Choro Q2 translation released!

Yesterday I finished my translation of Choro Q2. As expected, it used pretty much the exact same code as Choro Q3, so I was able to re-use what I had already done, with just a few touches here and there.

You can get the patch here: http://www.romhacking.net/translations/1783/.

Choro Q3 translation released!

So, I finally got into ROM hacking and translating from Japanese to English. I had to learn a lot of stuff, just to make a patch that probably only a couple of people will ever try. But it was fun... and also very painful.



Before I began with the translation, I thought that the hardest things to do would be learning ASM, programming the mysterious VWF that everyone talked about, learning Japanese ("the Devil's language"), creating custom tools to edit the text, creating a table with a million kanjis, fixing all kind of bugs and crashes that pop up, etc. And while it's true that all of those tasks were hard (and I probably didn't do good enough any of them), nothing prepared me to the most painful task ever created: graphics editing.

Ladders

I added ladders today. Fortunately for me, it was much easier to do than what I was expecting.



...now I can freely move around all the map without cheats. :D

Map Files and Accurate Points

I spent the last few weeks learning NES ASM, so I can make this game engine as similar as possible to the original.

The first step was to know the control points that the programmers had used for the main character. It took me a lot of time until I finally found the routines for this... And there were two sets of control points: the normal one, and one that is only used when Kid Dracula is walking on the ceiling.



I also added a function to load map files that I'm creating with an external tool, so I can make better looking levels very easily:



Yay.

Progress Update

Not a lot has changed yet, but there's been some progress:
- Basic gravity.
- Basic tile collision.
- Very basic map generation.
- A few more animation frames.



Yay.

Kid Dracula Something

I started a new game today: I think I want to make something like SotN, but based on the NES Kid Dracula engine. It'll be named Kid Dracula Gaiden or something like that... Or probably not: it's a very stupid name and I'm still not sure if I want to use a copyrighted character.



Anyway, today I ripped a few tiles of scenery and a couple of animation frames for the main character. I also programmed a quick animation routine, so he can already move left and right.

If I keep using the Kid Dracula theme in the future, I want to improve the NES graphics at some point... Maybe redo them at 320x240 and 256 colors. But I'm afraid I will be pretty busy with real-life work during these next weeks, so this one will be just a very minor side-project to kill some free time.