So, in the time since the last blog update these things have been worked on:
- Bugs: Designed the fixes for the bugs (as said before, they're actually quite complex to fix), now just need to implement them
- New feature: In-place patches. These won't create a copy of the game, so they're not useful for games which are in a constant state of flux or translations that are being updated frequently. However, once the game and translation are finished, in-place patching is a lot faster, so it's a nice feature.
- New feature: QT based UI. Up until now, the UI of RPGMaker Trans has been based on wxWidgets. I'm migrating to a QT UI for primary reason that rewriting the UI properly will mean less work in enabling features, and the secondary reason that I really need to learn QT for other utilities I'm planning, as wxWidgets doesn't support certain features on Windows.
- VX Support: Um... no progress on that yet, whoops.
Hello, I'm a translator, and I have translated a few Japanese games into Chinese, such as Yume2kki, Debris(fangames of Yumenikki) and Ib. Many of them are made of RM2k. I found RPGMaker Trans today, and I am very happy to know that it can extract text in common events. However, it is only available to read original Japanese games successfully. When I tried to read the Chinese translated version, it failed and said "'cp932' codec can't decode bytes in position 1-2: illegal multibyte sequence". Could you fix this problem? Thank you very much!
ReplyDeleteBTW, I've also tried another tool - DreaMaker made by King Kadelfek; it works fine for Chinese text, but it has no compatibility for extracting text in common events in RM2k games.
ReplyDeleteI am still finding a tool which can both extract and import text in common events in RM2k games while supporting Chinese text without errors.
I have actually tried, a lot, to get patching into a different locale to work. Unfortunately, I so far have been unsuccessful. Search the blog for trans-locale patching, and you can see an archive of what I've tried to do.
DeleteIncidentally, when you say DreaMaker works, does it actually successfully insert Chinese text into the game, and produce a runnable executable that displays Chinese? The reason why I ask is that as far as I'm aware this shouldn't be possible (as, theoretically at least, the cp932 code page used by RPGMaker 2k only has Japanese characters available).
Thank you very much for your reply!
DeleteI am sorry that I don't know much detail about the cp932 locale used by RPGMaker 2k.
Maybe it's just a matter of name; I only know ANSI(English), UTF-8(Unicode), GBK(Chinese) and Shift-JIS(Japanese).
But I think the most significant difference is that RPGMaker 2k does not use Unicode, but XP and VX do so.
I noticed that when RPGMaker Trans reads the Japanese game made by RPGMaker 2k,
it saves the text in "UTF-8" mode.
In such mode, open the text in Notepad on Chinese system (or English system),
Japanese characters also display correctly.
However, when DreaMaker reads the game made by RPGMaker 2k,
it does NOT save the text in "UTF-8" mode.
In such mode, open the text in Notepad on Chinese system,
Chinese characters display correctly,
but Japanese characters such as "こんにちわ" display as strange words like "偙傫偵偪傢".
But I can fix it manually very easily.
Maybe if RPGMaker Trans does not automatically encode Japanese into "UTF-8" mode, it can ALSO read Chinese characters on Chinese system?
Sorry for my poor English and long explanation.
To answer your questions directly:
Yes, DreaMaker actually successfully insert Chinese text into the game, and produce a runnable executable that displays Chinese.
And RPGMaker 2k is available to show Chinese characters on Chinese system.
If needed, I can send you some games I translated and some screenshots of Chinese RPGMaker 2k games.
I do know about the different codepages; for reference, Shift-JIS is actually something only used on Apple Macs; the Windows equivalent is cp932, but there are some differences.
DeleteThe encoding of the patch file has nothing to do with the specific problem (in fact, using Non-Unicode files would make it absolutely impossible to patch Japanese->Chinese, as an RPGMaker Trans patch must contain original and translated text). This is because RPGMaker Trans is designed to handle cases which Dreamaker cannot, specifically games which are being actively developed and hence the structure of the game can still change.
The problem is that I need to teach RPGMaker Trans how to patch from one locale into another, and this will have some difficulties attached. For example, images with Japanese file names need to be renamed, as the RPG_RT.exe won't be able to read Japanese file names once in a different locale. And this might be the current problem with my current code: If it can't find all external files to rename them, it crashes.
Perhaps I didn't make this clear before, but my actual question was this: in the games containing Chinese, has *all* the Japanese have been translated? Because this is another problem: whilst it is possible to translate a game to another language, it shouldn't be possible to have two locales in the game at once. So a partially translated game would have to have all non-translated text replaced with placeholders. And hence this also might be causing my code to crash: if there's some text it can't parse somewhere.
I'm afraid you'll likely have to wait a bit. I'm currently working on a few more features, and I won't be able to get back to trying to enable trans-locale patching until.. probably mid-March. On the plus side, the upcoming VX support will not have this problem...
Thank you very much for your reply. I'm glad that I've learned a lot from our discussion, and known more about RPGMaker Trans patch.
ReplyDeleteSorry, I didn't know about the difference between Shift-JIS and cp932 because my codepage converter tool and the browser Firefox used the former name.
Thanks for your explanation of the machanism of the RPGMaker Trans patch. Now I understand more about the detail.
About the file name problem, it seems to be a coincidence that the GBK locale (used for Simplified Chinese in Mainland China), has no critically conflict with the cp932 locale.
Let's assume a Japanese game with an image file "こんにちわ.png" and a text "さようなら" in an event. The game is in a compressed file.
Then on the GBK locale-based system, the situations will be below:
1)Use Microsoft Applocale to load Winzip (choose Japanese language). Uncompress the game and the file name will be "こんにちわ.png". Use Applocale to run RPG_RT.exe, no error happens, and the text will show "さようなら".
2)Directly uncompress the game and the file name is will be "偙傫偵偪傢.png". Directly run RPG_RT.exe, no error happens, and the text will show "偝傛偆側傜".
3)Directly uncompress the game but use Applocale to run RPG_RT.exe, it will not find "こんにちわ.png" and crash.
4)Uncompress the game with the aid of Applocale, but directly run RPG_RT.exe, it will not find "偙傫偵偪傢.png" and crash.
I translated the game under the 2nd situation. I just changed the text "偝傛偆側傜" to the corresponding Chinese of Japanese "さようなら" and left the file name to be "偙傫偵偪傢.png". So the players can directly uncompress the game, run RPG_RT.exe and see the Chinese characters.
But I also noticed that this coincidence may not happen in the ANSI locale, or the Big5 locale (used for Traditional Chinese in Taiwan and Hong Kong). I tried to run the English version of Ib (a RM2k game) on the GBK locale-based system, and run the Japanese version of it on the Big5 locale-based system, and both failed because of the file name problem.
So I am happy to know that RPGMaker Trans can solve the problem of Japanese file name. It may help many players from Taiwan and Hong Kong. And if RPGMaker Trans supports Chinese, it will be more convenient than Dreamaker for the translating games which are being actively developed, like Yume2kki (one of RM2k games I translated and the authors update very frequently).
Even if RPGMaker Trans does not support Chinese, it is still very useful since it can read the original Japanese version and I can use it to check if I missed any common event to translate. I will pay close attention to the progress of RPGMaker Trans and thank you very much for your hard work!
Well, it is certainly the goal that RPGMaker Trans will eventually support Chinese (and other non-ASCII languages), and when it does it will handle them well. But it could take a while for this to happen.
DeleteIncidentally, if/when I get Chinese support working, and if you decide to port your work to RPGMaker Trans, do tell me. I may have some experimental tools that could make the porting process easier for you.
Execuse me. I have another question. Can RPGMaker Trans automatically rename the Japanese-named files and their citations in the game to English names? If the RTP files are cited in the game, can I use RPGMaker Trans to rename both the RTP files and their citation to English names, and copy the renamed RTP files to the game folder, so that players won't need RTP any more? If so, it will be possible to directly uncompress and run the game without Applocale on any language system. Can RPGMaker Trans do so, and how to do it? Thank you very much!
DeleteAbout supporting RPGMaker Trans to be compatible with Chinese, I will be glad to help!
DeleteBut I know little about programming and python.
However, I can help trying to test your RPGMaker Trans on my system environment. I can also send you some Chinese-translated RPGMaker games for you to test. If you have time working on this, please tell me! Thank you very much!
Well, I'm not working on non-ASCII support at present. I should be able to manage without help, because getting a Japanese game to work under an English locale is the equivalent to what you would require for a Japanese game into Chinese.
DeleteThe plan is that all Japanese file names will be renamed, so that it would be possible to swap the RPG_RT.EXE file with one which had been localised (e.g. Chinese name entry screens etc) and run under the correct locale (i.e. without Applocale). The biggest unsolved problem here is the RTP, which also contains Japanese files; I'm currently trying to work out a way of sorting this problem out, but there are a fair number of legal problems to contend with.
mediafire link is dead. :p
ReplyDeleteit is indeed can you please reupload?
DeleteTemp fix now done. See post for more details.
Delete