Chibi-Robo English translation for Wii
- Thread starter Brand Newman
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Hello @fatherjack , and thank you for the information.Thanks for the progress report!
just a FYI....the 'Entrance' was originally 'Foyer' - dont know if this will affect anything else (utilibots menu?) if you're struggling for space on translation
keep going Brand Newman! ........but have some Christmas leave right now
Yes, I saw about the entrance being renamed "foyer" in international release and you're right : I should stick to the international names as much as I can, so I changed it.
That's the reason I kept the "squirter" instead of using the original "syringe" word, no matter how much that word screams "porn" to me!
The only problem I have is with "Living Room" (リビング), since the game doesn't leave me enough space to translate it this way : so I went with "Lounge" ("Salon" was another word I considered), but if someone has a better suggestion here, please leave me a message (can't be more than 8 characters).
Unless people are OK with the name being shortened to "Lvg Room", something like that?
But I must say I try to avoid shortening words as much as I can, so I'd really prefer to use a complete word.
About the "utilitbots menu", I was under the impression the utilibots were devices like ladder, whereas pressing "minus" takes you to a menu where you can choose the copter and such ?
But maybe these devices are all in the same menu, I don't know : I have never actually played the game, and won't really be before we reach the beta testing phase.
But if you tell me this is the name I should use, space won't be much of an issue (controls are actually a picture, not text, and I can move the "minus" button to a certain extend).
Let's discuss that after Christmas! Merry Christmas to you all!
Nice to see that someone's working on porting the game's translation to the Wii version. I was planning to give this game a look and disappointed to hear that there's a slightly better version of it exclusive to Japan.
I do have some concerns about the technical side of things, though. Since you mentioned having to rewrite some lines to fit with the Japanese version's harsher space constraints, am I right to assume it's not feasible for you to do any significant reprogramming of the game? To what extent will the game's script have to be trimmed? If this ends up having a significantly dumbed down version of the original translation, then I don't think it can really be called superior to the Gamecube version. Also, are there any other things specific to the English Gamecube versions that you can't replicate?
I also noticed some slight font rendering issues in your video, particularly when it comes to the uppercase T. Is that an emulation bug or an issue with the patch?
I do have some concerns about the technical side of things, though. Since you mentioned having to rewrite some lines to fit with the Japanese version's harsher space constraints, am I right to assume it's not feasible for you to do any significant reprogramming of the game? To what extent will the game's script have to be trimmed? If this ends up having a significantly dumbed down version of the original translation, then I don't think it can really be called superior to the Gamecube version. Also, are there any other things specific to the English Gamecube versions that you can't replicate?
I also noticed some slight font rendering issues in your video, particularly when it comes to the uppercase T. Is that an emulation bug or an issue with the patch?
Do you really think he is going to deliver a "significantly dumbed down version of the original translation"? That's not the Brand Newman we've all come to love. And the English translation on Gamecube wasn't exactly authored by James Joyce. It's a game about a small robot that cleans a house, not a 40 hour JRPG. In any event, it is up to each person to decide for themselves which version they prefer once it is released. I will never, ever play the Gamecube version again now that I know this is coming.
Hi @Rya687 ,
I have read your message, and would like to answer the questions you've brought up.
First, I'd like to emphasis the fact that I won't ever pretend my amateur translation is gonna make this version the "superior" one : the previous statement I made was all about the gameplay, which I believe suits the Wii pointer very much, and of course anyone is welcomed to differ.
About the necessity of shortening the dialogs and such, I confirm you'd need to be very much skilled (as in "having a degree" skilled) to expand the room left for the text, which I believe is only feasible if you know about modifying the pointers in a Wii game (meaning telling the software to look at another place than what it was meant to be to find the text, hence having potentially much space).
I don't know if some translators have relied on that (maybe the Fatal Frame IV translation team did, regarding the quality of the final product) : as for me I'm just a solo regular guy doing this on his free time, and that kind of knowledge is way beyond mine, meaning I'll have to deal with the space I'm left with.
That being said, I'm lucky enough Chibi-Robo is coded in uncompressed shift-jis, meaning western characters only take one hex value, when Japanese characters take two : that leaves me with double the size of Japanese text, which is more than I had with "Ikenie No Yoru" for example (coded in Big Endian).
If you're worried about the general quality of my work, you can try the previous patches I've released or (if you don't own the game or don't want to go through the trouble of patching them), you can watch the playthrough videos @stranno did of almost all my projects here : https://www.youtube.com/user/9esferas1
(Stranno, I realized I had never subscribed till now, contrary to my belief! I just fixed this!)
Finally, about your last two questions:
- I haven't found anything specific to the Game Cube I couldn't replicate so far, but it's still a bit early in the project, and I don't know the GC version that much. I can tell you however that some extra dialogs seem to be in the Wii version. Whether they appear in the final product of were just left unused remains to be determined.
- The "font rendering issue" is actually the font used by Dolphin (and the original hardware) as a "system font", but I'll have to check if the real Wii shows the uppercase T the same way.
Contrary to all the previous games I've translated, Chibi-Robo doesn't seem to rely on a game-specific font for its text (there's a "fnt" folder in the game, but it's empty).
That means if you boot the game on a non-Japanese console (at least on a French PAL one), you'll get gibberish instead of Japanese!
If you remember correctly, the same thing happened with message system ("Wiimote disconnected") in Earth Seeker, or when you tried to boot Ikenie No Yoru without having the savegame previously installed : the console just didn't know how to display Japanese, so unless you replaced it with western character, you couldn't understand what it said.
In that case, even being fluent in Japanese can't help you, as this screenshots taken from an old thread shows :
https://gbatemp.net/threads/npc-chibi-robo-translation.293818/
Dolphin handles it better, since it can display Japanese characters, and that's the "Dolphin font" you've seen on the video (which was taken with an emulator).
Anyway, that means I can't, contrary to my previous projects, alter the font to modify certain characters or "create" new ones (which came in handy sometimes to use only one hex value for combinations like "il", or even removed any need for an extra space after commas).
That has to be taken in consideration : on the other hand it should be easier for European people to translate my patch in other languages (like French or Spanish for example), since all the extra characters these languages use should already be there, whereas Japanese "ingame" fonts only have the minimum required to display English text.
I realize this message was fairly long : I hope you got all the answers you needed ; please feel free to follow this thread till the patch comes out.
Yours truly.
So it's one of those games that use the system font? To my understanding, Dolphin can only use it when you provide it with a BIOS. If you don't, it'll fall back on a different font known as Droid Sans. Are you sure that's not the case with the footage you took? If yes, it would certainly explain why the font doesn't look quite right. Or maybe I'm confusing this with something else. While Dolphin's wiki warns people that such an issue exists with skip's previous game, Giftpia, neither of the Chibi-Robo articles mention the game using the system font.
As for the need to shorten some lines, could you perhaps provide an example or two of what you've had to do so far? I realize that this isn't a game where the story is super important, but if the English script is full of funny lines that'll have to be stripped down to their bare minimum, I'm not sure if I'd want to use this patch.
As for the need to shorten some lines, could you perhaps provide an example or two of what you've had to do so far? I realize that this isn't a game where the story is super important, but if the English script is full of funny lines that'll have to be stripped down to their bare minimum, I'm not sure if I'd want to use this patch.
Wow this was only 2 months ago
I am getting into doing Wii & GC translations, and I thought that Chibi Robo was a good one that hasn't been done yet..
Anyway great job! Cool that you also did reginleiv AND task of magic
Right now I have started projects for Kururin Squash and Donkey Konga 3, if either of those interest you. Looking into Metal Gear Bonus disc. Nintendo's GameCube quiz game uses the same formats as Nintendo Puzzle Collection, so I'm trying to get tips from the ppl who partially translated NPC.
I am getting into doing Wii & GC translations, and I thought that Chibi Robo was a good one that hasn't been done yet..
Anyway great job! Cool that you also did reginleiv AND task of magic
Right now I have started projects for Kururin Squash and Donkey Konga 3, if either of those interest you. Looking into Metal Gear Bonus disc. Nintendo's GameCube quiz game uses the same formats as Nintendo Puzzle Collection, so I'm trying to get tips from the ppl who partially translated NPC.
Hello @NewGBAXL , and welcome to the family of GC and Wii games translators! We're just a few but the community is nice and supportive.
I'm glad we didn't inadvertently started a similar project, and I must say Kururin Squash looks reaaaally nice to me !
If I can be of any help to you, please DM me : I'll try to help you, though every game has its own structure (and sometimes compression), and we'll try to figure things out.
As to me, I'm almost done with one of the biggest files of the game (basically the "HUB" file of the Living Room / Lounge, though it does contain parts of the story, noticeably the last battle).
I'll probably publish a comparison of the first minutes of gameplay between GC and Wii on my YT channel very soon.
Then you'll be able to see the differences, which I tried to minimize as much as I could : be aware though that the translators actually added things that weren't in the Japanese version, making some characters (especially Drake Redcrest) VERY talkative!
So not only did I have to shorten the dialogs because of the room I had, but it was sometimes impossible to keep the "added content" that wasn't in the Japanese game to begin with!
I tried to keep the cheeky tone of the original though, and even emphasized a "gay" reference that had gotten cut out (yes you read me right.)
GameCube version (Sophie's diary) :
"Chibi-Robo and Telly seem very close. It's nice to see good friends like that."
Wii version (Japanese) :
なんだか とっても親密そうな２人でした
(The two of them seem to be very close.)
TellyさんとChibiさん
男同士なのに･･･
(Even though Telly and Chibi are both male...)
My translation (went for something a bit more subtle, and that could just be read as "girly", since Sophie acts a bit like a teenager , with a lot of clichés on men):
"Chibi and Telly seem to be close. As close as guys can be…"
I think it hits the ball out of the park a little bit more than the translation, which obviously decided to suppress any innuendo.
At least mine can be read both ways?
After all Sophie can just not believe guys can be as close as girls, in her -quite- "closeted" (ah ah) mind!
Anyway, not really mine to say : everybody has a nice WE, and once again welcome to @NewGBAXL , please let us know the address of your thread so we can follow your progress!
Yours truly.
I think most of us would be happy to see you lean towards the original Japanese rather than the translation as that is closer to the original developer's intentions. It seems to progressing well. Thanks for all your hard work!
Donkey Konga 3 interests me! I bought it with no realistic way to play it simply because it is one of the few DK Bongos-supported games. It would be a real service to the tens of thousands of us who still have them to finally get that one last game. (Actually, we'd also like "Old Play Controls" Donkey Kong:
Good evening everyone.
Since some people here and elsewhere have asked me about the differences between the Game Cube script and my translation, I found the time to make a little side-by-side comparison video for you to watch!
Remember nothing is final in this vid, but I hope it will reassure you about my will to make the best patch I'll be able to!
Please enjoy,
Yours truly.
Since some people here and elsewhere have asked me about the differences between the Game Cube script and my translation, I found the time to make a little side-by-side comparison video for you to watch!
Remember nothing is final in this vid, but I hope it will reassure you about my will to make the best patch I'll be able to!
Please enjoy,
Yours truly.
Thanks for the video. Unfortunately, this pretty much confirms my fears. As I expected, Nintendo's translation reads well, but is quite verbose. Your stripped down versions of the lines still succeed in conveying their meaning, but often aren't as funny and colorful as the originals. It probably wouldn't stick out much if this was the only translation that existed, but next to the original, it looks rather stiff.
I'll take your word that this is a necessary move for technical reasons, but it's still disheartening to see. In light of this, I think I'll just play the Gamecube version instead.
I'll take your word that this is a necessary move for technical reasons, but it's still disheartening to see. In light of this, I think I'll just play the Gamecube version instead.
Nice work Brand! I can imagine it can be difficult to convey such similar feelings in sometimes limited text.
One random comment, this thread is not tagged with "Translation", so I can't easily find it by filtering. Not sure if that's easy to fix.
Nice. Your post inspired me, so I made something similar for the Wii: https://gbatemp.net/threads/are-the...-translate-what-would-you-like-to-see.607101/ .
One random comment, this thread is not tagged with "Translation", so I can't easily find it by filtering. Not sure if that's easy to fix.
Nice. Your post inspired me, so I made something similar for the Wii: https://gbatemp.net/threads/are-the...-translate-what-would-you-like-to-see.607101/ .
Last edited by wiiAdventurer,
Hi @Mikef1 ,
Though my patches are primarly made to use with retail discs, I always provide the method to patch isos on my readme files.
WBFS being a better format (contrary to ISO, it doesn't store "empty data"), it can be patched as well !
To be honest I have dumped all my retail discs in WBFS, so no need to worry about that, my patch will be compatible.
Thanks @wiiAdventurer , feels good to read that.
I'm sorry if people feel my translation is a bit rough around the edges, both because of me being French and the game having technical limitations.
That being said, the official release is not always faithful to the original script, as already proven, and I'll go as far as saying I'm not a fan of overly talkative games (a flaw Line Attack Heroes and some Japanese games certainly have).
One small example I stumbled upon today is the total disappearance of the "Enka" reference in Telly's dialogs for the international release which, considering how much Telly loves to sing, is a bit of a shame.
I'll leave the comparison below, if anyone's interested in it.
International release :
"Sorry, but my heart is meant for another.
Only sweet music can tame me!
Well, that's a good thing. I'm
a crooner all the way!"
My translation (still WIP, remember the characters' limit):
"No can do. The only passion I have is for "Enka" music!
That's right, I'm an Enka-holic!"
(Original says "「えんか」一筋ですから" for "I'm all about Enka")
Less words, but at least the "Enka" word is back! (They probably dropped it because of Occident being unfamiliar with it, though from what I heard "Teriyaki Blues" suits the genre very well.)
Oh, that's too bad : does anyone know how to tag this thread ? I have no idea how it's done, and if someone could spare me the research...
From this thread https://gbatemp.net/threads/how-do-i-set-a-thread-prefix-on-a-old-thread.600171/ . Seems like you can do that by editing the first post? Or you have to report the post with the request to change the prefix to 'translation'
So tonight I had a nice conversation on Twitter about changes that occur between several versions of a game (mostly ports), like a modified texture to replace a brand name by another, that kind of things...
This reminded me of a noticeable difference between the Wii and Gamecube version of Chibi-Robo, at the very beginning of the game : the 1st one displays a large panel saying "happy birthday Jenny", making us immediately know what day it is.
The GC version, on the contrary, displays a drawing I find irresistibly cute, and waits for us to see the family to understand it's the girl's birthday (OK there's a cake on the picture, but it disappears quite fast).
Below is the comparison of the two.
I'm not really a fan of changing textures (other than translating Japanese text like in Reginleiv, obviously), and as I stated on the Earth Seeker thread, I even find it counter-productive sometimes (like I kept the French in certain textures, because the game was supposed to display the panels as "relics" from the ancient Earth).
But in that case, the GC version is so overly cute I'm considering trying to find the texture, and see if I can't at least make a mix of the two?
What do you think?
Yours truly.
This reminded me of a noticeable difference between the Wii and Gamecube version of Chibi-Robo, at the very beginning of the game : the 1st one displays a large panel saying "happy birthday Jenny", making us immediately know what day it is.
The GC version, on the contrary, displays a drawing I find irresistibly cute, and waits for us to see the family to understand it's the girl's birthday (OK there's a cake on the picture, but it disappears quite fast).
Below is the comparison of the two.
I'm not really a fan of changing textures (other than translating Japanese text like in Reginleiv, obviously), and as I stated on the Earth Seeker thread, I even find it counter-productive sometimes (like I kept the French in certain textures, because the game was supposed to display the panels as "relics" from the ancient Earth).
But in that case, the GC version is so overly cute I'm considering trying to find the texture, and see if I can't at least make a mix of the two?
What do you think?
Yours truly.
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