Magna Braben

• KingMike (insertion)

• Tomato (translation)

• Gideon Zhi (provided DTE hack)

• Game title: Magna Braban: Henriki no Yusya

• Released in Japan in 1994 by Ask Kodansha

• Game Format: 1,536KB (12 megabit) Super Famicom cartridge.

• Game Type: RPG

Game screens:

This is a standard SNES RPG, with good graphics. It also has an original battle mode. You don't command your characters during battle.  By default, they will automatically fight. When you want them to do something, like cast a spell, or use an item, then you break in, direct them, and then sit back and watch. This "hands-free" battle system is a nice change from other games (helpful when you are just fighting to build EXP, since you won't have to keep mashing the enter button over and over.

I currently have 1 script awaiting translation.

Monday, 5/14/2001 to 5/18/2001

    I am just starting this project. I am currently making scripts for any translators to pick up. 

Friday, 5/18/2001

    I'm attempting to decode the menu screens. Please somebody help with that.

Monday, 5/28/2001

    Name screen worked on. I can put the whole alphabet on one page, but what would I do with the second page. Maybe symbols. I'll decide later.

    I found the text pointers. Hopefully, I can insert text, without reducing quality (I hope!). I'll start anew on insertion. Yes, pointers work. But, I can't find space nearby. Need help moving text elsewhere in the ROM.

Menu screen. Text encoded.

Later 5/28/2001

Names in dialogue expanded. Had to overwrite data. Hope it wasn't important stuff.

6/15/2001

Magic skills inserted. Items list created. More dialouge screens.

Saturday, June 30, 2001

A couple screens, showcasing LIMITED menu work:

A FEW things on the menu screen are hackable, but much of the menu text is encoded, and can't be changed at the moment.

The text on this screen can be translated and inserted.	Just the spell descriptions are possible to insert right now.
The options (on the right can be translated), but not the "default" names. (In the first line mo - y - ra - ru changes to Mono when selected, and in the second line p - b - pu - A changes to TypA when selected.

Also, while I haven't done the battle text yet, I believe text could also be inserted easily.

7/7/2001

A couple dialouge shots, to show I'm getting work on this game done.

Still a roadblock in playing. Now I must find a different route through the dungeon.

7/8/2001

Yeah!! Passed that dungeoun (thanks Tomato!). And to celebrate, a couple excerpts from the next scene:

Yeah, that last one is a grammatical error. I'll fix later.

11/6/2001

Long time, no update. I've recieved a DTE hack, so I'll apply it, once I finish the table, then insert some new text. I'll post new screens later.

11/15/2001

Yeah!! I think I cracked the menu (finally)! For now, my belief is that the text is not compressed, just stored as graphics (using the same font table as the dialouge). Screenshots tomarrow. (Of course, I won't post until tomarrow, so shots will probably accompany this update!)

• ASM Work, including:

            - Menu screens (decrypting menu text-code)

            - Battle Tactics screen, fourth sub-menu, listed as "KHN - n" for now, where I'd need the text output rearranged to show <verb string> <item name>. Instead of the other way around. For example, "ShortSD Strike with" needs ASM re-coding, I believe, to become become "Strike with ShortSD".

Scripts have been done in MS Word format. Each is in MS Mincho font (which is a special font, and requires MS Office Japanese Text Support (search the Internet for jpnsupp.exe), or a Japanese computer I suppose.

For each file, I dumped the raw hex for that section to a .TXT file, opened in Word, and tediously converted each hex to its proper kana.

Note to any translator who picks up the script: 

• File size listed is how big the DOC file is (larger due to formating).

• Hex bytes in the middle of dialouge, like <$F5> for example, I believe are control codes (probably name pointers, but I haven't checked yet), and when I get to editing names, they should be changed throughout the game, and then I could just insert around the codes. 

• <PAUSE> means this is the control code to tell the game to pause until the player pushes "A", then clear the text window, and begin printing the next few lines of text. So, if translation can be done around these codes, it shoulsd be alright.

• Yes, I'm sure that the random bytes left in the script are placeholders for names. I believe <$f4> by itself signifies the player's name should be placed there. Others, such as <$F5><$05> signify other character names.

Interested in translating? E-mail me. Thanks.

Download v0.11 patch (roughly 11% done).