"A Life M36 Planet: MotherBrain has been aliving" fan-trans!
Sept 9, 2017 18:25:29 GMT -5
Post by wyrdwad on Sept 9, 2017 18:25:29 GMT -5
A while back, some of you may recall me posting about my discovery of an MSX1 game called "A Life M36 Planet: MotherBrain has been aliving." Well, I was so amused by the Engrish name that I *had* to try it out, and immediately did so the first chance I got.
I was expecting a Metroid clone from the short videos I could find online, but what I wound up getting was something much more ambitious and atmospheric -- kind of like a sci-fi equivalent to the NES classic "Faxanadu."
So I wrote a full walkthrough for the game a couple months back, in which I casually translated all the dialogue (since there's not a tremendous amount)... and to my surprise, a project to fan-translate the game rom using my text almost *immediately* popped up.
...Well, that project has now completed, and it wound up ballooning into something bigger than I ever could've predicted. Not only is there a fan-translation patch, but it includes fixes to some rather major bugs that plagued the original Japanese release, and another user of the MSX.org forums created patches allowing for invincibility and superjump on top of that. Still another user created a Java-based password generator for the game, and HG101's own MP83 (who helped immensely in proofing and beta-testing the English fan-translation this whole time) created a trailer to advertise the patch, and is working on a full game map now.
Here's his trailer:
Then my friend Brandi (Brandchan, for you old-school HG101ers) got involved, adapting the updated version of my original walkthrough into a snazzy html site!
So... I figured I'd share that all here -- in the form of the above trailer link, as well as the html version of my walkthrough, since that includes links to all the aforementioned things (aside from the full game map, which isn't QUITE done yet, but will be added when it is).
Here it is:
forgottenkings.tripod.com/m36.html
Check it out, watch the trailer, and if it looks like something you might enjoy, I'd urge you to give it a look! It's glitchy and flickery, but has three things in spades: ambition, atmosphere, and charm. And those three things more than make up for any of its shortcomings IMHO.
Hope you guys end up enjoying it!
-Tom
I was expecting a Metroid clone from the short videos I could find online, but what I wound up getting was something much more ambitious and atmospheric -- kind of like a sci-fi equivalent to the NES classic "Faxanadu."
So I wrote a full walkthrough for the game a couple months back, in which I casually translated all the dialogue (since there's not a tremendous amount)... and to my surprise, a project to fan-translate the game rom using my text almost *immediately* popped up.
...Well, that project has now completed, and it wound up ballooning into something bigger than I ever could've predicted. Not only is there a fan-translation patch, but it includes fixes to some rather major bugs that plagued the original Japanese release, and another user of the MSX.org forums created patches allowing for invincibility and superjump on top of that. Still another user created a Java-based password generator for the game, and HG101's own MP83 (who helped immensely in proofing and beta-testing the English fan-translation this whole time) created a trailer to advertise the patch, and is working on a full game map now.
Here's his trailer:
Then my friend Brandi (Brandchan, for you old-school HG101ers) got involved, adapting the updated version of my original walkthrough into a snazzy html site!
So... I figured I'd share that all here -- in the form of the above trailer link, as well as the html version of my walkthrough, since that includes links to all the aforementioned things (aside from the full game map, which isn't QUITE done yet, but will be added when it is).
Here it is:
forgottenkings.tripod.com/m36.html
Check it out, watch the trailer, and if it looks like something you might enjoy, I'd urge you to give it a look! It's glitchy and flickery, but has three things in spades: ambition, atmosphere, and charm. And those three things more than make up for any of its shortcomings IMHO.
Hope you guys end up enjoying it!
-Tom