Trying to create a Japanese to English in-game text modification to Donkey Kong Jungle Beat...but struggling a little..

Hi, Im new here. This is also my first try at something like this(Translate all the Japanese text in a Wii game to English text).

Ive posted over on GBATemp. but due to everyone talking backup loaders and their issues getting xxxxxx game to run they post is getting pushed back through the pages ans not seen.

Ill copy what ive posted so far, as it shows my progress.

If you can help in anyway, please Id appreicate your comments.

------------------------------------------------------------
Link [gbatemp.net]

Hi,
Since DK:JB is only out in Japanese at the moment, with no determined release date for USA or EUR. I thought id have a go at translating all the Japanese text in the game to English.

So far ive managed the following with no real trouble.
Have Disc Image, extracted directories and files.
Located 2-3 .arc files that I believe contain the text for the game;
These are: Font.arc, Home.arc and message.arc
Each of the 3 files are compresses arc containers, by viewing the files directly in a Hex editor - I can see they are Compressed with Yaz0.

Found a Yaz0 decoder and encoder at [www.amnoid.de]
My next step is to try and decode the files and see whats inside... ill update once i know.

*Update:
Well,I managed to decode the message.arc file, into a message.rarc file. using Yaz0Dec.exe
Then decoded the message.rarc file using RarcDump.exe, the output from this was 3 files
..\message.rarc_dir\jpjapanese\messageid.tbl
..\message.rarc_dir\jpjapanese\struct.tbl
..\message.rarc_dir\jpjapanese\jpjapanese\message.bmg

Is anyone familar with .BMG or .TBL files?

The 2 tbl files show nothing interested as the first few bytes in a hex editor.. whilst the bmg file shows 'MESGbmg1' as the first 8 characters.


I'l update when i know more... Please feel free to comment.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/21/2008 07:26PM by dan8310x.

hmm... not sure how many people from around here will know how to help, but I'll be looking forward to reading your progress!

Why don't you just wait until an Engish version comes out/is announced?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/21/2008 10:36PM by Arikado.

Because it's there!

Plus this could lead to translations of other Wii games that won't be coming over, like Captain Rainbow.

I too want to see where you get on this. So consider this a bump of interest.

I see this as a challenge. Plus I was thinking, if I can do this with DK:JB. I'll learn, and may be able to do other Japanese only Wii Titles. Create Patches for 1:1 disc copies and then everyone can benefit from English (Or another langauge) on the games that we would not have been able to understand.

Only problem I see, is that in order to pull this off you'll need to run the game as a backup. Most people who would patch, probably wont own the original game. So I really don't support this type of work.

cheers for your comments anyway. I'll just have to 'truck-on' and see how far I can get on my own. Though I did not intent to break any forum rules. hence my comments in my original post, about getting nowhere on GBAtemp cause of all the backup loader talk going on there.

The advise/assistance im really looking for is in understand the file types used on Wii Games, and from there having a strong enough understanding to edit the content.

There are some(albeit not many) out of region games that some collecters/fanatics would appreicate in their native language.
Thanks again.

Quote
Arikado
Only problem I see, is that in order to pull this off you'll need to run the game as a backup. Most people who would patch, probably wont own the original game. So I really don't support this type of work.

that was my first thought too... but maybe it could be like a real time patch through a HB app! Like snes games...
Ocarina cna do cheats, maybe a dev could create an "Ocarina" for language changing...

Is this something that Gecko OS can do using the Ocarina cheat system?
What what I thought, Ocarina is capable of changing the values of certain variables whilst in game....

But im looking at changing the values of constants, strings on the Disc itself that contain Japanese writing... and over typing those with English words.

If anyone knows anything that would be helpful, in assisting me.... Id be very grateful.

I was using Ocarina as an example... I don't think it would do... we would need a new app... but YOU ought to keep working on the translation!

That does sound like something useful a homebrew app could possibly do. I think an approach similar to Gecko OS would still work, because eventually the strings do have to get loaded into memory before being displayed and at that point you can modify them with whatever method Gecko OS uses. Unfortunately, I don't know the technical details behind Gecko OS so I can't help any more than that, but I think it is possible. It would be very cool to see a general purpose homebrew translating app though.

Ive found the Text String for the game (I think), just need someone else to verify this...? (Please)

Location:
\JpJapanese\MessageData\message.arc ----> decoded into ------>
message.rarc ----> decoded into ------>
\jpjapanese\jpjapanese\message.bmg

Im now stuck, because the Hex Editor im using - im new to. UltraEdit displays the characters as garbage. rather than the Kana(Or whatever) language characters for the Japanese writing.. which is making it impossible to translate..
Does anyone know how I get the hex edit software to display the Japanese characters?

I feel like im almost there..... right on the edge of this..its so fustrating.
I plan on making a small simple change, recoding the iso back together and testing on my Wii to see if the change in Characters are displayed on screen... but without the above...well you know.

Reply Quote

Quote
dan8310x
Ive found the Text String for the game (I think), just need someone else to verify this...? (Please)

Location:
\JpJapanese\MessageData\message.arc ----> decoded into ------>
message.rarc ----> decoded into ------>
\jpjapanese\jpjapanese\message.bmg

Im now stuck, because the Hex Editor im using - im new to. UltraEdit displays the characters as garbage. rather than the Kana(Or whatever) language characters for the Japanese writing.. which is making it impossible to translate..
Does anyone know how I get the hex edit software to display the Japanese characters?

I feel like im almost there..... right on the edge of this..its so fustrating.
I plan on making a small simple change, recoding the iso back together and testing on my Wii to see if the change in Characters are displayed on screen... but without the above...well you know.

here is a thought... I have done some Guitar Hero hacking which allows me to put on my own songs into he game. It also changes the song NAME in the menu and when the songs starts... maybe you can contact the guys who figured out how and put together the apps and see about the text part...

check scorehero.com

*Update:
Found a BMG file format document on the net (Well actually one of my friends off-line found it for me-and emailed it over, so I dont know the source).

Im still trying to understand it completely......

                                             
BMG File Format
Text is encoded using UTF-16LE

0000 = MESGbmg1
0008 = 2 bytes that represent the address of the FLW1 tag
0010-001F = ?
0020 = INF1
0024 = 2 bytes to represent the size of the INF1 block
0028 = 2 bytes to represent the number of pointers in the file
002A-002F = ?
0030-0037+ = The first pointer, The first two bytes represent the offset from the beginning of the DAT1 block, next 4 bytes are "00000002" for unknown reasons, last two bytes represent the number off lines that may be printed at a time during dialog.  (Pointers are listed one right after the next)

DAT1 block: first two bytes after the title represent the size of the block

FLW1 block: first two bytes after the title represent the size of the block

FLI1 block: first two bytes after the title represent the size of the block

Special Characters:

1A0008010A000300XXXX = load character XXXX slowly.
1A00080114000000 = instant load characters until linebreak
1A0008010A000F00

(should be the only hover over char codes)
1A000EFF020001WWWWXXXXYYYY00ZZZZ = print ZZZZ with WWWWXXXXYYYY as a hover over
1A000CFF020001WWWWXXXX00ZZZZ = print ZZZZ with WWWWXXXX as a hover over
1A000AFF020001WWWW00ZZZZ = print ZZZZ with WWWW as a hover over

1A0014FF020002SSSSTTTTUUUUVVVVWWWWXXXX00YYYYZZZZ = print YYYYZZZZ with SSSSTTTTUUUUVVVVWWWWXXXX as a hover over
1A0012FF020002TTTTUUUUVVVVWWWWXXXX00YYYYZZZZ = print YYYYZZZZ with TTTTUUUUVVVVWWWWXXXX as a hover over
1A0010FF020002UUUUVVVVWWWWXXXX00YYYYZZZZ = print YYYYZZZZ with UUUUVVVVWWWWXXXX as a hover over
1A000EFF020002VVVVWWWWXXXX00YYYYZZZZ = print YYYYZZZZ with VVVVWWWWXXXX as a hover over

1A00WWFF0200XXYYYY00ZZZZ = display WxYYYY as a hover over for XXxZZZZ

1A0008FF00000000XXXXYYYYZZZZ = black text for XXXXYYYYZZZZ
1A0008FF00000100XXXXYYYYZZZZ = red text for XXXXYYYYZZZZ
1A0008FF00000200XXXXYYYYZZZZ = green text for XXXXYYYYZZZZ
1A0008FF00000300XXXXYYYYZZZZ = blue text for XXXXYYYYZZZZ

1A0006FE0000 = Character Name
01FF = !

1A0008011400 = ? i need to figure this out
1A000EFF0200 = ? i need to figure this out
1A000CFF0200 = ? i need to figure this out

???

???

???

???????????????
?????????????????


???
?

B???? ? ????0???   ???

00000748 |             00 00 1A 00 |     .... |   ..
00000750 | 0A FF 02 00 01 51 30 00 | .ÿ...Q0. | ?.?0
00000758 | 88 6D 57 30 5F 30 C7 30 | ˆmW0_0Ç0 | ????
00000760 | FC 30 BF 30 6F 30 1A 00 | ü0¿0o0.. | ???.
00000768 | 0C FF 02 00 01 82 30 68 | .ÿ...‚0h | ?.??
00000770 | 30 00 43 51 6B 30 1A 00 | 0.CQk0.. | 0??.
00000778 | 0C FF 02 00 01 82 30 69 | .ÿ...‚0i | ?.??
00000780 | 30 00 3B 62 8A 30 7E 30 | 0.;bŠ0~0 | 0???
00000788 | 5B 30 93 30 4C 30 0A 00 | [0“0L0.. | ???.
00000790 | 54 00 65 00 73 00 74 00 | T.e.s.t. | Test
00000798 | 69 00 6E 00 67 00 1A 00 | i.n.g... | ing.
000007A0 | 0A FF 02 00 01 51 30 00 | .ÿ...Q0. | ?.?0
000007A8 | 88 6D 54 00 65 00 73 00 | ˆmT.e.s. | ?Tes
000007B0 | 74 00 1F FF 0A 00       | t..ÿ..   | t?. 

.?.?0?

00001A000AFF020001513000886D57305F30C730FC30BF306F301A000CFF020001823068300043516B301A000CFF02000182306930003B628A307E305B3093304C300A00540065007300740069006E0067001A000AFF020001513000886D54006500730074001FFF0A00

Did you ever finish the translation and make an app for homebrew

It's been almost two years; I don't think anything has come out of this.
You shouldn't revive dead topics.

Can't this be achieved with Riivolution?