==========Iblard: The City of Hatching Laputa=============== V 0.95 - Initial Release ------------------------------------------------------------ Japanese Title: イバラード ラピュタの孵る街 (Iblard Laputa no Kaeru Machi) Genre: Platform Adventure Source language: Japanese Patch language: English Original Platform: Playstation Original developer: System Sacom Original publisher: TV Asahi Original Release Date in Japan: October 16, 1997 ====================================================== Folder Contents ====================================================== Patch file Readme ====================================================== About Iblard: The City of Hatching Laputa ====================================================== Project History: Project started in mid-2021. I kept nagging Esper to suggest a project, and this came up. Iblard, a fictional country, is the brain-child of a living surrealist painter in Japan names Naohisa Inoue. He is a long-time work friend of Hayao Miyazaki, and the two men have been photographed in one another's home's in the past. An iteration of the title screen artwork in this game is, coincidentally, a mural inside of the Ghibli Museum in Mitaka, Tokyo. There are also some small dinosaur murals on the walls, so honestly I wouldn't be surprised if he did those too, since dinosaurs do appear in Iblard canon at large. You might also meet a few in the game! Qi Nona, Melkinso, Schopelo, Ninya and their surroundings are all featured in the Ghibli Museum short commonly translated as "The Day I Bought a Star". Given the extra context, I'll be calling it "The Day I Raised a Planet" for the rest of the readme. If you want to know more specifics about these particular characters outside of the Ghibli work, you can find them in a manga titled "Iblard Monogatari - Laputa no Aru Fuukei" (イバラード物語―ラピュタのある風景) ("Tales From Iblard - Home of the Laputa"). Cargodin's Baseless Musing Corner: Take this with a grain of salt, but the Ghibli wiki does mention that the main character of The Day I Raised a Planet was not originally Qi Nona at all; "supposedly", Mr. Inoue planned for the character to be a girl, but Miyazaki wanted to animate [Qi Nona] in some way. This is more subjecting, but since JP fans and Ghibli Gstaff often connect The Day I Raised a Planet(2006) animation to Howl's Moving Castle(2004) as either a prequel or other conceptual appendix, and since Howl is quoted as being a character that Miyazaki created as an idealized version of himself, I like to think that Miyazaki kind of low-key/VERY high-key kins this little Qi Nona dude to some degree. That said, other Ghibli staff and Inoue himself have humorously commented on the comparisons between The Day I Raised a Planet and Howl's Moving Castle. If you're curious, you should definitely read into it. Content Warnings: No violence, sexual content or suggestive topics. There is, however, a BIG photosensitivity/epileptic seizure warning here. If you are sensitive to rapid flashing lights or color patterns, we highly advise you avoid this game before consulting a professional and take any necessary precautions. There is a certain creature in the game called the megezo. (It's a pun on the Japanese words for "self-doubt" and "elephant", and looks like a big round elephant that scoots on the ground.) It appears by surprise more than once in the storyline, but every time it comes near, it makes the screen flash at a VERY rapid pace until you're able to scare it off. Coming from someone who has no history of photosensitivity issues, any time I had to look at the megezo, I secretly hoped the power in my house would go out, so even if you don't have a medical history with photosentivity, it might give you a headache still, so again, just be aware of it and be sure to play in a well-lit room. Added: one of our playtesters was replaying the game on a widescreen monitor at 4x the game's normal speed. She had forgotten about when the megezo first showed up, so by the time it appeared by surprise again, the seizure elephant was already blowing up her TV at 4x the fast forwarded pace. (She's my close friend so I can cackle as I tell this story at her expense, and you should cackle at her too, but please take it as a cautionary tale all the same.) (The megezo in Iblard lore is actually really cute, and I absolutely want one, but the merch of it is like a few hundred bucks on Mercari now, and long out of stock elsewhere, so... Hahahahaha...) Other comments: We had a recurring theme during playtesting that involved everyone playing the game for the first time thought something was wrong with their hardware. One person thought their console was busted, another was worried his CRT was finally giving out, someone else shopped for a new controller... Thankfully, none of those worried turned out to be true. The game is just visually and technically strange. Please be sure to read the controls and warnings in the readme, experiment with the controls for a little while until you get a feel, and don't be afraid to ask questions. Once you catch your stride, we hope you enjoye all of the actually relaxing moments this game has to offer. ====================================================== Controls ====================================================== D-PAD UP = Walk forward D-PAD LEFT = Turn left D-PAD DOWN = Walk backward D-PAD RIGHT = Turn right L2 + TRIANGLE BUTTON = Look up (Hold L2 first or it will not stay where you set it). CIRCLE BUTTON = Action / Confirm Button L2 + X BUTTON = Look down (Hold L2 first or it will not stay where you set it). SQUARE BUTTON = Throw boomerang / Swing broom L1 BUTTON = Strafe left R1 BUTTON = Strafe right L2 BUTTON = Camera Lock R2 BUTTON = Health Bar Displays ON/OFF SELECT = Exit Screen START = Item Window Start Screen Controls: D-PAD (UP, DOWN, LEFT, RIGHT) = Move cursor CIRCLE BUTTON = Select / Confirm X BUTTON = Cancel START = Start ====================================================== Story Prologue ====================================================== A gleaming red ore, called a low-grade synthester, falls through a tear in space-time and lands in a metropolis lacking any and all flora. This is the near future, only a few years beyond the present day in a certain Japanese city. The more this land was industrialized, the more plant life vanished from its every street corner. Here lives a boy who loves raising plants in flowerpots all around the living room of his apartment. He tends to them all day, except for when he has to leave his large apartment complex to go to school. However, there's a strange book in this boy's house. It has no publisher or publication date, so all the boy knows about the book is that his late grandfather left it for him. The book speaks of a fictional land known as Iblard, and, inbetween its pages, reads a piece of lore that catches the boy's eye: "'The hatching of the laputa. This refers to change in a laputa's appearance, similar to a snake molting its skin in a nest of cloud and star. The shells left behind by the laputa hold mysterious power that stimulates plant growth.' Or so they say here in Iblard." One that thought enters the boy's head, he looks at his plants and thinks, "A laputa shell...If only such a thing existed," for no matter how hard the boy tends to his plants, they keep wilting by the day. On that fateful day, on his way home from school, he sees a strange threesome walking down the back alleyways as if to avoid onlookers. They resemble a frog, a mole and a beautiful woman. "Wait, aren't those...characters from Grandpa's story book?!" Beside himself, he follows the threesome. Then, the sky softly gleams, and the ordinary street beneath him starts to gleam in turn. Sensing the boy's presence, they grab a glowing red ore from the sidewalk, hop on a strange vehicle that appears out of nowhere, and vanish in a flicker. Stunned, the boy looks down at his feet and discovers a mysterious, blue ore. When he picks it up and holds it in his hand, the ore gleams and calls forth a second vehicle. As if drawn to enter, the boy boards this train-like vessel of the likes he has never seen, and... ====================================================== Japanese Voice Credits ====================================================== Protagonist: Shotaro Morikubo (This protagonist does not appear in the Ghibli short.) Ninya: Megumi Hayashibara (In the Ghibli short, Ninya is voiced by Kyoka Suzuki.) Melkinso: Daisuke Sakaguchi (In the Ghibli short, Melkinso is voiced by Hiroshi Oizumi.) Schopelo: Takashi Nagasako (In the Ghibli short, Schopelo is voiced by Genzo Wakayama.) Burgalad/Other: Yusaku Yara (Burgalad does not appear in the Ghibli short.) Qi Nona: Kentaro Ito (In the Ghibli short, Qi Nona is voiced by Ryunosuke Kamiki.) ====================================================== More Translation Notes ====================================================== There really isn't content in this game that needed to be localized for localizations sake, but one thing that did disappear in the text were the English canon names for some of the game locations, as they're named directly after certain paintings. The reasons for this are text limitations within certain menus and easier understanding for the player that it refers to a specific location. Here are a couple of examples: Japanese name: 市電の森 Painting name in English: Station in the Woods Name used in English patch: Forest Railway Name used in save menu: Railway Japanese name: 巡回飛行士 Painting name in English: Patroling Pilot Name used in English patch: Patrol Tower Name used in save menu: Tower ====================================================== Patching Instructions ====================================================== Notes from Esper: The patch is done using xdelta. Any xdelta patcher should work with this including Romhacking.Net’s online patcher at : https://www.romhacking.net/patch/. To patch using the batch file just drop the original bin file on to it. If needed, the patch itself is in patch_data. ====================================================== Patch Notes/Warnings ====================================================== None so far. If you happen to find any, do let us know! ====================================================== Translation Patch Project Credits ====================================================== Blame: Font/Hard-sub video editing Cargodin: Translation, Image editing Esperknight: Head Romhacker Mr. Nobody: Image/Video editing PSXCraver: Image editing Special Thanks: Aria CJ Iwakura Endlessendings Gwendolyn Hilltop Jobless Floppy Kotcrab Midnight Bialy TurnipTheBeat Gemini for posting code on how to do soft subs for FMVs and also for project files that are setup to use the PSX SDK. Naohisa Inoue's official website (English side): http://www.iblard.com/english/ Ghibli Wiki article on "The Day I Bought a Star": https://ghibli.fandom.com/wiki/Hoshi_o_Katta_Hi ====================================================== "The Day I Bought a Star" original storybook: https://www.amazon.com/Day-you-bought-star-ISBN/dp/4877521399 https://www.amazon.co.jp/%E6%98%9F%E3%82%92%E3%81%8B%E3%81%A3%E3%81%9F%E6%97%A5-%E4%BA%95%E4%B8%8A-%E7%9B%B4%E4%B9%85/dp/4877521399 Rules for the patch: This patch is entirely fan-made and unofficial. Please do NOT redistribute this patch in bad faith- whether by pre-installed illegal roms or physical discs. Do not sell or buy this patch, or any materials supplied alongside said patch, under any circumstances. This was a labor of love, and those bad faith actions not only insult us, but also endangers fan translation as a whole. Thank you for understanding. ====================================================== Compiled by Cargodin, August 2022.