Hacking ROM Hack Translation Project [Release] Tomodachi Collection English Translation: Again

morelikejonarbuckle0 · Jan 11, 2026

The foundation of this translation relies on Deepl, an AI translator. It's the most accurate one I can find. Otherwise, I used ChatGPT for phrases that don't translate well. Complain about it here: https://gbatemp.net/threads/complai...-collection-translation-using-ai-here.681360/

Yep. @LandonAndEmma and I are trying this again.

This was originally done by @jjjewel (who's pretty much gone from the internet past 2015). I kept noticing little differences and oddities in the text and I thought I could try and rewrite everything and a bit more. @LandonAndEmma was going to do a similar thing, so I wanted them to join me so we can make the best version of Tomodachi Collection (in English) possible.
The only roadblock so far is the bin files and compressing and decompressing and me going nuts and begging the developers to update their program...

And also the news articles. But that's mostly why I made this mod in the first place. Sucks for me, I guess.
I used something slightly better than Google translate to finish this mod, I might go into detail about that in a seperate blog post. Don't flame me in the comments.

Features:
You can't get donations from the fountain or view old news articles. Totally not a bug
Job Descriptions
All News Articles Translated
Japanese Text Texture Replacements (most of them)
Jokes? (some of them are unfunny and will be removed)
Works With the Majority of Tomodachi Collection Roms by Upgrading 1.0 to 1.1 and Jjjewel's to This One
Xdelta Patch (with instructions)

Credits moved to comment section to break up this wall of text

morelikejonarbuckle0 · Jan 11, 2026

Credits:
Me - Mediocre sprite work, text
@LandonAndEmma - Support, proofreading text and consistency

Font credits:
Fountain - Some Libre one I forgot
Title - Dreamland STD
Career Counselor - Lea
Shops - TimeBurner
Question Hall - NewRodin Pro EB
Rankings board - kylie baker (hard to find, https://fonts2u.com/kylie-baker-bold.font)

Special Thanks:
Tomodachi Collection Russian Translation Team
Anyone trying to translate this game into their own language
@Arisotura for working hard on melonDS
R-YaTian for working on the only good fork of Tinke
AeonSake for working on the BMG editor used to edit all the text
Omega Khalid for posting a tutorial on how to edit text
Jay-san for posting tutorials on how to edit DS sprites (if link breaks replace inv.nadeko.net with youtube.com)

kaiw1201 · Jan 19, 2026

Heyy, I know this might be the wrong place to ask for help, but I'm wanting to make a Tomodachi Collection translation of my own (not english). I'm pretty new to romhacking and would like some pointers to get me going in the right direction.

morelikejonarbuckle0 · Jan 19, 2026

kaiw1201 said:
Heyy, I know this might be the wrong place to ask for help, but I'm wanting to make a Tomodachi Collection translation of my own (not english). I'm pretty new to romhacking and would like some pointers to get me going in the right direction

What's your secondary language? I reccomend trying to team up with someone else who's already doing a similar translation.
I wrote two pages about trying to translate this game, hopefully that helps

Hacking Tutorial Translation Thread 'Tomodachi Collection: Textures to replace'

Oct 7, 2025

This is a guide to others trying to figure out what textures to replace in Tomodachi Collection so they can translate it into their language.

You will need:
A computer running Windows or Linux (and hope all the programs work with WINE)
Aseprite or a free alternative: https://libresprite.github.io/
NitroPaint
MKDS Couse Modifier Beta 11
This specific build of Tinke
If you're afraid they'll give you a virus, extract the file and don't run it, then use Virustotal to see if it's malware or not.

I previously commented to use an old version of...

Hacking Tutorial Translation Thread 'How I tried to translate Tomodachi Collection'

Sep 1, 2025

This is how I horribly try to translate Tomodachi Collection for the Nintendo DS.

The rom I'm using is Jjjewel's translation since I don't want to mess with textures and fonts.
You likely have to edit those you're trying to translate the game into Arabic or Russian (or another language that doesn't use the alphabet)

I use Tinke, and this BMG editor.

I load that up, and in a web browser, I have 3 tabs that try to translate the text: DeepL, Duck.AI, and Perplexity.

DeepL: Most accurate
Duck.AI: In the middle
Perplexity: A bit inaccurate

Whenever I find something that...

kaiw1201 · Jan 19, 2026

Hey, those pages helped alot! I'm using my (albeit basic) knowledge of Japanese and my knowledge of toki pona to (hopefully) translate the game into toki pona. Since their phonologies are practically the same, I can also change dialog

stardustfrommercury · Jan 28, 2026

Hi I'm sorry to bother, I have a ds lite and a R4 but I do not have any idea how to make the translation work, does someone know? Thanks a lot!

morelikejonarbuckle0 · Jan 29, 2026

stardustfrommercury said:
Hi I'm sorry to bother, I have a ds lite and a R4 but I do not have any idea how to make the translation work, does someone know? Thanks a lot!

You find a copy of Tomodachi Collection (either untranslated or jjjewel's) and download the patches on the github page. This should end with a ".nds" file.
After patching the rom, put it in the games folder on your R4 (assuming you have a microSD card for that).

"How do I patch this rom?" Look up Xdelta GUI patcher. For Patch, select the one labled for your specific copy of Tomodachi Collection. (I don't know how to tell 1.1 and 1.0 apart though...) For source file, select your copy of Tomodachi Collection in the file explorer. For output file, make sure it isn't the same location or name as your Tomodachi Collection rom.

morelikejonarbuckle0 · Feb 26, 2026

pretty much the whole translation is in jeopardy once again due to text editors but here's a funny news article I found

{{1:30 arg="0x0000"}} Tourism announced several
super cheap summer tours, putting others out of business.
We interviewed one of their competitors for a comment:
"We can't afford to sit down and relax."

tmd_news will be updated for the final time on github soon...

morelikejonarbuckle0 · Feb 28, 2026

I begged a developer to make a new build of Tinke that fixes some sprite errors. Expect a sprite update soon!

Andi124 · Mar 8, 2026

heyy, i tried patching my tomodachi collection rom using your latest release (the one with the newer sprites) and for some reason it's just just not working. I tried using Rom Patcher JS and it did patch the rom, however when I tried openning it in melonds it straight up never loaded. And I did also try using xdelta patcher to try and patch, but it straight up just wouldn't let me patch. I tried patching on both a jjjewel rom and a regular 1.1 rom non-translated rom of tomodachi collection and neither of them worked.

morelikejonarbuckle0 · Mar 8, 2026

Andi124 said:
heyy, i tried patching my tomodachi collection rom using your latest release (the one with the newer sprites) and for some reason it's just just not working. I tried using Rom Patcher JS and it did patch the rom, however when I tried openning it in melonds it straight up never loaded. And I did also try using xdelta patcher to try and patch, but it straight up just wouldn't let me patch. I tried patching on both a jjjewel rom and a regular 1.1 rom non-translated rom of tomodachi collection and neither of them worked.

This translation always a bit... weird like that. I'm trying to come up with a patch soon.

morelikejonarbuckle0 · Mar 14, 2026

Andi124 said:
heyy, i tried patching my tomodachi collection rom using your latest release (the one with the newer sprites) and for some reason it's just just not working. I tried using Rom Patcher JS and it did patch the rom, however when I tried openning it in melonds it straight up never loaded. And I did also try using xdelta patcher to try and patch, but it straight up just wouldn't let me patch. I tried patching on both a jjjewel rom and a regular 1.1 rom non-translated rom of tomodachi collection and neither of them worked.

I think I fixed it? Look at the latest release

Andi124 · Mar 16, 2026

morelikejonarbuckle0 said:
I think I fixed it? Look at the latest release

Yes! It worked and I was able to patch it correctly! Thank you!

Shiroieievui · Apr 9, 2026

Not sure if you've tested this yet, but on a Japanese DSI LL (what I'm using) via Twilight Menu++ on a SD card, the game won't work past naming the island (。_。)

morelikejonarbuckle0 · Apr 9, 2026

Shiroieievui said:
Not sure if you've tested this yet, but on a Japanese DSI LL (what I'm using) via Twilight Menu++ on a SD card, the game won't work past naming the island (。_。)

Hold on, found the problem
I updated the github but these patches work in melonDS

Shiroieievui · Apr 16, 2026

morelikejonarbuckle0 said:
Hold on, found the problem
I updated the github but these patches work in melonDS

I feel kinda dumb after finding this out, but the fix to the issue was using the game settings menu (Pressing Y after hovering over a game) and then enabling the 133hz DSI Mode.

morelikejonarbuckle0 · Apr 16, 2026

Shiroieievui said:
I feel kinda dumb after finding this out, but the fix to the issue was using the game settings menu (Pressing Y after hovering over a game) and then enabling the 133hz DSI Mode.

I mean it did help me find out that one of the patches was broken so thanks I guess

Shiroieievui · Apr 17, 2026

Oops, I've found another problem then. Even after enabling DSI Mode, after getting to the first News Flash during the tutorial (after giving your second Mii food) just as the camera pans into the new station, the game crashes. Once more, "Error: Data Abort." (Same real DSI Hardware as mentioned prior.)

morelikejonarbuckle0 · Apr 18, 2026

Shiroieievui said:
Oops, I've found another problem then. Even after enabling DSI Mode, after getting to the first News Flash during the tutorial (after giving your second Mii food) just as the camera pans into the new station, the game crashes. Once more, "Error: Data Abort." (Same real DSI Hardware as mentioned prior.)

Try removing TWLilightmenu++ and re-installing it again. Worked for me on my 3ds and it fixed a lot of stuff.
I'd also like to know what version you're using, because my playtesting has the "recent articles" button crash the game.

Enderobot · Apr 24, 2026

How is everything working now? I have played a lot of the old 0.8 English translation so it is cool seeing this get worked on!

Hacking ROM Hack Translation Project [Release] Tomodachi Collection English Translation: Again

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

New Member

Well-Known Member

Hacking Tutorial Translation Thread 'Tomodachi Collection: Textures to replace'

Hacking Tutorial Translation Thread 'How I tried to translate Tomodachi Collection'

New Member

New Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

New Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

New Member

New Member

Well-Known Member

Attachments

New Member

Well-Known Member

New Member

Well-Known Member

New Member

Similar threads

Popular threads in this forum