Release v1.0 12-11-2006 This English translation for the Japanese Playstation game King’s Field, is by John David Osborne (full credits see below). If you find any errors such as untranslated text, incorrect grammar, spelling, translation error, display errors etc, or have any ideas that might improve this translation, please send me an email at weissvulf@yahoo.com Enjoy :) 1. How To 2. Translation Notes 3. King’s Field Links 4. Interesting Facts 5. Full Credits #1 How to Apply .ppf patch to a cue/bin type image with a .ppf patcher like PPF-O- MATIC #2 Notes This project was started with the intent to do the best job possible in bringing English speakers an accurate and unchanged translation of the original King’s Field Game. Because of various considerations, certain things have been changed during the translation. I’m listing them here so diehard fans can see what they’re missing out on :) Dark Magician: This is not the literal translation of this character’s name. Japanese has a word for magician and it is not used in this characters name but instead, the literal translation would be something closer to ‘Monster Leading Priest.’ In a few places he is called ‘Black Monster Leading Priest’ and since Black Dark Magician would have sounded stupid, those places were translated as ‘Evil Dark Magician.’ This name was changed because ‘Magician’ is a reasonably close interpretation for his name and it was used in later official translations. Dragon Tree Fruit/ Leaf: The actual name of these items is ‘Fruit of Dragon King Grass’ and ‘Blade of Dragon King Grass.’ Their names were changed for space considerations and to correlate with later official translations. Dark Magician’s Dungeon Maze: The literal translation of this place is simply Dark Magician’s ‘Dungeon’, but Japanese uses two forms of the word Dungeon. One is the Japanese native symbol for dungeon (i.e. prison) and the other is the English word ‘dungeon’ which they phonetically spell as something close to ‘donjon.’ The Dungeon on floor 2 uses the Japanese symbol, signifying ‘prison,’ while the Dark Magician’s Dungeon uses the phonetic English word dungeon signifying the recent corruption of this word to refer to any large underground maze like area filled with treasure or monsters (thanks a lot all you Dungeons and Dragons nerds ;P ). This change was made to augment this distinction to English Players. Floor [#]: The Japanese word for this is actually ‘level.’ This was changed to prevent confusion in the status menu where ‘level’ is already used to refer to character’s level. Saturn Shrine, Earth Star: This sign literally says ‘earth star’ but the Japanese word for the planet Saturn is also ‘earth star’. These signs have both renderings on them because, while it might be evident that the Dark Magician’s Earth Shrine and the Earth Star (Saturn) Shrine were the same place to Japanese players, English players would not see the correlation between ‘Saturn Shrine’ and the Earth Shrine. I would have just used Earth Star Shrine, but ‘Saturn Shrine’ had already been used in official translations. ‘Shield’ Symbol on Equipment Screen: This shield symbol was substituted for the word ‘protector’ due to space considerations. OK / NO: In various places in the menu where the confirmation message ‘OK’ or cancel message ‘NO’ are used, the actual Japanese words originally said things like ‘Discard’ ‘Buy’ ‘Back’ ‘Equip’ etc. These were all changed for space considerations. Format (Memory Card): The actual Japanese word is ‘initialize.’ It was changed because format is a word more familiar to English speakers and the consequences for misunderstanding this were severe. Also, The confirmation message when formatting a memory card originally read something like ‘memory card will now be initialized’ which I changed to ‘warning, formatting will erase all data on card’ because of the consequences of a misunderstanding. Flame Sword: The Japanese word for flame is not actually used here, but instead they use what seems to be a purposely off phonetic rendering which is actually something like ‘Frame Sword.’ This was changed to match later official translations and because the general reference is clearly to ‘flame’ (besides, who wants to fight with a frame sword). Leg Guards: Actually something like ‘leg guarder’ or possibly ‘girder’. This was changed to match later official translations. Twin Dragon Ring: This is actually ‘Ring of the Two-headed Dragon.’ It was changed for space considerations. Phantom Rod: A better translation would be ‘Staff of Visions.’ This was changed to match official translations. Magician’s Map/Key: Their name marks them as belonging to the ‘Dark Magician’ and, like his name, are actually ‘Monster Leading Teacher’s Map/Key.’ This was changed for space considerations and to match his name. Randalf II?: In one place, the original Japanese text says ‘last king Randalf II . . .’ This was treated as a mistake by the game makers and translated as Reinhardt II since there is no Randalf II and the ‘last king’ was actually Reinhardt II. Magical Artifacts: The actual name of what was translated as ‘Magical Artifacts’ of legend is closer to ‘magic holding vessel.’ ‘Magical Artifact’ has the correct connotation, but just be aware, that when you see this name capitalized, it is not speaking about a generic magical item, but the objects mentioned in the legend of the Forest Dragon. A few (as in 3 or 4) NPC dialogue and truth mirror panels were edited down (though the meaning was kept intact) because of space considerations. #3 LINKS Agetec’s King’s Field forum (healthiest KF forum I know of): http://p068.ezboard.com/fagetecfrm13 King’s Field world - ground zero (great info about the entire KF series): http://www.kings-field.com/ A King’s Field Fan Forum: http://games.groups.yahoo.com/group/theverditeinn/ Another KF fan forum: http://p208.ezboard.com/fmartinsstudiofrm2 JAPANESE SITES links and their Gloogled links (Auto Translated into Japanglish by Google… HA HA HA) From Software’s Sword of Moonlight (KF constructor set for PC) page (Japanese) http://www.fromsoftware.jp/main/soft/som.html Gloogled: http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=ja&u=http://www.fromsoftware.jp/main/soft/&sa=X&oi=translate&resnum=2&ct=result&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dhttp://www.fromsoftware.jp/main/soft%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26sa%3DG Pretty good fan site for the entire KF series including maps (Japanese): http://www.catnet.ne.jp/okano/games/kfs.html Gloogled: http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.catnet.ne.jp%2Fokano%2Fgames%2Fkfs.html&langpair=ja%7Cen&hl=en&ie=UTF8 Another good fan site for the entire KF series (Japanese) http://www.mscom.or.jp/bowcat/know/know.html Gloogled: http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mscom.or.jp%2Fbowcat%2Fknow%2Fknow.html&langpair=ja%7Cen&hl=en&ie=UTF8 Very Informative KF Jap Character Relations Chart from the above site (Japanese) http://www.mscom.or.jp/bowcat/know/kf1/kf1_ini.html Gloogled (or in this case more like ungluegled hee hee) http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mscom.or.jp%2Fbowcat%2Fknow%2Fkf1%2Fkf1_ini.html&langpair=ja%7Cen&hl=en&ie=UTF8 KF Wikipedia (Japanese): http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/KF3 Gloogled: http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http%3A%2F%2Fja.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2FKF3&langpair=ja%7Cen&hl=en&ie=UTF8 #4 FUN FACTS A. Some of the pictures in the KF Japan manual must have been screenshots from before the game was complete because they are picture that do not exist in the game as it was released. For instance on pg11 in the picture with Heinz, the compass needle is pointing north but it should be pointing west, and the ‘Buy’ screen is longer than it is in the final game and missing the ‘Have Gold’ information. B. In the game’s data, there are references to items that don’t appear in the final game: Dragon Crest, Demon Hand, Gold Coin, Light Tower Seal, Holy Seal Stone and Salamander Statue. With the exception of the Dragon Crest and Gold Coin, there are no 3D graphics for the items, only their names in the item data. The gold coin appears to be a close up of the gold that is dropped by monsters and thus it seems likely that its data exists in the items menu to facilitate development testing. The Salamander Statue as well may refer to the statues that shoot fire balls at you which were called Salamanders in later KF games. But the other items are likely planned aspects of the game which were cut before release but not removed from the game data. C. There are several Truth Mirror descriptions, location signs and pop up texts that do not seem to appear in the game but are in the data: Description for Reinhardt III, sign marking a ‘Gladiator Arena’ (literally ‘armed combat palace’), ‘honored citizens graveyard’ sign, ‘graveyard for soldiers of the king’ sign, ‘barracks’ sign, ‘hear the voice of my prayer’ sign, ‘the Dark Magician’s labyrinth is death Erik Blair’ sign, descriptions of where the portals lead to, ‘invisible wall’ pop-up, ‘won’t move’ pop-up, ‘recovered’ pop-up. There is also one hand written (hard to read) note in Japanese whose readable parts say something like ‘explanation, reading in (opening).’ #5 FULL CREDITS Full Credits: Rom hacking, and all text translation other than what is mentioned below, and everything else needed for this project was done by me, John Osborne. Text translation for the following characters was done by Kazuhiru H (edited for overall cohesion, grammar and flow by J.O.): Wilfred Light, Gill Baccus, Juedds Kross, Basque Crize, Watta Virgil, and about 1/2 of Erik Blair Various members (including Ryusui, Perhaps it is Satsu, and Porjoa) of the romhacking.net forum provided general help and a translation of approximately 6 difficult passages (edited for overall cohesion, grammar and flow by J.O.). Special thanks to my wife who put up with many month of King’s Field hacking gibberish like, ‘ ohhhh wowww hunny, guess what I just figured out! The dragon’s name is the forest dragon and John’s name, we’ll actually they called him Alfred in the American King’s Fields but they call him John here, is Forrester, maybe they translated his name as Forester with one r instead of Forrester with two rs because he’s named after the forest dragon, you know . . . I wonder if the one they originally called the dragon of the forest was actually a member of the Forrester family and not actually the forest dragon, maybe the hero who saved Verdite was named the forest dragon after the forest dragon! That would make sense since the legend said that the dragon of the forest would return with the magic holding vessels and the Moonlight sword was one of the magic holding vessels and it was John who returned with it! ’ Sheesh, I woulda left me . . .Love ya honey :)