Another localization project in the can! 100% in English with dub!! :)

  

Details

Well, where to begin... This project had quite a few setbacks but persistence paid off! It originally began with Akimaru, my good pal, but I later took over as he could no longer continue it. Let's see, what got me started was purchasing Ys IV from www.tzd.com back in December 1996 and I always kept the experience with me. Mainly, I always lamented that I couldn't enjoy it in English, but that all changed with the romhacking position I was in post-2001 after starting the Xak III project.

Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine I'd one day help bring it to the US shores, it was inconceivable! Sure, by today's standards, it's an average Action-RPG, but it really was a gem of a series back then which is likely harder for today's gamers to appreciate. I still remember finally managing to beat it years later, having gotten stuck due to the language barrier, and it was actully thanks to a guide by B.J.DeuceBag (Jeff Nussbaum) on GameFAQs, an absolutely DISGUSTING, vile, lying, callous, cyber-criminal cheat who'd one day wind up helping to translate for the project... A series of unfortunate coincidences as it all turned out in the end... Anyway, I doubt I could ever fully convey in words all the tribulations and joy that I experienced in undertaking this project... Sadly, I didn't keep a more tidy log of things to provide a better history, but I added a lot to the ReadMe for now.

Screen shots

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Overview

Ys IV: The Dawn of Ys was released in Japan on December 22, 1993, the product of what would be the final partnership between Falcom and Hudson Soft. Rather than repeat the disappointing side-scrolling mistake of Ys III, they went back to the overheard formula of Ys Book I & II and rightfully so! The soundtrack is also just as legendary as its predecessors with Ryo Yonemitsu returning to the helm. All in all, it does not disappoint and is worth every penny you pay for it! Storyline: Two years after defeating Darm and bringing peace to Esteria, Adol returns to the town of Minea with his companion in adventure, Dogi. Everything seems fine as friends are reunited and the people hail their hero, but there’s an unseen evil looming in the air. As Adol goes to the seer Sara, she tells him of an even greater darkness in the land of Celceta and asks the red-haired swordsman to go there and seek the truth behind this mystery. Thus, Adol steals away unnoticed in the middle of the night to embark on his next adventure. In Celceta, Adol will learn of the Romun Empire’s ambitions, fight the mysterious Clan of Darkness that seeks to ressurect their long dead leader, and discover the ancient history of Celceta itself as well as its connection to the land of Ys. The last survivor of a forgotten race of winged beings holds the power that may bring back darkness to the land, and only Adol will be able to stop it. (By Ranzor)

Downloads

1. Ys IV English Dub v1.1.zip - The long awaited dubbing patch making this game finally playable in 100% English 8 years after the 1st failed attempt! We did it!!! You must apply both this and the text patch for now!
2. YsIV(US)v95.zip - PPF-based English text patch for an Ys IV ISO/WAV/CUE image file set.
3. YsIVScriptHTMLData.zip - Please use this to proofread the script and email me back any recommendations for improvement. Thanks!
4. YS4_DUB_KITv2.zip - The Ys IV Dub Kit, the sequel to YsIVADPCM.zip and what made dubbing possible! It allows you to both extract and insert all the ADPCM voice-acting clips from an Ys IV data track. The data track (track 2) must be ripped in MODE1/2048 form (use my TurboRip) and you must edit the batch file included to point to whatever name you then give the track file thereafter.
5. YsIVhack.zip - Eh, your choice to try using this/if you want it or not. It's a Perl script, so you need Windows Perl runtimes installed. It'll hack a MagicEngine or YAME save state file so when you load it next time, you'll have full EXP, Gold and all weapons/items. If using MagicEngine, save state compression needs to be turned off and you need to figure out which save state file to use which will be named by the CRC32 of the data track. The last modified date can help you figure that out.

Links

• FantasyAnime's lovely screenshot-heavy Ys IV tribute!
• The newly translated Ys IV Developer Interview Collection
• Ys IV Review by RPGFan.com
• Ys IV Review by The Brothers Duomazov
• The Online PC Engine Catalog Project

Progress

-Tuesday, December 25, 2012

Merrrrry Christmas folks!! Well, ladies and gentlemen, I am pleased to finally take the time given the occasion to report that 8+ years and 2 failed attempts later, this dubbing project has FINALLY been completed thanks to a fella, BurntLasagna/Mike, stepping up to the plate and going all the way!!! Hallelujah! 3rd time's a charm, right? Well, hard to believe, but it finally happened!

>>> Download details can be found here! <<<

-Saturday, December 25, 2004

Ho ho ho! Merry Christmas! Guess what? The Ys IV Christmastime patch, version .95, is here! w00t!!! Talent on loan from Goooooddddd, baby. =) Oh and don't mind the version value. This is completely translated, but I'm essentially not marking it 100% in case someone finds any line that deserves a tweak or two (I expect feedback from you lazies in exchange for this release). Also, you'll wanna know to come back for when our ADPCM dubs go public. Anyhow, pull that Turbo Duo out of the closest and dust it off or get your emulator ready for another adventure with Adol Christin!! And away we go: YsIV(US)v95.zip

Addendum: Forget about the dubbing project. That idea is over with.

-Sunday, October 24, 2004

After working with Justus, I now have 8 ADPCM audio clips (of the 232 in total) that inserted fine. I haven't felt like updating this in awhile even though a lots been going on. To bring you up to speed, he came onboard the project awhile ago offering his sound engineering services. He found a pretty good female voice for the Karna character which I think works out nicely. On the script end, it looks like a new patch release is imminent if I get everything I want in the readme file. It'll be good enough to be called a RC1 at this point as I don't foresee any future tweaking need. Any dub patch will be separate and released sometime in the future.

-Thursday, September 23, 2004

All ADPCM audio for the voice-acting has been dumped using Dave's tool. With this, we're possibly thinking of doing dubs. It'll all depend on what B.J.DeuceBag can do, so we'll see. It's gonna be tedious...

-Wednesday, August 18, 2004

UMMMMM! WOW! After Dave found the code related to the font, we worked on it for awhile and finally, it happened!!! As you can see, full lowercase support is now enabled with no bugs thus far. Fantastical!!
<Howard Dean>Yeaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh!</Howard Dean>.

-Tuesday, August 10, 2004

Thought I'd throw this up. I've been trying to hack the font routine these past few days. I discovered the font tiles weren't compressed after all. There happens to be space for a full ASCII alphabet set, but figuring out how to hack the code is another matter. D-boy helped with getting me the Courrier font, and David Shadoff will hopefully take a look at the code. I've decided to try and learn some PCE ASM so I'll see what I can do myself. Hope is on the way, it seems, with regards to this issue...

-Sunday, August 1, 2004

Patch version .57 released. Minea Town and Promalock are finished; technically, 4267 strings are unfinished out of a total of 9929. Massive duplicates result in the high percentage rate, so it doesn't mean script wise, it's 57% complete (Don't let it fool you is essentially what I'm saying).

-Sunday, July 25, 2004

B.J.DeuceBag finished the Ys IV script today and so I began some string insertions for the first town of Promalock.

-As of late

B.J.DeuceBag is around 67.1% or more past reviewing Shimaru's original translation work and finishing off any untranslated strings... I've released the first patch ever for this wonderful title that translates locations, weapons, and items.... Just a teaser, if you will, but something to keep the hope alive :).

Turbo Tips

What if I told you getting to play this game in English was as easy as simply extracting the patch archive? MagicEngine supports two of my PPF patches directly to avoid having to go through the hassle of ripping an original Ys IV disc, patching it, and reburning it! Just follow the simple instructions below:

1. Download the latest MagicEngine v1.XX emulator and extract it to some permanent install folder of your choosing. Note: This feature is not supported with earlier versions. You can purchase a license for a mere €15 EUR if you haven't already.
2. Download the YsIV(US)v95.zip file listed below and simply extract it in the same folder as pce.exe, your MagicEngine folder. You really just need the "YsIV-ISO.ppf" file to remain with pce.exe. That's it!
3. Now, simply load your original Ys IV disc into your drive or mount an image of it with Daemon Tools if you prefer to run it smoothly/quickly from the hard drive. Boot the game and voila! Guess what? It's all English! It's being patched-on-the-fly saving you all that headache of ripping/patching it yourself as mentioned.

Credits

• (El NightWolve)
  Project Manager/Producer/Programmer/Script Editor, etc. (Plus, the guy missing the most hours of sleep here... :) It's OK, I'll catch up on my sleep when I'm dead.)
• Neill Corlett
  Programmer/Hacker; originally started work on this game and left us the Ys4 decompression code along with some notes/code analysis. The first to dump the script!
• David Shadoff
  Programmer/Hacker; wrote the Ys IV compression code and font hacked for 8x12 lowercase support!! Also, amazingly enough, he handled the ADPCM dump/insert utilities to allow for re-dubbing.
• Akimaru (Mika Peurala)
  That crazy Finnish guy who provided some quickie translations and was the original founder of this project along with Neill.
• Shimarisu (Rachel Seleski)
  Our first translator. She's a loyal & hard working Ys/Falcom fan that's been a great asset. After a PC crash, she managed to recover her lost translation work which covered about 94% of the script.
• Sugimo
  For providing a transcription of all spoken dialogue in Japanese which allowed for eventual translation to English and dubbing.
• Jeff "DeuceBag" Nussbaum (AKA "The X.X.XSEED Cock-Flasher") - Or, to be accurate, WWWJDIC
  Just a two-bit, bigoted, callous, criminal cunt that needs to be brought to justice and never should've been allowed to work on the project!
• Derrick Sobodash (D-BOY)
  Courrier font tiles & font conversion tool. His knowledge on fonts was indispensable. Bravo, D!
• Justus Johnston
  1st Dub Director (2004) - Attempted to direct the dubbing aspect of the Ys IV translation project back in 2004. The selection of his friend, Chris Adams, to play Dogi back then was ultimately the best choice and he was able to get him to re-record all his lines again for this 3rd and successful attempt! A few other characters dubbed from that 1st attempt, such as Dr. Flair, also were reprised in this finished dub. The very awesome "Darm v. Adol" opening battle dubbing work was produced by him as well.
• Michael G. (Burnt Lasagna)
  3rd Dub Director (2012) - Final and most successful dub director completing all unfinished voice directing/syncing/mixing/etc.
• mjmmx (Mike), ViperD
  BETA testing/script corrections.