Hey, I'm new to the site and was hoping someone could help me

I got the Japanese rom of this game (don't really remember where) and I got the translation patch from here

I just don't know how to use a .ips file

Alternatively, since the last Wozz patch was released prior to including patchers in my distributions, I released a patch for header and non header versions. If one doesn't work, you can try the other.

http://transcorp.parodius.com/downloads/

Also, read the readme and make sure you have the proper ROM.