Emulation help needed

[Chainsaw_Charlie]

I have no knowledge on the subject but there are several fan translated games such as Mother 3, Moon(ps1) 7th Saga 2 to name a few. How do I go about playing said games?

[shadowkn55]

The translations come in the form of a patch. Depending on the format of the system (cartridge or disc based), you'll need to obtain a rom or an iso, respectively. After you apply the patch to the rom or iso, you can use your favorite or unfavorite method playing the game (emulator, flash cart, modded system, etc).

[Ed Oscuro]

If you go the IPS route you'll need to find an IPS patching program (easy enough to find, but iirc functional ones can be old enough that they're command line) and a ROM.

Alternatively (my preferred & suggested way), you can torrent a GoodXXX (where XXX = name of console) set for said system which may have the specific translation applied to a ROM image already (unless it's very new). If it doesn't, you still get the ROM you need to patch.

[InsaneDavid]

If you go the IPS route you'll need to find an IPS patching program (easy enough to find, but iirc functional ones can be old enough that they're command line) and a ROM.

SNESTool.

[Daria]

There's no translation for Moon as far as I'm aware.

The only translated RPGs on the PSX so far have been Tales of Phantasia and Persona 2: Innocent Sin.

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Anyway, first you're going to need some emulators. Get both ZSNES and SNES9x for SNES. You'll want to get both because some games that aren't compatible with one are with the other. Whichever you get, do yourself a favor and in the options enable the super eagle gfx engine. It will smoth out the pixels and generally makes every game look better.

For GBA I'd suggest Visual Boy Advance.

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Next you'll have to download both the Japanese rom and the translation patch. For patches go to: http://romhacking.net

For roms.... erm.... you're on your own. Unless you want to shoot me an AIM message. ;)

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Patching:

SNES patches are easiest to do because both SNES9x and ZSNES do all the work for you. Just download the rom and the patch file. Unzip both into the same folder and rename to match:

Example:

test.smc
test.ips

This is called soft patching as the rom file hasn't actually changed.

Oher system (such as GBA) will required a hard patch, and that means writing the information that the patch changes directly to the rom file. Don't worry they're also extremely easy to do. Just download a good patching utility, I've always used IPS Win and have recently switched over to Lunar IPS. Patching is literally a matter of clicking a button to load a rom, selecting the rom. Clicking another button to load a patch, selecting a patch and clicking GO. This isn't rocket science, forget the old school utilities that require typing. :P

[geneshifter]

I've been playing through Mother 3 (translated) on my PSP. I waited to play the translation until I received the cool fangamer game guide and it was worth the wait! The music is just so awesome!! You are in for a treat.

[bombman]

Hmm, didn't know Moon was translated, if it was. The data file on the CD has the entire script in plain Japanese so maybe it's just matter of replacing that text? Probably not that simple though but hey.

At any rate, the game was a bit plodding and tedious but the ending was absolutely mind-blowingly phenomenal. Huge mindfuck and still my favorite ending of any game ever. Hope they don't ruin it with shoddy translation.

[Nonplus]

I was actually looking for a Moon translation a couple of weeks ago, and I couldn't find one.
The closest I came was http://sennue.com/en/moon/
I'm not sure how out of date the page is, but the forum link is dead. He's only working on a script, but I'm sure someone would put on a disc. Unfortunately, he might've quit.