It’s time to fight — Bomberman style, now that a partial English localization patch for Saturn Bomberman Fight!! is available to the public.
Translation team leader Malenko posted the SSP patch to the SegaXtreme Resources area Dec. 27. It translates into English the game’s main menu and sub menus, character select, end credits and three characters’ stories — Shiro, Kuro and Baguro.
The team doesn’t plan on dubbing over the game’s Japanese voices. “Not only are they quite charming, it’d be like making Ryu scream ‘DRAGON PUNCH!'” Malenko said in the patch’s FAQ.
Malenko was assisted by SoloNerfHerder, who translated the game from Japanese into English; BlueMoon95, who did extensive beta testing and hand-placed English tiles into the game; Derek “ateam” for providing a text dumper; and Black Dragon King, who’s worked on an assembly hack.
Malenko also credited this reporter for making a localized title screen despite it not being in the patch yet. (Sorry about that. You can see it in this story’s header image.)
The process of hacking a localization into the game has been documented in Malenko’s thread on SegaXtreme.
Earlier versions of this patch first were made available to SHIRO! Patreon supporters as early as November 2022.
In the patch’s FAQ, Malenko explained why he’s released beta versions of the patch to SHIRO! Patreons. “It is my way of helping them get more subs, and me getting involved BETA testers,” he said. “I previously released betas to the public and didnt get a ton of feedback [to be honest].”
Saturn Bomberman Fight!! released in December 1997 exclusively in Japan. Rather than a classic Bomberman-style game, Fight!! features an isometric perspective with level design that includes slopes and characters with health meters who can jump over obstacles. Its 15 playable characters each have a unique story mode complete with voice acting. While its battle mode doesn’t support 12 players like the earlier Bomberman entry on the Saturn, it does support four players by way of the 6Player multiplayer adaptor.
Danthrax is a contributor to the Shiro Media Group, writing stories for the website when Saturn news breaks. While he was a Sega Genesis kid in the ’90s, he didn’t get a Saturn until 2018. It didn’t take him long to fall in love with the console’s library as well as the fan translation and homebrew scene. He contributed heavily to the Bulk Slash and Stellar Assault SS fan localizations, and has helped as an editor on several other Saturn and Dreamcast fan projects such as Cotton 2, Rainbow Cotton and Sakura Wars Columns 2.
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