Fan translation: Difference between revisions

A '''fan translation''' is, in the context of video games, an unofficially translated version of a video game, usually created by a fan or fans of the game in question. Fan translations of console games are almost universally accomplished by modifying a [[wikipedia:ROM image|ROM image]] of the game in question by way of hacking, then creating a patch for a clean ROM image which applies the fan translation. The end result is then played on an emulator program, like a normal ROM image, or for those with the ability to do so, can be transferred into a game copier cartridge to be used on the game's native hardware.

In the {{FES}}, fan translations are particularly important, as only seven of the fourteen games have so far been given official international releases; combined with the sheer age of the games in question, using ROM images is often the only option. While there are generally numerous patches of various ages available for each game, they vary drastically in quality, and as such there is one translation for each game which is widely considered to be "the" translation to use. As of November 2012, all seven Japan-only games have functional fan translation patches which provide a near-complete translation of the game's script; in some patches, there remain elements (mainly graphical text) which have yet to be translated.

'''It should be noted that the possession of ROM images of video games is illegal. While prosecution over possessing them is highly unlikely and has never happened before, you do so at your own risk.''' For this reason, Fire Emblem Wiki will neither host ROM images, nor point in the direction of them; as it stands, they are easy enough to find without assistance. Fire Emblem Wiki encourages readers to support the official releases of these games, should they ever occur in the future.

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Ironically, the original NES ''Shadow Dragon'' was the last of the pre-{{FE7}} games to be given a serious attempt at a fan translation; this was largely because of the existence of {{title|Mystery of the Emblem}} and later {{title|Shadow Dragon}} rendering the game obsolete and unnecessary in the eyes of many. For a long time, all that existed were a number of scattered and rudimentary efforts, with none approaching a complete product and plagued with errors. As such, it was not until 2010 that a translation attempt was announced by ''Quirino''.<ref name="arhtannounce">YouTube: [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJ-Mkp9K2Ms Fire Emblem NES Translation Announcement] (retrieved 22 May 2012)</ref> The patch was completed comparatively soon after, in February 2011.

Though the patch is claimed by ''Quirino'' to be only 99% complete, the translation is entirely complete and operational. The names used in the translation are the same as those used in the ''Mystery of the Emblem'' translation, the most common unofficial names for the characters before the release of ''Shadow Dragon''; ''Quirino'' has stated, however, that in the next revision of the patch he releases, the names will be changed to be in line with the official names from ''Shadow Dragon''.<ref name="arhtupdate">Serenes Forest Forums: [http://serenesforest.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=31680&view=findpost&p=1954399 Improving the Genealogy Translation Patch] (retrieved 23 May 2012)</ref>

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Like the NES ''Shadow Dragon'', ''Gaiden'' was one of the more neglected games in terms of fan translation for many years. Though several translation patches existed, none were complete and possessed many other problems. With this in mind, a complete patch was released by ''Artemis251'' in 2009, commenced in September and completed within a month.

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A fan translation for {{title|Mystery of the Emblem}} was completed in 2008, translated by ''VincentASM'' with hacking by ''RPGuy96''. The patch is far from perfect - the translation is rough, menu text is not translated in numerous places, and there are numerous glitches (for example, attempting to use the [[Geosphere]] will crash the game). Though there are numerous problems with the patch, it cannot be updated - ''VincentASM'' has stated on several occasions that since ''RPGuy96'' has all but disappeared, so too have the tools to modify the patch, and there's no chance of him being able to update the patch. ''VincentASM'' went on to work on the fan translation for this game's remake, {{title|New Mystery of the Emblem}}.

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''Genealogy of the Holy War'' was the first ''Fire Emblem'' game to receive a fan translation. The earliest translation was started in 2000<ref name="j2eearly">Romhacking.net: [http://www.romhacking.net/translations/358/ Translations - Fire Emblem: Genealogy of Holy War] (retrieved 22 May 2012)</ref> by the group ''j2e Renegade'', with its last release under this group being in 2002;<ref name="j2e">Romhacking.net: [http://www.romhacking.net/translations/359/ Translations - Fire Emblem: Genealogy of Holy War] (retrieved 22 May 2012)</ref> however, it was left vastly incomplete with many issues, described by the creators as "not to be enjoyed".<ref name="reparation">Dark Twilkitri Net: "[http://darktwilkitri.thegreatbeyond.net/dtntd_fireemblem4.php Fire Emblem 4 Translation Homepage]" (retrieved 21 May 2012)</ref> At some point, the group died and their website (http://fe4trans.freeshell.org/) became defunct; after several years of other efforts to try and fix its problems, ''DarkTwilkitri'' picked up the patch and updated it to fix some of its problems, calling his patches "Reparation". The last of these releases was "Reparation 0.87d", in December 2006; afterward he admitted to losing interest in further developing the patch.

On April 6, 2012, years after the release of the previous version, ''Twilkitri'' released a new version of the patch, "Reparation 0.87e".<ref name="serlis">Serenes Forest Forums: "[http://serenesforest.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=31680 Improving the Genealogy Translation Patch]" (retrieved 21 May 2012)</ref> In addition to fixing a number of bugs and errors, its main purpose was to bring the patch into consistency with official English releases of the series. Two further revisions were since been released, with the final release being "Reparation 0.87g".<ref name="serlisg">Serenes Forest Forums: "[http://serenesforest.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=31680&view=findpost&p=1968810 Improving the Genealogy Translation Patch - Page 9]" (retrieved 21 May 2012)</ref> As ''Twilkitri'' is Australian, the translation script uses Australian English spellings, such as "Armo'''u'''r Knight". In May 2013, as ''Twilkitri'' has not yet updated the patch to reflect the ''Awakening'' international release, a [[wikipedia:Fork (software development)|fork]] revision of the patch was produced by Serenes Forest user ''Gharnef'', taking the "Reparation 0.87g" release and updating it to use the ''Awakening'' name changes and to revert other names to the Nintendo of Japan official romanizations.<ref>Serenes Forest Forums: "[http://serenesforest.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=39994 Gharnef's Improved FE4 Translation Patch]"</ref>  

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There are two patches of note for ''Thracia 776'', each with a different focus. The first and lesser-known one is a menu patch by ''Luxifer Angel'', last updated in 2003, which translates only the menu text and leaves the dialogue untouched.<ref name="luxifer">Romhacking.net: [http://www.romhacking.net/translations/624/ Translations - Fire Emblem: Thrakia 776] (sic) (retrieved 22 May 2012)</ref> The other, later and primary patch was the work of ''Shaya''; this patch is something of the opposite to the ''Luxifer Angel'' patch, in that it fully translates the game's script, but some of the menus are left untranslated and in a questionable state. It was last updated in 2008, with ''Shaya'' claiming no intent to do so again because of the interference of life. In recent times, the ''Shaya'' translation has been criticized for its lacklustre and often erroneous script, gratuitous and out-of-place memetic references (for example, [[Kempf]] spontaneously declaring "IN AMERICA!" in [[Dandrum Fortress|Chapter 11]]), the poor quality of its menu translations (such as a majority of options being displayed as garbled text), and for the bugs of various degrees of severity caused by the above errors.

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At the time, coming off the heels of the attention garnered by [[Roy]]'s appearance in {{SSBM}} and the international release of {{FE7}}, it was assumed and hoped by some that an official translation of ''The Binding Blade'' would soon follow. When such a release failed to eventuate, a fan translation project began, developed by ''DarkTwilkitri'''s "DTN Translation Division". The patch was first released in 2005 under the title ''Sword of Seals'', with development continuing until 2007 and the last stable release being distributed in 2006; progress ended in 2007 when the members of the team found less and less time to work on the project.

The translation was largely complete in its last release, albeit in a relatively primitive state. This led to a revision project in 2013 by ''gringe'' of the Serenes Forest forums, an experienced manga translator. The project, now calling the game by its modern name ''The Binding Blade'', retranslated and rewrote the script, cleaned up the graphics and other facets of the patch's presentation, and implemented official name changes from {{FE13}}, intending to result in a more polished patch. The patch is complete for all practical purposes and features a bevy of newly-translated features, including the game's class roll and the opening narration; remaining bugs and presentation issues were fixed in a final 1.0 release.<ref>Serenes Forest Forums: [http://serenesforest.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=41095 FE6 Translation Patch Redux v0.99c - Seriously, we did something] (retrieved November 30th, 2014)</ref>

! style="{{roundt}}; border-left:1px solid {{Color2}}; border-right:1px solid {{Color2}}; border-top:1px solid {{Color2}}; background:{{Color3}}; font-size: 13px;"| [[File:Ss fe12 fan translation athena support.png|200px]]<br><small>In-progress screenshot of an [[Athena]]/[[Avatar (New Mystery of the Emblem)|Kris]] [[support]]</small>

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''New Mystery of the Emblem'' is the first game since international releases of the series began to not be released internationally. While it was initially expected that it would be, this expectation was not met, and so one year following the Japanese release, prominent ''Fire Emblem'' hacker ''Blazer'' convened a team of translators, editors and hackers to do a fan translation, calling themselves the "Heroes of Shadow"; the team was later led by ''VincentASM'' as ''Blazer'' had to leave to contend with real-life issues. The team's goal with the patch was to create a complete and highly polished translation and localization on par with the official ''Shadow Dragon'' release. A preliminary menu patch was released on July 15th, 2011, near-completely translating menus and names, while leaving dialogue untouched, and no further releases were issued until the translation was 100% complete, bug-tested and polished,<ref name="fe12faq">Fire Emblem 12 Translation [HoS]: [http://www.heroesofshadow.net/p/faq.html FAQ] (retrieved May 22nd, 2012)</ref> with the first "complete" release occurring on November 21st, 2012.<ref name="fe12complete">Fire Emblem 12 Translation [HoS]: [http://www.heroesofshadow.net/2012/11/complete-translation-patch-released.html Complete translation patch released!] (retrieved January 29th, 2013)</ref>

From even before it became evident that a fan translation would be necessary, the patch's development progress was profiled on [http://www.heroesofshadow.net/ the Heroes of Shadow blog]. For a time, in addition to the blog, the patch's progress was also maintained in [http://serenesforest.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=27426 a thread on Serenes Forest], allowing for ease of discussion on the matter; however, eventually the thread was closed as it was dominated by an endless argument about name changes, mainly "[[Belf]]" to "Vergil" and "[[Malliesia]]" to "Malicia".<ref name="heroesserenesclose">Serenes Forest Forums: [http://serenesforest.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=27426&view=findpost&p=1851271 Fire Emblem 12 ~Heroes~ Translation Project] (retrieved 22 May 2012)</ref> The controversy surrounding the "Vergil" name has been extensively mocked and parodied by members of the Serenes Forest community, and the act of satirically suggesting changing a name to "Vergil" in fan translation has evolved memetically and regularly appears in the efforts to clean up the ''Genealogy of the Holy War'', ''Thracia 776'' and ''The Binding Blade'' translations.

|style="border:none; background-color:{{Color3}}"|[[Avatar (New Mystery of the Emblem)|Kris]]

[[Category:Localization]][[Category:Fire Emblem universe]]