What translation patch should I use when hacking Fire Emblem 6?

Questions
1

When I open Gringe’s most recent translation patch in Febuilder, it says there’s an error with the support conversations data and when clicking on it, it shows that there’s no support conversations there.

I tested around a little and it seens support conversations work just fine. Besides, this is more of an one chapter personal project, so I don’t really need to have support conversations.

Still, I would like to know what translation patch is the most recommended to use when hacking FE 6.

2

If it’s just a single chapter personal project, then any patch should do, though preferably you want one that messes with data the least. I mean ideally you wouldn’t use a tl patch at all and would instead use whatever febuilder has available to change the charset to EN though

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3

I see, thank you very much for your help.

4

To give a bit more information, the translation adds assembly hacks in places that community patches put their hacks in, and the latest version rewires the supports in a new way that FEBuilder doesn’t recognize. It might as well be classified as FE6U now. It sucks 'cause it means we either dance around the new changes, dance around an old version’s changes, or recreate all the US text in FE6J. Dunno why they felt the need to make things complicated when they could just watch where the greater community puts their hacks, but w’ever.

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5

As far as I’m aware there isn’t a comprehensive list of all custom FE6 patches out there. Closest thing would be the list of patches in FEBuilderGBA. If the project you set out on just aims to translate a GBA game into english you won’t have to:

  • download a romhacker tool specifically for that game (and two other games, I suppose) and learn how to use it as well as how to read its patch format.
  • ensure all your hooks do not conflict with any or conflict with as few as possible hooks, potentially further complicating the work you have to do yourself. Potential issues here:
    • You might need to bring branches into your own hooks leading to multiple different return addresses meaning more things that can break.
    • You might need to copy far more code into your hook due to the more limited options of where you can hook (early bird takes the worm, patches that do not take other hooks into account will take over the better spots). More opportunities for a mistake to slip in.
    • Hooks can get especially complicated if patches re-do systems that your translation depends on. You’ll then need to have two implementations of a function and also a way to tell if some patch has or has not been applied. If the patch changes at some point in time, your implementation might not be able to tell that the patch is applied and end up using the wrong case.

These things seem far beyond the scope of ‘merely’ translating a GBA game. If someone wants to apply patches to a translated FE6, I’d say it’s more than fair the onus should be on them to adapt the patches they want to use to this translated FE6, or adapt the translation to work with the patches they had in mind, instead of expecting the people making a translation to take all the aforementioned things into account.

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6

Hmm. Sorry, I sounded pretty indignant just now, didn’t I? The reasons I disagree on who the onus falls on are that FEGBA is more tight-knit than any other hacking community l’ve seen, and the English translation goes beyond a simple translation. Those two things combined are what make me expect the two to converge in order to make the major hacks work with each other. That, and the translation’s not been released recently, there’ve been years for this gap to be bridged.

But in the end, you’re not wrong. Making things compatible is more work than l initially gave thought to, particularly when it’s an overarching project. l’ve made one hack compatible; just one. l am far from an expert, so l apologize again for my attitude.

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7

I see what you mean. I already started hacking it and one of the things I noticed is that you can’t change any dialogue at all. Like you can skip or remove it, but never change it. Otherwise the emulator crashes.

I imagine the imcompatibility might happen because the translation is older than Febuilder itself?

I must say it’s really impressive how people can hack this game and make competent projects with FE 6 limitations.

8

As far as l know, it can only be caused by assembly hacks the translation adds. I’ve done lots of text edits in FE6, but mine’s on a translation version from the tail-end of 2020. (Though, a version 1.1.3 I have lying around seems to accept text edits fine, too.) You’ll likely have to look for an older version if you need to work on FE6 in English, unless someone else can tell what’s wrong.

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9

I see, thanks. I don’t mind having no text editing though. Since as I said it’s more of a small personal project and I was curious how hacking worked for FE 6. Nonetheless thank you for the help.