Tendo City

Because you can't always depend on a faceless corporation to give you what you want. And what is it that you want? RPGs with dialog in some strange moon-language that have been translated into something legible, that's what!

I found a site that has pretty much ever translated and untranslated released of every SNES games that's ever existed, which is nice because it saves me from digging through various pages looking for something that may or may not exist. Aside from the usual like Seiken Densetsu 3 and Tales of Phantasia, there's also quite a large number of smaller, lesser-know RPGs that have been translated like Metal Max Returns and Emerald Dragon. Not all these are all-time classics of course and it's often hard to tell, since reviews are hard to come by, but it's fun to dig up these old, obscure games and try them out.

http://www.romhacking.net is so awesome... sure, they don't get you the roms, but those are easy to find. What that does get you is the most comprehensive rom-patch and rom-hack database on the web, updated whenever new translation patches are released. Absolutely invaluable site for anyone interested in fan-translated games!

Because I quite agree, fan-translated games are awesome. There are so, so many games out there only released in Japanese, but they're doing what they can to reduce that number, and it's an amazing, and fantastic, service.

You just got me to check out RHDN again, here's a few recent ones I find interesting...

The Black Onyx (Sega SG-1000 version)
http://www.romhacking.net/trans/1489/
The original PC-8801 version was probably the first "JRPG" ever. I put JRPG in quotes because the person who made it was actually an American living in Japan (Henk Rogers, of later Nintendo Soviet skulduggery/The Tetris Company Tetris fame), but it's one of or maybe even the first one... and it's finally in English for something. (Why this version and not the Famicom one, though?)

Slayers (SNES)
http://www.romhacking.net/trans/1494/
Yes, a Slayers game is finally available in English! That's great news, Slayers is one of my favorite anime franchises really and I've wanted to try the games...

I've been using RomHacking and RomNation [the site where they have all the different versions of games]. Those two combined have pretty much fulfilled my needs in this regard.

You spoony bard!

Die, monster, you don't belong in this world!

I'll knock you all down!

But I'm still the winner because I'm playing games that you guys have never even heard of before.

"My father? You mean my dad?"

Great Rumbler Wrote:But I'm still the winner because I'm playing games that you guys have never even heard of before.

I've heard of them too, most likely. I do read RHDN after all.

But yeah, the others here... probably not so much, and it is too bad. Some of the games are quite good. Not all are of course, there are translations of mediocre stuff too, and a lot of them are SNES RPGs and such so you have to like lots of random battles and menu combat... but still, awesome stuff.

Fan-translated games to recommend... there are too many, hundreds of games are fan-translated by now.

I'll just mention a couple right now. Seiken Densetsu 3 is of course great, plus it has a 3-player patch on top of that (it's only 2 player by default, unlike Secret of Mana; on that note Evermore has a 2-player patch too, where the other person plays as the dog, and a fix patch that fixes some of the many bugs in the game too). Dark Lord (NES) and Dark Law (SNES) are pretty interesting games too, kind of like PC-style RPGs in a way, but Japanese... pretty good games. There are lots more of course.

As for non-RPGs, how about Umihara Kawase (SNES), the NES and SNES Fire Emblem games, SNES Tactics Ogre just got some translations, Front Mission, FEDA, Shodai Nekketsu Kouha Kunio-kun, Clock Tower, Miracle Girls, Wonder Project J... (those are all SNES games)

A bunch of Genesis stuff has translations too, such as most or all of the Phantasy Star 2 text adventures, Gleylancer, Undead Line, Twinkle Tale, Langrisser (Warsong) 2, Battle Mania Daiginjou (Trouble Shooters 2), Yuu Yuu Hakusho: Makyo Touitsusen, King Colossus, Monster World IV... Monster World IV, Battle Mania Daiginjou, Twinkle Tale, and Gleylancer are particularly great. Oh, there's also a Bare Knuckle III translation, because Streets of Rage III completely changed, and utterly mangled, the story of that game.

Most rom patches are for older systems, up to the 16-bit era. Only a few are for newer systems. Some patches for games for newer systems do exist, though, such as Namco X Capcom, Dragon Quest V, and Front Mission 5 for the PS2, Tales of Phantasia, Policenauts, and Persona 2: Innocent Sin for the Playstation... there's even one for the Wii Fatal Frame game. Oh, there are some for the GBA as well, including Love Hina Advance, Mother 3, and Dragon Quest Monsters: Caravan Heart.

Obviously I haven't played all of those myself, but some I have played include Final Fantasy V SNES, Seiken Densetsu 3 SNES, Gleylancer, Monster World IV, Battle Mania Daiginjou, and a few of the Phantasy Star 2 text adventures on the Genesis, one I didn't mention for the Turbo CD, Xak III (Ys IV TCD also has a translation, but I haven't played that one yet), at least some of all of the SNES games I mentioned, Love Hina Advance, Dark Lord, etc.

On a similar note as the OP, emulators are also cool too. As evidence by how I just ripped a bunch of my PS1 games to my PC for easy play.

I played Super Mario 64 on my PC with an Xbox360 controller! AWK-WARD.

A game that's held up surprisingly well for being nearly 12 years old is Spyro the Dragon, developed by Insomnia [creators of Rachet and Clank and Resistance]. They made three games in the Spyro series before Universal took it over and pooped the bed. Anyway, the first in the series came out about two years after Super Mario 64. It offered some of the same platforming/action/collect-a-thon fun that its predecessor did, but does have a charm of its own and some ideas of its own.

The graphics still have a colorful look to them and certainly aren't painful to the eyes as some PS1-era games are, possibly in part because of texture jiggering on my part. But even so, it's got a nice visual style to it.

More importantly, it's just fun. It doesn't take itself too seriously and Spyro has a nice variety of moves and attacks for you to play around with. A lot of games that I remember playing a loving back when they first came out just don't hold up well under scrutiny 5 or 10 years later, but Spyro the Dragon does.

Whenever I want to play something retro, I do one of two things: boot-up my NES or download a game via the Wii's Vitural Console. I really enjoy the former. The Wii's VC has introduced me to games that I never had the chance to play. It brings days of yore into the present.