Rom-Hacks & Fan-Games: Anyone into them?

[yagamikun]

I've had a soft spot for ROM hacks over the last few years looking for new ways to enjoy old games. There are some that are small tweaks to game engines to fix dumb shit, while others are more or less entirely new games. Fan translations are one thing, but this rabbit hole goes pretty deep (TWSS).

Anyone else into hacks or new/old fan games? Any recommendations?

Here's some Hacks I recommend:

• NES - Castlevania 2 Redaction: Makes the game playable and fixes and myriad of dumb shit with the game and includes a full retranslation.
• NES - Mega Man 4 Voyage: Rom hack of Mega Man 4 that turns it into an entirely new game including importing assets from Mega Man 9, entirely new stage layouts and tiles, entirely new boss patterns, and a (really good) original soundtrack.
• NES - Metroid Rogue Dawn: Prequel to Metroid 1 that uses Metroid 1 as a base, but it's a 100% completely different game with a really haunting atmosphere.
• Mega Drive - Sonic 3 Complete: Combo Sonic 3 & Knuckles with a bajillion options to customize the experience from level layouts (beta, release, etc), soundtrack options, sound effects options, and a ton more. 100% the best way to play Sonic 3.
• SNES - Gradius 3 SA-1 Patch: Removes the slowdown - game is incredibly hard this way, but Gradius 3 should be. Transforms the game completely, imo.

New Games for Old Consoles or PC:

• Mega Drive - Mega Man the Sequel Wars: Fan-created sequel to the Wily Wars. Not at rom-hack, was created from the ground up. Currently "Episode Red" includes a full, really good, remake of Mega Man 4. LOADS of options, selectable playable characters, two different soundtracks, and all the issues with the original Wily Wars are gone. This plays amazing, super impressive. It's incredible playing this on a Mega Drive - just throw the ROM onto your Everdrive.
• PC - Streets of Rage Remake: The best SOR game ever.
• PC - AM2R: Another Metroid 2 Remake: Make it a point to play this year. Nintendo should have hired this guy to remake Metroid 2 instead of Mercury Steam. Incredible Metroid game full-stop.

 

[kernow]

Good idea for a thread, I find there's often too many of these to sort through

 

[yagamikun]

Good idea for a thread, I find there's often too many of these to sort through

Aye. There's just so much out there it's overwhelming - and if you try your luck and land on a couple duds out of the gate, it will taint the whole search.

Games are easy to patch, too, but can often find pre-patched versions of most of the hacks if you look around. I have a few repro carts of my favorites just for funsies, like Sonic 3 Complete. Total goobtastic nonsense, but looks good with the set.

 

[JoeAwesome]

Most hacks’ novelty wears thin after a short while, but my faves were the “Newer Super Mario Bros.” (Wii) one, with additional seasonal add-ons, and the “Oh No! More Zombies Ate My Neighbors!” (SNES) one.

While not completely polished (few hacks I’ve played are), these definitely were fun while being more of the same (in a good way).

 

[pixeljunkie]

Splatterhouse Chrome is worth a playthrough

I've also been a fan of Pyron's hacks where he updates colors to look way better.

 

[sirlynxalot]

I enjoy hacks when the creator essentially turns it into a new game or episode of the base game, such as by substantially replacing the level graphics with original ones in a similar style, and new music instead of reusing the stuff from the base game or sticking things in from other games. Here's a substantial Commander Keen hack I thought was quite good.

Operation Ocflore - KeenWiki

keenwiki.shikadi.net

 

[city41]

Probably my favorite hack so far is Warios' Hint Art. Bundled with the hack is a whole bunch of image clues like this



and then you use those clues to find newly hidden stars in what is otherwise a pretty vanilla Mario 64. More than any other Mario 64 hack, this one made me feel like it was 1996 again. A pure joy to play from start to finish. I hope someone incorporates the images into the hack some day (currently you need to pull up the images on say your phone), but that's a minor complaint.

And the PC port of Mario 64 is honestly one of the greatest accomplishments in rom hacking/homebrew history. It's phenomenal. I do mostly play the Wii U port now which was derived from the same decompilation, as I prefer to play on my couch.

 

[100proof]

Yeah, those decompilations have been an amazing development.

The port/decompilation of GTA3 that just came out on the Dreamcast is incredibly impressive.

I generally don't play a lot of rom hacks and fan games but I have played a number of translation patches over the years to enjoy games that never made it to the States. Also played the shit out of the Streets of Rage remake (great soundtrack) and a few of the randomizers over the last few years (Zelda NES, Final Fantasy 6). Great way to see an old game in a new light. Oh yeah... plus that Metroid 2 remake that came out on PC. As usual, fuck Nintendo for being so litigious/anti-fan.

Edit: Is there a good repository to find these anymore now that romhacking.net removed all of their files? Having to dick around on individual Github pages is frustrating.

 

[roker]

Awesome thread. I’m also into the home brew stuff. NES has been getting some quality releases. I usually buy roms to support developers.

Check out Alwa's Awakening. Great game. Rom is for sale on itch.io

I haven't played it yet, but Changeable Guardian Estique looks pretty cool. No rom release so physical copy only:

Changeable Guardian Estique (NES)

Changeable Guardian Estique is a NES game created by Cat Hui Trading. Buy the official physical edition. Complete in Box. Cartridge with box and instruction manual.

www.brokestudio.fr

And of course, looking forward to Earthion for the Genesis/Mega Drive from Yuzo Koshiro's Ancient. Looks badass.

 

[max 330 megafartz]

Awesome thread. I’m also into the home brew stuff. NES has been getting some quality releases. I usually buy roms to support developers.

Check out Alwa's Awakening. Great game. Rom is for sale on itch.io

I haven't played it yet, but Changeable Guardian Estique looks pretty cool. No rom release so physical copy only:

Changeable Guardian Estique (NES)

Changeable Guardian Estique is a NES game created by Cat Hui Trading. Buy the official physical edition. Complete in Box. Cartridge with box and instruction manual.

www.brokestudio.fr

And of course, looking forward to Earthion for the Genesis/Mega Drive from Yuzo Koshiro's Ancient. Looks badass.

Changable guardian estique is basically not an NES game from what I have heard. It’s like Paprium, just has its own processor and uses the NES like a supergun.

 

[roker]

Changable guardian estique is basically not an NES game from what I have heard. It’s like Paprium, just has its own processor and uses the NES like a supergun.

Former Dawn seems to be along the same path, but they have promised to get it to work with the n8 pro everdrive. I bet even Paprium could work with the Mega Everdrive Pro if the developer wanted to stop being a douche. That's a big IF though.

 

[pixeljunkie]

I always liked this game. I would pick it up to start multiple times but could never stick with it as it felt pretty frustrating. This might fix that:

Arcana, One Of The Most Underrated SNES JRPGs, Just Got A Fan-Made Upgrade

"Seal of Rimsala is a labour of love"

www.timeextension.com

Arcana - Seal of Rimsala

Seal of Rimsala is a labor of love, and designed as the definitive version of Arcana. Also known as

www.romhacking.net

 

[Neo Alec]

Everyone already knows, but I have to tip my hat to all of the Game Gear to Master System hacks that fans have made over the years, including ones that provide 2-player support for the Streets of Rage games. The SMS is one of my favorite systems, and it's great to see it get more great games in the form of GG ports. It can be a great option to play these games at a higher resolution on the big screen. Some of these hacks are virtually flawless ports.

Game Gear to Master System - Hacks - SMS Power!

 

[yagamikun]

Yeah, those decompilations have been an amazing development.

The port/decompilation of GTA3 that just came out on the Dreamcast is incredibly impressive.

I generally don't play a lot of rom hacks and fan games but I have played a number of translation patches over the years to enjoy games that never made it to the States. Also played the shit out of the Streets of Rage remake (great soundtrack) and a few of the randomizers over the last few years (Zelda NES, Final Fantasy 6). Great way to see an old game in a new light. Oh yeah... plus that Metroid 2 remake that came out on PC. As usual, fuck Nintendo for being so litigious/anti-fan.

Edit: Is there a good repository to find these anymore now that romhacking.net removed all of their files? Having to dick around on individual Github pages is frustrating.

All previously uploaded stuff to Rom Hacks thankfully didn't go away from what I understand, just the new hacks require some sleuthing to get. I downloaded a bunch of older stuff the other day no problem.

Unfortunately, Nintendo has scared the fuck out of emulator sites, developers, and even the game hacking community making it really hard to find anything these days. I also assume that we'll see far less developed now that the community for these projects is too closed off. Much as I love me some Nintendo games, they won't be getting much of if any "new" money from me moving forward thanks to them slapping on a DMCA takedown for any fan project made with love.

I think it'll be easy to find Sonic and Mega Man hacks and fan-made stuff given those games have gargantuan modding communities that have their own dedicated forum sites and the like.

 

[GohanX]

My favorites are the fan translations of games we never got here, or a patch that fixes some glaring flaw of an original game without breaking something. The OP has a lot of my faves listed already. Here are a few of my faves:

NES/Famicom:
Castlevania 2: There are many patches, turns out there is a great game hidden in there. I made a cart with my preferred patches that saves
Castlevania 3: Japanese version with English text is fantastic. The difficulty is balanced better than the US one and the enhanced soundtrack is amazing.
Mad City: Japanese version is a much better game than Bayou Billy, now with English
Final Fantasy: There are many patches, and I don't like to muck up the game too much but allowing auto targeting after you kill a baddy transforms this game for me.

SNES:
Too many Japanese RPGS to name, lots of good stuff
Super Mario All Stars: The physics in SMB1 are fucked when you hit a brick, there is a patch that fixes it and makes it much better
Megaman X3 Zero Project: Totally transforms this game into what it should have been to start with

Genesis:
Sonic 3 Complete
Contra Hard Corps: Like Mad City above, is the better Japanese difficulty with English text
SF2 Hyper/Super SF2: Various patches on these, the best ones improve the sound
Outrun: There are many color hacks, this actually makes it look mostly like the arcade game

32X
Doom Resurrection is incredible if you are goob enough to want to play Doom on a 32x in 2025.
Virtua Racing 32x: There is a simple hack that makes the Japanese version region free, and the Japanese version saves. Simple but handy when playing on real hardware.

Also, the Working Designs games on various platforms all have patches to unfuck most of the bad changes that were done to them and restore the gameplay to the original design. Popful Mail on Sega CD imo is the best example, the Unworked version is fantastic. It doesn't retranslate though, so you still have stupid Bill Clinton jokes.

 

[Cousin_Itt]

I've been wanting to have a try at the many Zelda game randomizers. That and the Zelda ii fan pc remake (not the snes msu port)

 

[JoeAwesome]

@GohanX be a man and play the American version of Contra Hard Corps with Browny

 

[yagamikun]

I've been wanting to have a try at the many Zelda game randomizers. That and the Zelda ii fan pc remake (not the snes msu port)

The radomizers are much fun - especially the Super Metroid ones. I think there's even one for Secret of Mana now, but I haven't tried it out.

There are a few baller fan PC updates - Zelda 2 is excellent. 100% the best way to play this game in the modern era. Castlevania Revamped is also excellent - full CV1 remake in NES style, but the dev turned it into a Metroidvania. It looks like CV1 but because of the nature of exploring a huge map, the controls have been modernized a bit to compensate. The music is also of note.

Side note, the SNES MSU Port of Metroid 1 is for sure worth playing - my favorite way to revisit the game these days. A bajilion QOL updates and many features from Super Metroid have been ported in. I just use the OG NES soundtrack option, though.

 

[kernow]

Quite enjoying playing GB hacks in colour on GBC

 

[roker]

There are a few baller fan PC updates - Zelda 2 is excellen

I hear that a lot. Zelda II was my first Zelda and I still replay it from time to time. I guess it’s time to give the PC version a shot.
I

 

[kernow]

I'll give you a shot

 

[city41]

Kaze's second Return To Yoshi Island demo has been released. Even if you don't like the n64 or mario64, seeing what he is able to do on the hardware is worth it. Imagine if commercial games back in the day looked this good.

I set the timestamp on the video to a particularly good looking area. And yeah, this runs on a real n64

 

[yagamikun]

WOAH! That looks incredible! Man, getting (what looks to be) a Mario 64 hack running at a full 60fps alone is super impressive on real hardware! I'll for sure check this out - not much of an N64 fan, but I love seeing what modern coders can do with these old machines.

 

[city41]

Not only does it work on real hardware, the release notes talk about how it doesn't work on many emulators.

it doesn't use the expansion pak either. It's very impressive.

 

[HornheaDD]

Is the Simons Quest hack the one with the in game map, and the shortened transition from day to night and back? If so- yeah that made the game way better, and I even liked the OG Simon's Quest.

Agree on AM2R. Much more enjoyable than the one on the 3DS.