Well wow there is some crazy stuff going on with the graphics in this game. I have spent about 1.5 hours going through all the files with GGD and so far I have found only a couple things that I can recognize as graphics. The world map in "TP_MAP" and the character portraits in "FACEDATA". Though I couldn't find palettes in either of these file. Definitely nothing as far as menus are concerned.

I still haven't looked everywhere, but given my lack of success I'm guessing things are pretty complicated.

Hi little_one! It's chugging along slowly but surely. The amount of text to translate is huge, but we're gradually getting more people on board on the translation side, which is great. All the compressed text has been uncompressed and dumped for the reading pleasure of the translation team. Since everyone's schedules are hectic, we're always keeping an eye out for more bilngual talent.

Next up on the technical side of the DF II project is handling a nasty issue where the text decompression routine is preventing us from using ASCII values (and the lovable half-width character output associated with those values in Shift_JIS) in storyline dialogue. Sixfortyfive had simply been using ASCII to type in menu text as seen in the now ancient sample video, but when it comes to the storyline dialogue, the compression routine treats ASCII values as compression dictionary references and not as ASCII input. We haven't found any way to make the dictionary entries refer to the English section or otherwise read half-width areas from the font sheet either.
 
Normally what would be done at this point, I think, is to NOP out the text decompression routine via ASM modding. Failing that (seeing as I'm inexperienced in ASM routines, let alone Saturn ASM code), I have a kooky backup plan.

If anyone reading this just happens to be either really experienced in reading, or interested in studying, Saturn ASM routines, and doesn't want to even begin to think about whatever constitutes a "kooky backup plan" in this case, we'd be greatful to have your help.    If I can figure out enough about ASM code to intelligently communicate with the author of Yabause, I'll give that a try.

Going straight to the source, eh? It's not an idea I would jump on after the Crimson Echoes experience, but has anyone in the game modding community ever done that before? I mean, got a technical question answered by the game's very developers? That would rock.

Well, it would have been Sega of Japan's "JForce team" that probably developed Dragon Force II (Working Designs translated and published in the US/English market); but it's also true that Working Designs had to do some modding of its own to make game enhancements from what I understand.

I'm confident enough in working out an elbow grease solution to the dictionary compression scheme problem. The major concern right now is just the translators finding time to work on the project, and recruiting more. Sandslice and Hanmyou have been much occupied with life lately, but most (if not all) of the in-battle quotes have been translated to date. That still leaves the story dialogue text, which is really the meat of the game's text. Filler has expressed interest in joining up once his plate is clear, so I'm excited at the prospect of getting this baby jumpstarted again down the road.

Expect another video on September 3 as an anniversary progress update.

Holy shit! That is truly amazing. This is for another thread, but I'd love to see some kind of effort to document those few instances in which game developers have crossed over to assist fan communities with unofficial translations and stuff. The only other similar instance I can think of is that the person who translated Mother 3 works as a translator in the videogame industry as well, though I'm not sure whether he's related to the Earthbound/Mother property in any way as part of his job.

Just a proof of life here -- still goin'!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jFxBf1tm39c
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q9tVNqBnKY4

Way more has been translated than is reflected in the anniversary video, I've just gotta sit down and get it all inserted. Big news on the technical front though: a small ASM tweak has disabled a text decompression routine that was active in the game's storyline text, allowing straight ASCII input there. I can't describe just how worth it sitting down and learning some basic assembly language concepts is. A year ago I was seriously going into this with the idea that I would fill up the SHIFT_JIS space on the font sheet with English character pairs, because the text decompression routine basically forced the use of SHIFT_JIS encoding...yeah, that would have been bad. Now we can focus on shifting around menus and other onscreen elements to better display English text.
 
Still keeping an eye out for more translators! The final stretch on the translation side is all the story dialogue, which dwarfs what's been translated to date. We could always use more help on the technical side too if anyone's interested in Saturn game modding.

Looks sharp so far. Hit me up if you want a tester, or an amateur translator.

Mediocre, but I know people who are better who may be able to help.

cj, if you can get in contact with some folks and let them know we're on the lookout for additional translation help, that would be awesome.

Most definitely! I absolutely adored the manual Working Designs did for Dragon Force I, and we've got several physical Japanese Dragon Force II manuals on hand amongst the project team members. It's a lower priority right now, but I'd like to release a PDF with the story & nation background, general bios and troop matchups at least. Rather than a scanlation of the physical manual, I think we'll probably go in the direction of composing a fresh mini-booklet based on the source material so the quality of the imagery won't depend on our personal scanners .


The text insertion in the game still looks pretty rough right now, really; some menu rearrangement and text wrapping alteration needs to be done to fit general class names and some other labels.