no experience with the Japanese language and thus trying to translate it will probably come out a butchered mess. I am basing everything off of the English translations of previous Persona games (specifically 3 FES, 4, Q, and 5).

Game Info
Name: Persona Q2: New Cinema Labyrinth
TitleID: 00040000001CBE00
Developer: Atlus
Publisher: Atlus (JP)
Game Release Date: JP - November 29, 2018

Patch Release Date: When I feel enough of the game has been translated to make playing it much easier. Or canceled if they announce an English release, whichever comes first.

WIP Screenshots (taken from a New 3DS)

Spoiler

Spoiler: Tools Being Used

• HackingToolkit9DS by Asia81 for decompiling the game.
• CriPakTools by esperknight for unpacking the game data.
• Atlus BF Message Script Editor and Atlus Script Toolchain by TGE for editing BMD and BF files.
• Kuriimu by IcySon55 mainly for looking into BMD files to see if there's anything in them before decompiling them.
• TBLEditor by me to so I don't have to use a hex editor on TBL files.
• wxMEdit by Alston Chen and JaiYanwei for hex editing files that I can't use the above tools on.
• Mod Compendium by TGE for merging the parts I edited with the game files.

 

[EvilMcBadGuy]

Dude, you are awesome. Using the google translate camera is getting rather irritating.

 

[Lomeli12]

Just a small update. Looking at the table of Persona names and went ahead and translate Arsene.

 

[Beagle-Bagel]

Holy Cow! This'll be a Godsend once its Completed or At least Slightly finished, Persona is a usually heavily dialog based game and pulling up Google Translate Camera every time someone speaks is very irritating

 

[Lomeli12]

Another small update:

Haven't done much in terms of translations, but I have been working on a tool to help me read/write tbl files (so I'm not just stuck in a hex editor), which is the format the game uses to store some text like skill names, persona names, enemy names, etc. ATM I have reading done, just need to get writing and perhaps a GUI to make it much less painful to use.

Spoiler: Large Screenshot

 

[WiikeyHacker]

im pretty sure this will get a english release but i wish you all the best

 

[NANASHI89]

im pretty sure this will get a english release but i wish you all the best

I dunno, the PSP version of Persona 2: Eternal Punishment never came.

 

[Shinox]

I LOVE YOU FOR THIS .. keep working on it my man !

 

[WiikeyHacker]

I dunno, the PSP version of Persona 2: Eternal Punishment never came.

ok but if that the case why did they show it in the direct?

 

[NANASHI89]

ok but if that the case why did they show it in the direct?

Wait... PQ2 was shown in an American Direct?

Where??

I wanna see!

 

[WiikeyHacker]

My apologies, i'm Japanese so I assumed it would it as they localized youkai watch that and i feel this will be getting localised but probably one of the 3ds's final games.

 

[NANASHI89]

My apologies, i'm Japanese so I assumed it would it as they localized youkai watch that and i feel this will be getting localised but probably one of the 3ds's final games.

Don't worry about it.

Anyway, there are actually quite a few Persona and Megaten games that have never been localized. The 1st Devil Summoner game. Most of the Devil Children (Demikids) games, II, if..., Majin Tensei, not even the original Megami Tensei games for Famicom.

 

[Lomeli12]

Update:

Finished making my tool for editing TBL files, which should make editing skill/enemy/persona names much easier and quicker (as it'll display them in a list instead of having to edit them in a hex editor). You can look at the source and download releases if you're interested here: https://github.com/Lomeli12/TBLEditor

As for actual translating, a got a few more skills and some Persona names done (including entire P5 cast's Personas). The only hiccup I have right now is editing the BMD files that contain move descriptions (amoung other things), as for some reason LayeredFS doesn't seem to like mine and always defaults to the original BMD file. If you're a Megami Tensei fan this probably won't be a problem as you'll already know what most moves do, but it's still quite a pain.

Spoiler: My now obligatory update screenshot

im pretty sure this will get a english release but i wish you all the best

I fairly certain as well, but we haven't gotten any sort of acknowledgement from Atlus about a PQ2 English release at all, which puts some doubts in my head. And this patch is just to make it easier for those who couldn't wait for an English release but don't understand Japanese to play the game until they make some sort of announcement. If/When that happens, I'll just release what I've gotten done for those who want it (and/or want to continue it themselves) and wait for the official English translation myself.

 

[haltcatchfire]

Hi, thanks for working on this!

You can try and use these:
github . com/zarroboogs/pqct/tree/master/data
github . com/zarroboogs/pq2ct/tree/master/data

(Sorry for non-links, I'm a new member and can't post them).

These are both links to the data used in two cheat tables, the first one is for Persona Q (USA) and the second one is for Persona Q2 (JPN).

Now, take a look at skills.tsv in both of those repos.
From a brief glance It seems that for skills, Atlus copied the original PQ skills and only added skills where previously there were blank spaces.
For example, the skill "Gears of Time" that was used by the PQ final boss appears in PQ2 (ID 1204).
Therefore, the first 1375 skills are almost the same.
They also added new skills with IDs between 1375 and 1500.

I believe they also did this for enemies, personas and characters, but not for items.

Hope this helps!

 

[Lomeli12]

Hi, thanks for working on this!
Now, take a look at skills.tsv in both of those repos.
From a brief glance It seems that for skills, Atlus copied the original PQ skills and only added skills where previously there were blank spaces.
For example, the skill "Gears of Time" that was used by the PQ final boss appears in PQ2 (ID 1204).
Therefore, the first 1375 skills are almost the same.
They also added new skills with IDs between 1375 and 1500.

I believe they also did this for enemies, personas and characters, but not for items.

Hope this helps!

It does, though there first 1375 don't completely line up. They added a new electric spells before both Keraunos. Otherwise, yeah, this basically makes it a copy/paste job for skills and probably the others as well.

Edit: I made a mistake. Forgot notepad++ doesn't start line numbers with 0. There is a new skill, but they just replace the blank after Thunder Clap with it.

 

[haltcatchfire]

I think that the skill descriptions (among some other things) are also somewhat copy-pasted from the original Persona Q. That's quite a lot of text that doesn't need to be re-translated. You can get those from an English PQ dump.

Also, Persona Q2 was updated to version 1.1 a few days after release, and there were quite a few dialogue and text changes (to me it seemed like mostly typo fixes, but I didn't check everything). Just a heads-up in case you weren't aware of the update.

 

[Lomeli12]

I think that the skill descriptions (among some other things) are also somewhat copy-pasted from the original Persona Q. That's quite a lot of text that doesn't need to be re-translated. You can get those from an English PQ dump.

Also, Persona Q2 was updated to version 1.1 a few days after release, and there were quite a few dialogue and text changes (to me it seemed like mostly typo fixes, but I didn't check everything). Just a heads-up in case you weren't aware of the update.

I was already working with the 1.1 update, but forgot to take into account that the update might have text changes. You've actually just solved my issue with BMD file changes not being loaded by LayeredFS. Thanks!

Edit: Screenshot now that I have skill translations working!

 

[TheGuyMadeOfTofu]

im pretty sure this will get a english release but i wish you all the best

Very likely but will be a year long wait if anything.

 

[shantaelover69420]

The race between a working fanslation and a Western port.... I'm excited to see who wins!

 

[WiikeyHacker]

I will be happy regardless as this looks promising.