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+--- Thread: Final Fantasy Origins (/showthread.php?tid=507)
Final Fantasy Origins - Dark Jaguar - 9th April 2003
Thanks to the amazing power of getting money I never expected, I now have this set of games. As per usual, it's a Square (well, it's Square-Enix now isn't it?) package with a remake of a game I already own and a remake of a game I don't own. So far, I'm rather enjoying myself. The graphics are boosted just like what I read about. The music, that's incredible! It's Chrono Cross quality!
The gameplay for FF1 has been altered... They removed the individual limited equipment and used the later FF's pooled unlimited equipment. You can have pretty much whatever you want whenever you want, and everyone can use everything during battles! Nuts... I liked that kind of difficulty in the original. Oh well, I still HAVE the original. I really wish they kept the original gameplay. Some of the things they changed they DO allow you to change back in the options menu, but not everything.
Oh well, I'm off to continue the fantasy! FF2 I've only just started. That too seems amazing, especially with it being a game I have yet to play, it being never released in the US before. Now all we need is FF3 for GBA and all the unreleased games will be here!
Final Fantasy Origins - Dark Jaguar - 10th April 2003
Well, I reached Elfheim (Elfland), and it seems there is a gravestone with something interesting printed on it.
Quote:May Link rest in peace.
Funny thing is in the NES version, it says "Here lies Erdrich" or something similar. That fellow being the main character of Dragon Warrior 1. Another point of notice is that was actually a change from the Japanese version, and it turns out that the Japanese version of the original Famicom game has Link on there too. Seems they went one way here in America to kinda mess with Enix, then later then went back for the PS1 version since Square and Enix are fused together as one.
I thought the gravestone was cute.
Final Fantasy Origins - OB1 - 10th April 2003
How are the load times?
Final Fantasy Origins - Dark Jaguar - 11th April 2003
How 'bout, nonexistant? They really did a good job optimizing things here. When you use fast loading on the PS2, what little there is vanishes. Remember, this game is a remake, not just a port (well, it's a port of a remake, but they added more stuff to this so it's actually a slight remake of a remake...), so they actually did more than just simple emulating. It's all pretty much seamless.
Final Fantasy Origins - Geno - 11th April 2003
That's good. Because from what I heard about Final Fantasy Chronicles, poor ol' Chrono Trigger took quite a while to load. Of course, PS2 is much better at loading than its predecessor. I've never played FFC, but I've downloaded a few anime cutscenes from CT on KaZaA. Talk about suh-weet! :D I have the original SNES cartridge of CT though, and I already beat a ROM of FF4 I used to have, so I may not ever get FFC. But I would like to get my hands on FF Origins, as well as Anthology. (I beat an FF6 ROM, but it was so awesome, I just have to own the game! Just in case my computer has to be reformatted a third time this year. @.o)
Final Fantasy Origins - Dark Jaguar - 11th April 2003
There are good reasons to get all three collections. FFV here in the US is only on PS1, so that's why you need Anthology. FFIV's original unaltered version with all the cool moves (well, the enemies have new moves too...) and a DECENT translation make Chronicles worth it (I never played FFIV when it was on SNES anyway). Origins has the unreleased in America FFII, plus the amazing graphical and sound updates and some various tweaks to make various activities easier (like being able to buy multiple items in one go at a store instead of having to buy 99 potions individually...).
You are right though, Chrono Trigger has TERRIBLE load times! It's very weird. In Japan, Final Fantasy IV had the horrendous load times while Chrono Trigger had seamless loadtimes. However, when they translated it, they somehow screwed up Chrono Trigger enough to give it HORRIBLE load times (can't even stand it on a PS1, it's only playable on a PS2 with fast load times activated). On the other hand, the translators fixed Final Fantasy IV and gave it completely seamless loadtimes (the whole game save music is dumped into RAM from the start).
I've been hearing lots of conflicting reports on FF3. Some places that are decently reliable say that the Wonderswan Color port is still on (which begs the questions, why so long to release, and why not update the sound and release it for the Wonderswan Crystal?), while others are saying that it's been cancelled for Bandai's handheld and is either being ported to GBA or being ported to PS1. I hope at least one of the latter is true (hopefully the one that will make the game portable :D), but now I'm very confused, whereas just yesterday I thought I knew that it was certainly going to GBA. I WANT THE ONION KIDS!
Final Fantasy Origins - Dark Jaguar - 12th April 2003
Haha, I just tried something out of curiosity and wow. There's this file called "ROM.BIN" on the Chrono Trigger CD in the Chronicles collection for PS1 when you put the PS1 disk in your computer's drive. It was roughly the size of the actual SNES game, so I figured I'd try something. I loaded up an SNES emulator, went to the disk, and loaded the file straight off the disk. BOOM! Chrono Trigger's ROM is actually stored directly on the disk. It happens to be in Japanese, and none of the changes are there, but still, it's quite hilarious. I think this may explain why the US version is so slow in load times compaired to the Japanese version. The US version has to apply language changes constantly, while the Japanese version just uses the default ROM's langauge features during emulation! Loading all these, even for just loading battle text, likely takes time.
In other words, the people who ported Chrono Trigger here were lazy because they didn't just put the US ROM on the disk and translate the added menus. That actually could have saved them time in the long run :D. Sad really...
Final Fantasy Origins - OB1 - 12th April 2003
That sucks. I didn't have any patience for the PS1 port of Chrono Trigger. The load times are annoying as hell.
Final Fantasy Origins - Dark Jaguar - 12th April 2003
Yeah, like I said I can only bare the loading when I turn on the PS2's quick load feature for PS1 games. Well, I only got it for FF4 anyway, so no biggy (the FMVs and various extra game data are nice though).
Another thing they have to reapply during each load is the stupid control change Square USA has been applying to ALL their RPGs since FF8. I mean, the original control style the Japanese versions have is FINE, why must they constantly switch the X and O functionality for the US versions?! Seriously, if the disk didn't have to constantly read from the edited text and edited button assignment files every single time something loaded, the load times would be as instantaneous as the Japanese version! Had they MERELY put the English ROM on the disk and did some minor translating of the "external" (outside the ROM) menus (and left the button assignment alone), the load times would be exactly the same as the Japanese game! That is to say, none except for the "external" menus (like the added save menu and the PS1 specific menus for other stuff) and the FMV starting, which were the things that took the least amount of time to load anyway. Lazy people... They actually made more work for themselves and in the end made a worse product than if they just thought for a moment... And it's not that they are lazy, no, they are just selectively lazy! The translated copy of FF4 is flawless loading. I mean, it's like they only cared about FF4 (except the memory card access is still very slow) and didn't really even try on Chrono Trigger.
Final Fantasy Origins - OB1 - 8th August 2003
Quote:Originally posted by Dark Jaguar
Haha, I just tried something out of curiosity and wow. There's this file called "ROM.BIN" on the Chrono Trigger CD in the Chronicles collection for PS1 when you put the PS1 disk in your computer's drive. It was roughly the size of the actual SNES game, so I figured I'd try something. I loaded up an SNES emulator, went to the disk, and loaded the file straight off the disk. BOOM! Chrono Trigger's ROM is actually stored directly on the disk. It happens to be in Japanese, and none of the changes are there, but still, it's quite hilarious. I think this may explain why the US version is so slow in load times compaired to the Japanese version. The US version has to apply language changes constantly, while the Japanese version just uses the default ROM's langauge features during emulation! Loading all these, even for just loading battle text, likely takes time.
In other words, the people who ported Chrono Trigger here were lazy because they didn't just put the US ROM on the disk and translate the added menus. That actually could have saved them time in the long run :D. Sad really...
I got a "backup" version of the game (so that I can alter the disc) and want to try to replace the Japanese ROM with the English SNES ROM, but I'm not sure what else I should do. I assume that I'll have to remove the English translation patch, right?
Final Fantasy Origins - Dark Jaguar - 8th August 2003
The best solution would probably be to find out what files are stored on the Japanese disk and use those. It would be a lot easier than having to figure out how the patching works and how to disable it. Of course that'll mean all the extra menus will be in Japanese, but the main game will be in English like you want and I think the extra menus will be easy enough to navigate, in theory... Well, it might be annoying to have all those monster data things in Japanese, I dunno...
In any case, give it a try. If this works, it'll mean English CT on PS1 with the Japanese instant load times (ala US FFIV and FFOrigins). From there we can try seeing if we can get just the right files to translate the extra menus.
Final Fantasy Origins - A Black Falcon - 8th August 2003
OB1... I found a site with the game like one minuite (actually, it was less than a minuite...) after you quit MSN. :)
This is a subsite of a decent rom site that is marred by everpresent broken links... but the ones on this site work.
Its just got the Chrono series. Yup, that's it... but it has all of them. :)
http://chronotrigger.emuparadise.org/
Final Fantasy Origins - OB1 - 8th August 2003
Nice, thanks.
DJ, I don't have the Japanese disc so I don't know where the translation patch is. Guess I'll just have to try it a bunch of times. :S
Final Fantasy Origins - Dark Jaguar - 8th August 2003
Hmm, well that was the easiest way.
The thing is, the patch is almost certainly not just a file you can remove. It could be that the files are different all around. It could be that they added a translation file, but would of course also have to tell the main file that runs the emulation to access said file and how to incorporate it. Being a PS1 game that expects everthing to be exactly as it needs to be, it would likely crash if that file was missing.
The other way they did it could have been that the Japanese could have made the game with the translation in mind, and it could have just looked for the English patch file, and if it's not found, just run the game in Japanese. This seems VERY unlikely...
The thing is, I'm fairly certain the only real way to do this would just be to get a copy of the Japanese version and use that as the basis. I know that'd be hard though... Sucks that Square USA would be so incredibly lazy... I mean, I knock them on laziness because I KNOW they have the skill! They ported FF4 excellently, with no load times at all except for saving and loading (being a 2 block memory file, it's ridiculous how long it takes to do that), but just kinda slapped a patch on CT, not even trying to keep it up to the Japanese version's speed, and left it at that. I still think if they had just put the English rom on the game and translated the menus it not only could have been easier but it would have been just as speedy as the Japanese version. I do believe I may be missing something about that though... something they as the actual programmers know that I obviously don't.
In any case, good luck on this project. Maybe if you do get the Japanese version you can test this out and fix it after all, thus prooving WE should be doing the translating jobs (well, if we knew ANY Japanese at all that is :D).
Final Fantasy Origins - OB1 - 9th August 2003
Ok I tried simply replacing the Japanese ROM with the English ROM, but it would not start in my PS1. Perhaps it's because it was named differently, or maybe because the Engish ROM is a .spc file while the Japanese one is a .bin file?
Final Fantasy Origins - Dark Jaguar - 9th August 2003
Um, duh? :D It's looking for a specific file name, plus I'm not sure if the extension means the file is stored differently, but it does need to be binary, that is straight data not processed in any way from the cart.
Final Fantasy Origins - OB1 - 10th August 2003
Well thanks for telling me that before. :bang:
What do I do now?
Final Fantasy Origins - Dark Jaguar - 10th August 2003
Yeah sorry, I just assumed you knew that.
Anyway, now then... Try looking online for some sort of ROM type converter. Not sure if any exist, but it's worth a try. If that doesn't work, try just finding the binary version of the ROM image.
Final Fantasy Origins - OB1 - 11th August 2003
No luck so far. Would you mind helping me out here?
Final Fantasy Origins - Dark Jaguar - 11th August 2003
It would help if you would tell us what you've done so far.
Final Fantasy Origins - OB1 - 11th August 2003
I can't find a .bin CT ROM or a spc-to-bin converter. That's all I need.
Final Fantasy Origins - Dark Jaguar - 11th August 2003
I wouldn't even know where to start looking for those things... Perhaps someone else could aid in this.
Final Fantasy Origins - OB1 - 11th August 2003
...
Well crapola.
Final Fantasy Origins - A Black Falcon - 11th August 2003
I've never even heard of SNES bin files... Genesis, sure, but not SNES... you could try looking around Zophar's Domain's utility section, I guess.
Final Fantasy Origins - Dark Jaguar - 11th August 2003
I suppose bin is what most ROM files are actually stored as by the companies that actually MADE them.
Final Fantasy Origins - A Black Falcon - 12th August 2003
Or maybe its just a special format they are using in this game. :)
http://www.zophar.net ... by far the best site for any emulation programs (but not roms)...
Final Fantasy Origins - Dark Jaguar - 12th August 2003
Indeed, I thought of that too. I'm just VERY used to .bin on pretty much ANY file meaning it's a binary dump of data into a file in the order it's read from whatever source. I would be surprised if they did anything further than just a binary copy. If they did, then I'm surprised the file runs perfectly in the SNES emulator I have.
Final Fantasy Origins - OB1 - 12th August 2003
So... I'm stuck, right?
Final Fantasy Origins - Dark Jaguar - 12th August 2003
Stuck until someone comes up with a viable solution...
The big question is this. The .smc extension for "normal" SNES roms, is that totally binary? If it's just a straight copy with a weird extension and NO extra data added or modified, then I would assume then that the file could be renamed into a .bin file. I would think that it would be like that, unless they DO add some data to it or modify it for whatever purpose, like maybe adding specific data for certain emulators or something...
Final Fantasy Origins - OB1 - 12th August 2003
Ok I just tried that and it did not work. There goes another CD-R. :S
Final Fantasy Origins - A Black Falcon - 3rd June 2006
Quote:Haha, I just tried something out of curiosity and wow. There's this file called "ROM.BIN" on the Chrono Trigger CD in the Chronicles collection for PS1 when you put the PS1 disk in your computer's drive. It was roughly the size of the actual SNES game, so I figured I'd try something. I loaded up an SNES emulator, went to the disk, and loaded the file straight off the disk. BOOM! Chrono Trigger's ROM is actually stored directly on the disk. It happens to be in Japanese, and none of the changes are there, but still, it's quite hilarious. I think this may explain why the US version is so slow in load times compaired to the Japanese version. The US version has to apply language changes constantly, while the Japanese version just uses the default ROM's langauge features during emulation! Loading all these, even for just loading battle text, likely takes time.
In other words, the people who ported Chrono Trigger here were lazy because they didn't just put the US ROM on the disk and translate the added menus. That actually could have saved them time in the long run . Sad really...
Does FFIV from Chronicles not also share this 'feature' of containing the ROM, or is this disc scratched even in the parts you CAN copy... because it doesn't work in a snes emulator, that's for sure. And the CD is too scratched to run in a Playstation. :) (it's not mine, I'm borrowing it, because it doesn't work... those relatives of mine aren't too good with "not losing things". Just for PSX Resident Evil Director's Cut, FFVIII, disc 2 of Syphon Filter, and the Chrono Trigger disc from Chronicles (and the case and manual) are all missing... maybe PaRappa too... and they only had like 14 games for it... :D
Anyway, I wanted to see if FFIV also contained the rom, and while there is a file called "FFIV.bin" (752kb), it doesn't work in SNES emulators. Ah well.
Final Fantasy Origins - Dark Jaguar - 3rd June 2006
Thread ressurection! Anyway, so you have a super scratched disk eh? As far as I can tell, only Chrono Trigger contains the ROM of the game on the disk itself.
Final Fantasy Origins - A Black Falcon - 3rd June 2006
Yeah, there's a huge scratch on the back... :)
Final Fantasy Origins - Dark Jaguar - 3rd June 2006
The BACK of the disk? Huh... that's actually where the data is kept so... yeah that's not good...
Final Fantasy Origins - A Black Falcon - 3rd June 2006
Really? Huh... :D
Oh, next to the giant long scratch there's a mark that looks oddly like some tape was stuck to the disc once... on the back. :weird:
Final Fantasy Origins - Dark Jaguar - 3rd June 2006
...tape? The mind reels...
Final Fantasy Origins - A Black Falcon - 3rd June 2006
On the good side however, I also got my cousin to let me borrow his quite functional copy of the awesome Star Ocean: The Second Story for PSX, so it's not all bad. :)
Final Fantasy Origins - Fittisize - 4th June 2006
I found out a few days ago that my copy of Chrono Cross was badly scratched and prevented me from entering Marbule, crucial for me to advance in the game. On the bright side, I bought a new copy off of eBay (and also Xenogears because I hear it's good) so my new games should be arriving any day now.
At least they better...I logged over 12 hours in two days on my Chrono Cross file and I desperately want to continue playing.
Final Fantasy Origins - Dark Jaguar - 4th June 2006
Keep in mind that while Chrono Cross has that now popular "enemies are all visible on the world map" thing, Xenogears does not.
Xenogears is still a great game though.