/vr/ - Retro Games

>not calling it virtual boy edition

>>3740930
More like ancient plasma screen edition. Then again if he added some green in there it'd be CGA mode CV.

Pretty much all of the ones that aren't bugfixes, translations, or ones that restore cut content.

Any other hack just makes me want to play the original games.

>>3740904
If you want shitty look at early fan translations. FF is especially notorious for this.

Your example seems like more of a personal project then someone trying to improve a game, weird its under improvement though.

Speaking of, this thread reminded me of a story. Awhile back on a virtual boy fourm (weird, I know) a guy was trying to port snatcher to it as a side project. Unfortunately I believe he died from a form of cancer and once word of this broke the fourm decided to honor him by continuing his project. It was a really cool story of a fourm coming together.

>>3741038
Early translations are great!
That's how I know Frog's real name Kaeru and that Arche fucks like a tiger.

>>3741049
Is this a literal translation?

>>3741057
Hahaha, I highly doubt it, but it still makes me laugh after all these years.

>>3740904
I very rarely find myself willing to divulge any hacks, even the more popular ones. Once in a while though I do find one that I enjoy enough to overlook some of the more obvious shenanigans. Things like assets literally copied and pasted from another game or something are just entirely too common.

>>3740904

>>3741245
Hacks that are ACTUAL improvements (not making the screen shitty red) can really enhance a game.
For example in A Links Awakening there are patches to get rid of the text when picking up an Acorn or Piece of Power.
That GREATLY improves the game. Hell, I used to avoid them because I didn't want to see the text.
Another Zelda patch removes the beeping when low on health. That is another good hack.

Castlevania 2 has been hacked to have a day to night transition that is actually smooth.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oCfnehhRBsk


The problem is most of the hacks these days seem to be about making games harder. Or making them have shitty graphics.

"improvement" is just the category, meaning it only changes a few things which aren't fixes and aren't big enough to warrant a "complete" label. Not hard to understand.

>>3740996
You haven't looked hard enough. Somes hacks still close to the original game while providing new interesting level design that feels very pro. Check out SCHWA's hacks for instance, Chaos Control for SMB3 or Gadget Master for MM4.

>>3740904
>baby figured out where the palette data was stored

>>3741057
Supposedly it's a very, very loose translation of the original text. Absolute Zero did another translation and it's pretty different, something like 'Mint is a nice girl but Arche seems like a real firebrand'.

DeJap's Phantasia translation is known to have taken some liberties here and there, although it's not terribly bad, like the official translation for GBA was. This is an official translation that translated 'Ragnarok' into 'Kangaroo' and other things.

It did have the best voices though:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WbmCKT3XSAU

>>3740904
>I put the game in my NES, and all of a sudden, HYPER-REALISTIC BLOOD started dripping off the screen!

>>3741278
That's a failing of their system then, since changing graphics is not an improvement.

>>3741273
Stuff listed here could be considered improvements. Making everything "blood red" or changing the sprites in Mario 1 to look like Mario 3 is not an improvement.

>>3741273
This is the opposite of what I was talking about.

I understand that a lot of folks prefer the so called improvement hacks. I do not. I would rather play the original in every case I can think of, with the only exceptions being an official re-release on a newer system. Even with those, I often prefer the original if I played that one first.

If I am actually going to play a hack of a game, in that rare instance, it is probably because: a) I really enjoyed the original, and b) though it may be based on an existing game, it is by and large a new one created using the original as a foundation.

For instance, the vid you posted is neat. But that would not warrant another play-through to experience. However, had the author also re-arranged the maps, item locations, and possibly, but not necessarily the story, then I might be down if it was well done and not some Newgrounds-tier shit-show.

>>3741278
>You haven't looked hard enough.
The ironic thing is that I actually have.

I've played all of the "big name" romhacks that everyone throws around as being "amazing." They're all awful and can never hide their amateur origins.

Pokemon Dark Rising. Holy shit, I heard stories but they don't compare.

>>3741995
>The ironic thing is that I actually have.
>I've played all of the "big name" romhacks that everyone throws around as being "amazing."

Like I said, haven't really looked. You sound like you'd like the same kind of hacks I do.

Go try Chaos Control for SMB3 and Gadget Master for MM4.

>>3741995
What are the "big name" romhacks?

>>3740904
I hope in the future they develop an emulator that seperates the layers on 2D roms and lets you play them with a 3d head set. Not quite like in the pic but more the Sega classics on 3Ds

>>3741995

are you expecting a trophy for your refined and definitive taste for not liking any romhack?

>>3742132
>seperates the layers

lol

>>3742146
What? Am I being unreasonable? I just want some crisp, sweet ass 3D parallaxing on a 3D display.

>>3740904
Pretty sure it's listed under improvement because it's just a minor tweak instead of a total gameplay overhaul and there isn't any other category to put it under.

>>3741995
I sincerely doubt that.

>>3742157
>parallaxing
>crisp
>NES game

>>3742118
Stuff like Super Mario 3Mix (absolute trash from top to bottom), Rockman 4 Minus Infinity (level design consists of just throwing whatever elements from other Mega Man games together into a mish-mash of shit), SMW: TSRP2 (horrid level design and graphical changes), etc. etc.

I'd rather play a game made by professionals than hobbyists.

>>3742142
Not really, no. Romhackers should just make their own games instead of piggybacking off of games made by people who are infinitely their betters.

>>3742952
100 times this. Professionally made games had experienced staff brainstorming ideas, planning everything on drawing board—you know, doing actual work. They didn't come there from nowhere, at times they had worked on dozens of games before making their breakthrough hits.

I'd rather play a finished, play-tested game with a coherent, fleshed out concept made by industry veterans at their peak, than some fan diarrhea made by people with 0 talent and experience in game design.

>>3742952
Play a rom hack that is actually good, like Super Metroid Zero Mission

>>3743004
That's a false dichotomy if I've ever seen one.

>>3742919
Stop memetexting like some child from /v/.

>>3742157
NES doesn't have layers.
BG map and sprites, that's it nigga

>>3741049
this part really took me out of the game, so bad

damn, now I remember I gave up at the flying unicorn part

>>3742952
>>3743004

While I do see your point, and even agree to some extent, I do not think it is so cut and dry or black and white.

There are dudes who learn to create games by reverse engineering them. There are also hacks that take a small team years to produce and even go through beta-testing and quality control.

Likewise there are 'professionals' that put out complete garbage just to cash in on people who don't know any better. I got more than one NES game back in the day from Grandma that was borderline unplayable.

It doesn't hurt to have an open mind. I rarely find myself interested in any hacks beyond a simple translation. But I have played a couple hacks that were basically an entirely new game, and which really impressed me by how well it was done.

I mean, it can't be done on modern consoles anymore, but plenty of retro titles were literally just thrown together by a bunch of dudes who had little idea of what they were even doing and were just trying to get by.

>>3742952
So you're saying pro games are always better than romhacks and fangames.

So Mega Man V or 7 are better than Minus Infinity, Rockman 7 FC or the hack are mentionned.

>>3743479
As a general rule 99% of romhacks suck.
Hell even official rom hack are pretty shitty. Just look at New Super Mario Bros 2/wii/u, official rom hacks that were pretty shit.

>>3743514
>official rom hacks

>>3743541
See also: Mario 2 (NES) or New Super Luigi U.

>>3743543

>>3743435
>I have played a couple hacks that were basically an entirely new game, and which really impressed me by how well it was done.

Which ones?

>>3743541
>>3743562
See also: e-Reader levels for Super Mario Advance 4: Super Mario Bros 3 on GBA.

>>3743569
Except the e-Reader levels are the sickest shit.

And you don't know what "romhack" means, do you?

>>3741247
I remember playing this on NESticle.

>>3741285
The Kangaroo bit is really the only truly bad part about the GBA translation of Tales of Phantasia.

It's better than the juvenile humor in the DeJap version.

And yeah, the dubbing is a bit hilariously terrible in some parts, "IN-DIG-NAY-SHON" comes to mind, but it's pretty good.

It's better than the fan-made SNES English dub.

Everyone sounds wooden in the fan dubbed version.

Also, some of those "Parody" hacks if they're just "dude cussing lmao".

Also, those typos and spacing issues...

>>3743435
Yes, I know, but I replied to the post about SMW, SMB3 and Rockman 4, and these are not cash-ins. In fact, I'd be hard pressed to believe someone actually could make WAY better version of SMB3.

There's Kaizo Mario which is cool though, and Rockman 4 is not exactly the best game ever so there's room for improvement. So if you really gather people who put as much effort and devotion into it as the professionals who made the game to make a hack, then why not. But guess why it almost never happens. That's right, exactly: because these people work for free and out of enthusiasm, when experienced pros got paid to work full time for months, if not years, to create a game with a dedicated team of artists, level designers, character designers, art directors, composers, and so on.

People will say, "but AM2R is great". But that's an obvious cherrypicking. It's a single good hack in a sea of literal shit. How many hacks of the same level you can name, that took as much effort and produced similar results, especially for games other than Super Metroid?

>It doesn't hurt to have an open mind
"Open mind" doesn't mean "you should try eating shit". I guess you might have enjoyed the taste, but thank you, I'll pass. On the upside, more shit for you, I guess.

>>3743479
No one said that, you just made a strawman.

Of course you can go with cherrypicking and give examples how such and such hack was better than some Mega Man game. This doesn't make them objectively worthy of playing.

Hacks are usually not made by Japanese, so a priori they're gonna be shit. Besides, games are finished products envisioned by their authors. I don't want someone fiddling with ready games, I want to experience things how devs intended them. Do you think people buy CRTs and real hardware to play fucking hacks?…

>>3743592

>AM2R
>romhack

>>3743606
>No one said that, you just made a strawman.

>>3742952
>Romhackers should just make their own games instead of piggybacking off of games made by people who are infinitely their betters.

>>3743607
Well so what that it's not, it's a fan-made game made using a lot of the existing assets from Metroid games, right? It's still related to the topic of fan-made content.

>>3743607
It is practically an over glorified romhack

>>3743592
you're right. in general, romhacks have excessive difficulty, design flaws, and overall clunkiness and lack of polish.

they often implement cool ideas that wouldn't see the light of day otherwise, they often have really good custom assets, and they're great for kaizo difficulty if you're into that sort of thing.

other than that, they're bogged down by design flaws and poor execution. unbalanced difficulty, frustrating cheapness like invisible coin blocks, weird hitboxes, cringey plot/dialogue/gimmicks that a 12 year old would enjoy, lazy rehashing, etc.

with some exceptions, romhacks prove that the original devs knew what they were doing, and making games is a craft that not everyone can pull off properly.

>>3743584
I... I kinda want to play that game.

>>3743617
He said
>Romhackers should just make their own games instead of piggybacking off of games made by people who are infinitely their betters.
You said
>So you're saying pro games are always better than romhacks and fangames.
So either you didn't get what he said, or conveniently made a strawman. Where did you get the "always" part from? He was pretty clear: stop piggybacking off good games made by way more talented people. What's there not to understand?

>>3743642
>they often implement cool ideas that wouldn't see the light of day otherwise
That's true, but as you said they are usually bogged down by too many problems. Cool idea is one thing, well-executed idea is another. A cool idea doesn't make the game, it's only a small part of what potentially COULD make a game. But most hack creators seem to stop at that.

i remember playing a hack of street fighter where the only changes made were that the winquotes had the word DICK in place of other words.
they also changed dhalsim to dhalslim.
the early days were a chaotic time

>>3743694
>So either you didn't get what he said, or conveniently made a strawman. Where did you get the "always" part from?

He your makes a generality out of the whole thing. Not just in that sentance either, in his your whole speech too. That's where the always comes from.

Then when shown otherwise, when presented with romhacks and fanmades of quality that he'd enjoy, he either pretends he didn't hear anything (I mentionned twice hacks that should fit his taste but which he ignored) or dismisses it.

At this point nothing can be done, which may be the intent (= bad /v/ style trolling).

>>3743694
Sturgeon's Law is Sturgeon's Law no matter what you're dealing with.

>>3740904
Awful Fantasy 3.

>>3743989
It's not really about the percentage, it's about how much good stuff we have in numbers. 90% of hacks could be shit; but if, say, we had around 100 truly worthwile, must-play hacks, and stuff like AM2R came out every month, that wouldn't be a problem.

It's like with people who say 90% of games for some popular console were shit. You know, they might even be right. But IMO, if a console with 2000 releases has 200 decent games, of which 20–40 are truly amazing, that's enough really. You won't play 2000 games in your life anyway, unless you're an autist.

But with hacks, even decent ones happen once in a blue moon. The quality bar is set ridiculously low too.

>>3743479
>So you're saying pro games are always better than romhacks and fangames.
>So Mega Man V or 7 are better than Minus Infinity, Rockman 7 FC or the hack are mentionned.
Absolutely.

>>3742157
>>3742132
You do know that Kirby's Adventure, Kid Icarus and a few other got that treatment on the 3DS, right?

>>3743989
I would still argue that the quality distribution of romhacks is well below average. occasionally I've been pleasantly surprised and discovered a gem; but most of the time, romhacks are not good games due to poor execution, as I said earlier.

>>3744584
NOPE thought it was only sega games. Thanks brochacho

>>3744623
Aint that the truth and a half. Its partly due to the nature of the platform being open to just anyone but it seems even the really good ones are still missing something. Making fun games is hard.

So, a few weeks ago someone posted that an ebay seller was selling this for 3 bucks. Got mine in the mail today.