ROM Hack Professor Layton and the Last Specter dub-swap

[eyeball226]

I'm working on getting London Life into the UK version of Layton 4. Most of the work is already done: using the principles of undubbing, I've swapped the video and sound files from the UK version into the US.

I haven't fully tested it, but I've played it a bit and Luke is indeed English.

The text and title screen are still from the US version though, and although the title screen is purely cosmetic, it'd be nice to swap that for completeness's sake, since the goal of the patch is to reconstruct what should have been released here. As for the text, there are small differences between the US and UK localisations and so I want to (if possible) swap the text from the UK version into the US.

I've run into the limit of my extremely small knowledge of 'hacking' (and I use the term loosely here), does anyone else have any ideas which files the text might be in?

EDIT: Here are patches for what I have so far. Any suggestions on how to improve it would be much appreciated.

some point.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/0ezl8gidznobtng/Apply this to US version.xdelta3?dl=0
https://www.dropbox.com/s/ozsxekxi3cr957a/Apply this to UK version.xdelta3?dl=0

I've only just started uploading the patches, the links should become active in 15 minutes or so.

 

[LWares87]

I think, it would be easier to use the US version as a base and change the GameID to match the UK/EUR version. Transfer the dialogue and audio from that version (if the London Life dialogue is still within the rom, you could try it to find out).

It's probably not the right way to go about it, as most things would have to be repointed to work properly.

 

[eyeball226]

I think, it would be easier to use the US version as a base and change the GameID to match the UK/EUR version. Transfer the dialogue and audio from that version (if the London Life dialogue is still within the rom, you could try it to find out).

It's probably not the right way to go about it, as most things would have to be repointed to work properly.

It is the US version basically, just with the movies and sound files from the UK version. London Life is completely absent from the UK rom, there's an extra folder called ll in the US version.
If I've understood your post correctly, what you're suggesting is pretty much what I've done. I've got no idea where the text is though, so at the moment it's literally the US game with UK sound (analogous to an undub).

A more elegant solution would be to add London Life back into the UK version as it's very separate in the file system, and as far as I can tell it's self pretty contained. If I was a real hacker I might actually be able to insert London Life back into the UK version by moving the files back across and then restoring the option on the menu by looking at the differences between the US menu and the UK menu.

As it is though I've decided to take the long way around, inserting media from the UK version into the US version (with some success).

 

[LWares87]

There's bound to be someone else around who will help you (especailly, if they are into the Professor Layton games).

As what I said, was just a theory which was worth trying. Anyway... There's probably a patch somewhere that already exists to reinject London Life back into the UK/EUR version.

 

[pleonex]

So, if I have understood right you're trying to modify the text from London life?
Some time ago I did a tool to do that because we were doing a spanish translation of it. The text of London life are under ll/common/ll_common.darc/File2.denc/File2.MSG. So if you're interesed I can upload the tools.

What we are doing is to translate the london life folder from the US rom and then we'll see if we can unpack the GFSA files to replace the files from Last Specter and get the full rom in spanish. Adding the folder to the spanish rom and make it working it's so difficult (a lot of ASM hacking) and from my point of view is useless.

 

[eyeball226]

So, if I have understood right you're trying to modify the text from London life?
Some time ago I did a tool to do that because we were doing a spanish translation of it. The text of London life are under ll/common/ll_common.darc/File2.denc/File2.MSG. So if you're interesed I can upload the tools.

What we are doing is to translate the london life folder from the US rom and then we'll see if we can unpack the GFSA files to replace the files from Last Specter and get the full rom in spanish. Adding the folder to the spanish rom and make it working it's so difficult (a lot of ASM hacking) and from my point of view is useless.

Actually, I'm pretty much leaving London Life alone. What I'm trying to do is modify the US Last Specter to make it closer to the UK Spectre's Call. So far I have inserted the sound and videos from the UK into the US, I'm just looking for a way to swap the text across and possibly put in the UK title artwork.

What you're doing sounds similar to my other thought, trying to add London Life to an EU version but as you say it would require ASM hacking to get the European version of the game to pick up on London Life. That's why I'm going the other direction and trying to modify the US version.

 

[pleonex]

We are doing that, translate the US version, specially the london life folder. Then after I have figured out the big pack files where all the data from the main game is (it4_main_en.fa), I will unpack it, replace the files from the spanish rom and then pack it again.

As I have told you, I haven't finished to figure out how to unpack the files from Last Specter, I have some info to be able to decrypt the header of it but not so much...

 

[Skelletonike]

What's this London Life exactly? Is it some puzzle or something similar?
I've played the first two games, haven't had time to play Specter yet so it intrigues me as to what it is. =O

 

[Deleted_171835]

What's this London Life exactly? Is it some puzzle or something similar?
I've played the first two games, haven't had time to play Specter yet so it intrigues me as to what it is. =O

London Life is an entire bonus RPG available as an extra in the game. You play as a character in London (Layton universe) doing tasks and other things.

http://www.joystiq.com/2011/09/21/a-brief-look-into-professor-laytons-london-life/

 

[Skelletonike]

What's this London Life exactly? Is it some puzzle or something similar?
I've played the first two games, haven't had time to play Specter yet so it intrigues me as to what it is. =O

London Life is an entire bonus RPG available as an extra in the game. You play as a character in London (Layton universe) doing tasks and other things.

http://www.joystiq.c...ns-london-life/

Now that does seem pretty sweet, I'm surprised I never heard of it.
Isn't it kinda stupid that the EUR version removed it tho? :S

 

[Deleted_171835]

What's this London Life exactly? Is it some puzzle or something similar?
I've played the first two games, haven't had time to play Specter yet so it intrigues me as to what it is. =O

London Life is an entire bonus RPG available as an extra in the game. You play as a character in London (Layton universe) doing tasks and other things.

http://www.joystiq.c...ns-london-life/

Now that does seem pretty sweet, I'm surprised I never heard of it.
Isn't it kinda stupid that the EUR version removed it tho? :S

Well they would have to translate it into a bunch of other languages so I understand why they took it out.

 

[Skelletonike]

What's this London Life exactly? Is it some puzzle or something similar?
I've played the first two games, haven't had time to play Specter yet so it intrigues me as to what it is. =O

London Life is an entire bonus RPG available as an extra in the game. You play as a character in London (Layton universe) doing tasks and other things.

http://www.joystiq.c...ns-london-life/

Now that does seem pretty sweet, I'm surprised I never heard of it.
Isn't it kinda stupid that the EUR version removed it tho? :S

Well they would have to translate it into a bunch of other languages so I understand why they took it out.

I never noticed if the Layton games were Multi-5, but I think they just release a dif version for each country, so I don't see why they couldn't release it at least in the UK version (which is the one that countries like mine that don't do translations get).

 

[eyeball226]

I never noticed if the Layton games were Multi-5, but I think they just release a dif version for each country, so I don't see why they couldn't release it at least in the UK version (which is the one that countries like mine that don't do translations get).

Yeah, so I'm trying to 'reconstruct' what we would have got in the UK if they had included London Life. My patch(es) as they currently are give you the US version of the main game with the UK voice acting. The the dialogue and puzzles are, AFAIK still the US versions so that's what I want to try and swap next...

 

[eyeball226]

We are doing that, translate the US version, specially the london life folder. Then after I have figured out the big pack files where all the data from the main game is (it4_main_en.fa), I will unpack it, replace the files from the spanish rom and then pack it again.

As I have told you, I haven't finished to figure out how to unpack the files from Last Specter, I have some info to be able to decrypt the header of it but not so much...

Is there something you can link me to so I can keep up to date on your project's progress? The translation of London Life itself obviously isn't useful to me, but anything you guys discover about re-integrating London Life into the Spanish version will probably be really useful to me.

 

[pleonex]

Well, actually I'm the only who is investingating that, all the other in the team are translator but this is the official thread (it's in spanish obviously). Anyway, this is one of the things I want to finish once I have free time again. I will contact you when I got it

 

[Rockmaniac]

@eyeball226 did you manage to finish this - this was 7 years ago lol. if not - any chance you still not the patches from here? dropbox is long dead.

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@pleonex did you guys manage to get this done?