SNES Hacks, Translations, & Re-Translations

[Bazoo]

I recently obtained a Super Everdrive and have been exploring its uses. Since I already owned many of the standard games in cart form, its main use is to play hacks and translations of Japanese-only releases. Along with hacks and translations, you also have re-translations of released games and pirate games.

It is nice to scroll through romhacking.net to find these but it can also be a bit daunting. So, which ones are your favorites? Many hacks are lackluster or unfinished, but I feel there are a couple out there I am missing out on.

So far, one of the best games I've found that wasn't released on SNES stateside is Front Mission. There is a lot of complexity there for its era! I guess eventually it came to us on DS, but it is neat to play in its original form. I've enjoyed Return to Dinosaur Land as well. I'm also looking for quality retranslations of games whose original releases were skewed due to censorship or limitations, and possibly pirate games that are any good at all. Let me know what others are out there!

[WulfeLuer]

I have a fair bit of affection for the translation hack of Seiken Densetsu 3 (AKA Secret of Mana 2). The class mechanics are interesting (holy crap Ogre Battle-esque promotion in an action RPG), magic isn't horribly borked like SoM but a lot more interesting, and all those little references in Legend of Mana make a lot more sense. Having the game take different routes and giving you different penultimate dungeons and final bosses based on your choice of characters is also a big step forward, particularly for the era. Yes, 85-90% of the game is still the same for any given playthrough, but compared to contemporary titles and even ones later on where the only real variation is usually whether or not you felt like grinding and/or some random drop decides to show up it can be a big deal.

[Aussie2B]

In lieu of the typical RPG recommendations, I'm just gonna suggest Wonder Project J and Marvelous. The former is one of the extremely few games I've actually play through with a fan translation, and the patch is perfectly serviceable. I've also played through the game in Japanese a number of times, and the patch didn't seem to introduce any glitches or anything. The latter I've only played in Japanese, but I have heard that it's been patched, and it's such an excellent adventure game and loaded with personality that I think a lot more people should be giving it a try.

[Tanooki]

Probably unexpected with so many adventures and RPGs people go nuts over running straight to Square and Enix, but try out Sailor Moon Another Story as it's fantastic.

[TonyTheTiger]

Check out the Zelda LTTP randomizer. It does a great job making the game fresh again.

[kainemaxwell]

Tales of phantasia also.

[Bazoo]

Thank you for the suggestions! I played some Sailor Moon and really liked it, never expected to enjoy an SR game! I also appreciate the non-RPG suggestions and I like those games that are fairly experimental, not really defined by a genre.

Any good Megaman X hacks out there? Seems like that would be a prime target for hacks but I haven't seen many except the Zero Project (which, you can't play X2 and X3 on SEverdrive)

[Steven]

In such threads I'm always quick to respond with two of my personal favorites that don't get nearly the love they both deserve:

Gunman's Proof and Treasure Hunter G.

I'm currently going through Energy Breaker and recommend that one, too, but it's not as good as the aforementioned two IMHO. Still good stuff though and uses the strategy grid concept of Treasure Hunter G.

[InsaneDavid]

In such threads I'm always quick to respond with two of my personal favorites that don't get nearly the love they both deserve:

Gunman's Proof...

Outstanding game and one that should have been localized and released in North America! Now I'm going to be whistling the town theme all day...

[BlastProcessing402]

Tales of phantasia also.

isn't that the one where they just made stuff up in thier fan translation?

[vrikkgwj]

Check out the Zelda LTTP randomizer. It does a great job making the game fresh again.

If you ever want to have some fun, look up some of the randomizer races on YouTube. Great fun, especially because even if a speed runner memorizes the game, with the items not being in their regular places there's a lot of fun on-the-fly thinking.

[Pr3tty F1y]

isn't that the one where they just made stuff up in thier fan translation?

I don't believe so. (https://www.romhacking.net/translations/470/)

However, as far as non-RPG translations that I recommend:

Majuu Ou (https://www.romhacking.net/translations/649/)
Golf Daisuki!: O.B. Club (https://www.romhacking.net/translations/2583/)
Umihara Kawase (https://www.romhacking.net/translations/493/)
Sutte Hakkun (https://www.romhacking.net/translations/3280/)
Rockman & Forte (Mega Man & Bass) (https://www.romhacking.net/translations/621/)
Snoopy Concert (https://www.romhacking.net/translations/1105/) <-- Just because I like Peanuts comics
Wrecking Crew '98 (https://www.romhacking.net/translations/3214/)
Super Back to the Future Part II (https://www.romhacking.net/translations/1691/)


There are definitely more, but those should get you started.

Majuu Ou is totally awesome. I wish there were more SNES games like it as I don't think that there is anything that's quite as dark/creepy/sinister on the system. The sprites may be small, but the art direction and story line is fantastic. BS Out of Bounds Golf is probably the best golf game on the SNES (if you're ok with a 3/4 perspective). Umihara Kawase/Sutte Hakkun are great puzzle-platformers and the rest are games that would have done well if they came out in the west.

[Aussie2B]

Yeah, the old Tales of Phantasia patch is a bit controversial:

https://twitter.com/clydemandelin/status/412708578227544064

Here's a little blurb about it from the TVTropes page:

"The official translation is often bashed for such things as "removing" adult humor that was never in the original. The only things that were the translations fault, however, was "Kangaroo" instead of "Ragnarok" and some inconsistencies with Tales of Symphonia. DeJap thought the script was dull, and since they didn't actually know Japanese that well, they thought that they would spice it up by putting in a bunch of swear words and adult humour. Several of these changes became very popular."

[WulfeLuer]

Wow, so the Phantasia patch was an attempt to be like Working Designs more or less. Eh, needs more feelies then.

Anyway, I've also heard good things about Wonder Project, and I have a friend that liked Magic Knight Rayearth, but I don't know if it was a translation hack or he just muddled through on the emulator. If there's fanlation hacks for the first two Breath of Fire games, I'd go for those; no way they'd be worse than the official versions.

[Aussie2B]

I don't know if there's one for the first Breath of Fire, but there's a popular retranslation of Breath of Fire II: https://www.romhacking.net/translations/1384/

[BlastProcessing402]

Wow, so the Phantasia patch was an attempt to be like Working Designs more or less. Eh, needs more feelies then.

Anyway, I've also heard good things about Wonder Project, and I have a friend that liked Magic Knight Rayearth, but I don't know if it was a translation hack or he just muddled through on the emulator. If there's fanlation hacks for the first two Breath of Fire games, I'd go for those; no way they'd be worse than the official versions.

First BoF official Square translation was okay as I recall, but yeah BOF2's official translation was awful.

Regarding ToP, didn't they add shit like "F***s like a tiger" describing a character or was that another game?