******************************************************************************** * Eternal Legend (Game Gear) * * English Translation Patch * * v1.0 (15 May 2020) * * * * TheMajinZenki -- Translation * * Supper -- Hacking * * cccmar -- Editing and Testing * ******************************************************************************** tells of the of 'Millennium', a golden created to praise the . It is said that the bearer of the eight [Golden Knives] shall open the way to 'Millennium' and its long-lost and . One day, <>, a hunting for , unexpectedly finds himself caught up in the for 'Millennium'. In a spanning the entire , <>, together with companions <> and <>, must solve and uncover from across the ages in order to learn the of 'Millennium'... [Eternal Legend] is a 1991 RPG developed by Japan Art Media for the [Sega Game Gear]. It's a very RPG notable mostly for being the very one on the [Game Gear]. It features vast overworlds based on real-world , a simple monster mechanic, and a highly idiosyncratic system of . This [patch] fully translates the into . **************************************** * Table of Contents * **************************************** I. Patching Instructions II. Notes III. Authors' Comments IV. Version History **************************************** * I. Patching Instructions * **************************************** You'll first need a ROM image of Eternal Legend for the Game Gear. It should match the following specifications: No-Intro filename: Eternal Legend - Eien no Densetsu (Japan).gg CRC32: 04302BBD MD5: C58D6291DA8A4919328B8F42BE8640A7 SHA-1: 717B4E33CF3956E4194B912533BF1B7BF9D20725 The patch itself is a standard IPS patch. Use a tool such as Lunar IPS to apply the IPS file to the ROM. The patch will expand the ROM to 1 MB, so don't use ancient patching utilities that don't support that. **************************************** * II. Notes * **************************************** Eternal Legend was the very first RPG released for the Game Gear. It is, to put it mildly, a bit clunky. Though the gameplay is largely standard RPG fare, the game has a bad habit of making important event triggers invisible and in some cases unfindable without manually using the "Search" command. It also likes to prevent the plot from progressing until you talk to *exactly* the right people in the right order, often without any indication that this is the case. And while the game maps are unusually large, your party walks agonizingly slowly, often while being assaulted by monsters every few steps. In the interest of making the game slightly more bearable, several features that we originally added to the game to help debug the translation have been left in as strictly optional cheats: - Holding down Button 1 while walking will make the party move faster. This will also speed up forced movement during cutscenes. - The System menu now contains an option to disable random encounters. - Holding Button 1 will fast-forward text (in the original game, only Button 2 did this). - The patch comes bundled with a full walkthrough (see "walkthrough.txt"). If you're stuck, don't hesitate to check it; the game pulls all kinds of unfair stunts that you really, really don't want to try to get through blindly. Anyone familiar with this game isn't going to have fond things to say about the Labyrinth. To reiterate, all of this is totally optional. For the original game experience, don't use the "run" button, leave encounters on, and don't look at the walkthrough ever. And, uh, try to have fun. And needless to say, all in the are exactly per the original . We wouldn't change those for the . **************************************** * III. Authors' Comments * **************************************** ------------------- -- TheMajinZenki -- ------------------- I decided to translate this game because we had worked on Moldorian earlier on, and I heard that was some kind of spiritual successor to Eternal Legend. Apparently it was the very first RPG on Game Gear, which made me interested in it. Considering its age, the story is very simple, but I think it still has its charm considering its limitations. I hope you'll enjoy :) ------------ -- cccmar -- ------------ Alright, so what can I say... Eternal Legend is the very first RPG on the Game Gear (and incidentally, the last without an English translation). It has some unusual features for the time, such as degradable weapons, summoning (still not too common in JRPGs at that time) and a weakness targeting system. The main issue with it is the cryptic nature of some segments - that's why Supper cooked up a handy walkthrough for you, should you ever get stumped. You probably will. We did the game kinda on the spur of the moment, seeing that was the last JRPG for the system without a translation. So, this is probably it for our Game Gear projects. It was quite a ride, but I'm happy we all partook in it. So long, Game Gear... the unknown journey will continue! ------------ -- Supper -- ------------ I tried to talk Zenki out of it, I really did... but here we are anyway. There aren't any more Game Gear RPGs left to translate, right? Right?? We're not going to have to suffer through all this again, right??? ...Well, anyway, here's one more translation done. You might have picked up on the fact that I don't care for the game much, but in all fairness, it *was* the first RPG on the Game Gear. Unfortunately, that doesn't change the fact that it's just not a great game. I've tried to make it less painful by leaving in my debugging cheats -- ironic, considering I'm usually the one arguing *against* translations making arbitrary "enhancements", but given that it's all 100% optional and the game desperately needed something to alleviate all the tedious, sloooow wandering through its gigantic maps, I'm more than willing to let it slide this time. At any rate, I hope a few of you out there will at least give this a shot despite the fact that I can't seem to stop badmouthing it. It has its good points: the plot isn't bad, there don't seem to be any major bugs, and it has a few legitimately creative ideas, like the giant retracting spike and spear traps on the overworld. It's just that for everything the game does right, it does something else wrong, or at least very clunkily. Oh well. And boy, you can tell they wanted to have color-coded text but couldn't figure out how to make it work, huh? Well, guess are the thing. **************************************** * IV. Version History * **************************************** v1.0 (15 May 2020): Initial release.