Classic SNES RPG Illusion Of Gaia Gets Fresh Translation 30 Years After Its Western Release | Time Extension
Classic SNES RPG Illusion Of Gaia Gets Fresh Translation 30 Years After Its Western Release | Time Extension
Has improved load times, too
In September of 1994, Illusion of Gaia made its North American debut. Known for being much darker than the other RPGs Nintendo was allowing at the time, it left players with a lot to think about... but unfortunately, the localization was often incomprehensible.
Now, thanks to the efforts of L Thammy, the game has received a new fan translation 30 years after its western release. The GitHub project page for this translation can be found here.
Key points:
- The new translation aims to make the English script more comprehensible and closer to the original Japanese dialogue.
- A demo is available on GitHub, including the translation up to South Cape location.
- In addition, the patch improves load times by decompressing all assets in the game.
Do you remember being confused by the original localization?
Illusion of Gaia is one of those games that holds a magical place in my heart, so much so that just hearing or thinking of the name..even all these years later, still gives me goosebumps.
Such a fantastic game. and such a fantastic story
I immediately started hearing the music when I saw the title. I tried playing this game as a kid, but had a fairly hard time with it. Went back in the past decade and finally beat it. Am I remembering correctly that the instruction booklet had an entire strategy guide in it?
It was the first rpg-type game I ever played and it awoke a passion in me I still have 30 years on.
I still have the cartridge. Don’t have an SNES to play on anymore (I’d just emulate anyway). But I keep that and ff8 on display, for being formative titles.
The script was a little rough at times for sure, like plenty of the other localized games of its era, but I don't remember it being especially bad. Terranigma was definitely worse, though, possibly due to not getting a North America release. Would love to see a project tackle that one.
I really want to play this game. Been looking at reproduction carts of it cause that's all I can find. I'm not really good at setting up emulators so I tend to stick to consoles when it comes to 4th-5th generation games.
I don't know how well it's aged for a new player, but I found it very notable at the time for being dark, if not outright macabre, at times. We had very little of that in the 16-bit era.
Drawing from real-world locales and cultures was interesting, too. Ys is another series that does that to good effect.