Oni II (aka Bakumatsu Korinden Oni) English Language Patch V0.50


Introduction:



	Japanese Developer:				Pandora Box
	Japanese Publisher:				Banpresto
	Japanese Release:				February 2, 1996
	English Patch Production:			Dynamic-Designs



Dynamic-Designs Patch History:



	V0.50:  Initial Dynamic-Designs Buggy Release:	February 1, 2025




Dynamic-Designs Production Credits:



	Project Coordination:				Wildbill and Taskforce
	Hacking/Tools/Bug Fixing:			Bongo`
        Assembly: 					Bongo`
	Translation:					BrandNewScooby
	English Graphics:				Taskforce and Bongo`
	Script Writing:					Wildbill



NOT FOR SALE INFO

This game in English or patch to make it English is
NOT for sale under any circumstances!  If you paid
for this game in any way, including in a cartridge,
demand your money back immediately!  File a complaint
with your credit card company and/or paypal as well!
Especially if you got this game in cart form!




Game Description:

Description From Moby-Games: https://www.mobygames.com/game/13731/bakumatsu-korinden-oni/

The game is set in the end of Edo period in Japan (1600-1868). Japan, controlled by the feudal rulers
(shoguns) of the Tokugawa dynasty, consumed by a peaceful sleep for three hundred years, was awoken
by the arrival of the Westerners. It seemed that they only wanted the end of Japan's isolation from
the rest of the world. But their true purpose was to take control of a mysterious Japanese energy
source called reiketsu. To protect those sources, that were running dry during their three hundred
years-long reign, the Tokugawa Shoguns formed the famous Shinsengumi special force. In addition to
its primary mission of clearing out forces that would try to overthrow the shogunate, there also
existed a special branch of them called "Shadow Shinsengumi". The duty of the "Shadow" was to take
care of "those things the human hand cannot manage"...

You control Yamatomaru, a strong-willed sixteen-year-old boy who lives in Iida village, near Koufu.
His father has recently passed away. After failing to defeat a monster in his village, he was saved
by one of the Shadow Shinsengumi man, Mibu Juurota. As he receives his father's katana, he goes on
his first mission - rescuing boys who were trapped in a mountain path. Soon the plot thickens and
the young hero becomes involved in mystical struggles between the forces who try to control
reiketsu...

The gameplay is similar to Dragon Quest series and other Japanese-style RPGs: the battles are random,
turn-based, and are viewed from first-person perspective. You fight using physical attacks and a
variety of special moves based on spiritual energy. An unusual addition to the gameplay is the
karma system. By doing good deeds you can increase your 





Special features of this game.

This game has a huge script for an SNES game.

This game is based during Japanese history.  The game features
the shinsengumi which were a real group of swordsman during the 
Edo period in Japanese history.  For more information on the
shinsengumi group see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shinsengumi

Anyone who regularly watches anime has probably seen this group
mentioned in other works.  




Bugs still present (some but may not be all)

1. Every time someone other than the main character
   levels up and gets a skill the game will lock up.  
   The only way past this is to use the Japanese rom.
   Copy the save game, fight and level the other characters
   then copy the save back to the english game.

2. There is a shop later in the game that you can get stuck
   in an infinite loop trying to shop at. 

3. The Boating sessions also have bugs with fighting
   and buying tickets but these can be avoided.

4. The game is still in such a buggy state, we've forgone
   beta testing.  So expect text issues that we might have
   usually squashed.  Overruns and repeated text can and
   probably will happen now and then though we do get most
   of those during the editing process.

To be clear, this is what we consider an early beta release.
While the text is fully or at least mostly fully translated.
The game still has a massive amount of bugs and we do not
consider it in a playable state.  It can be played but will
require you to do some work to be able to play it.  We're
releasing it as is because we cannot finish it at this time.
It may or may not ever get another release with these issues
fixed.





Production and Lack of Testing (and hope of completion):

First off, the translation in this game is fully in place as far
as I'm aware.  The game can be completed in English language but
only if you don't mind spending time switching between the Japanese
and English roms.  Therefore, consider this game as incomplete and
this is why the release is V0.50 not because the translation isn't
fully done. 

This game unfortunately has been in production standstill for years
since Bongo` retired.  Bongo` did all the assembly and once he
retired, all the bugs remained unfixed.  We've tried many times
to find assembly help but all of it fell though in the end.
While I do know some assembly, it is just about enough to be
dangerous to the poor game.  Worse, most of my experience is
with Z80 based systems and I've hardly done anything with
6502 or 65816 based systems like the SNES and NES and while
some things are the same, overall you still need time to
invest. And I'm not overly confident in even those Z80 based
systems.

Anyway, we very much appreciate all the work that brandnewscobby
put into the translation for this one.  The translation is excellent
by an absolute top notch translator.  The translation was also an absolutely
massive undertaking as the script was extremely large and we sure wish we
could have gotten this to full completion.  Who knows, maybe someday that will
happen if this sparks interest in someone doing some bug fixes.

We're VERY willing to finish the game if we can find help, but since
all attempts have fallen though, we decided it was time to release
whatever we have.

-Taskforce-





Patching:

Contained within this archive is an IPS (international patching system) file or a patch file in another
format for the end user's convenience that when used in conjunction with a ROM file will make the
game playable in English *with bugs remaining that require some use of the japanese rom*.

Do note that this patch is a result of countless hours of love and labor. Hence, they are not meant
to be sold at any price under any circumstance, be it in digital form or burnt into a donor cart's
ROM chip.

To patch the ROM file, one needs to procure a patcher for their preferred format, a widely available
class of programs, many of which can be found at http://www.romhacking.net/ for one source.  A few
can even be found on our download page for your convenience at
http://www.dynamic-designs.us/downloads.shtml.  Look at the bottom under utilities.  We did not make
these utilities, we just provide them for your convenience.

At some point, ROM sites may upload pre-patched ROMs of our Oni II translation. Obviously,
Dynamic Designs cannot endorse playing these versions, nor will we support resolution of any
associated problems. Moreover, pre-patched ROMs may float around the web for years.  Only by
downloading patches containing just our original work from D-D's web site may gamers obtain
revisions to these patches - if any - and take advantage of possible bug-fixes and corrections.

Below is the information pertaining to the ROM file our patch requires, according to Nach's SNES ROM
Tools:






---------------------Internal ROM Info----------------------
       File: ONI-2(J).smc
       Name: S-ONI2                   Company: Banpresto
     Header: None                        Bank: HiROM
Interleaved: None                        SRAM: 64 Kb
       Type: Normal + Batt                ROM: 32 Mb
    Country: Japan                      Video: NTSC
  ROM Speed: 120ns (FastROM)         Revision: 1.0
   Checksum: Good 0x4F7E            Game Code: A2OJ
---------------------------Hashes---------------------------
      CRC32: 1CF3C877
--------------------------Database--------------------------
       Name: Bakumatsu Kourinden Oni
    Country: Japan                   Revision: 1.0
     Port 1: Gamepad                   Port 2: Gamepad
    Genre 1: RPG                      Genre 2: Turn Based



**Also take SPECIAL NOTE that the original rom lacks a header.  You may have to remove the header
from your ROM file, but don't worry as there are a variety of programs that do this, such as
SNESTool, Smile, Toolbox, etc.  



Size before patching: 4.00 MB (4,194,304 bytes)



Size after patching: 4.00 MB (4,194,304 bytes)


Alternatively, most emulators support a feature called soft patching, which keeps the ROM file
intact, merging the patch data only during run time. To make use of it, make sure both the ROM file
and the IPS are in the same directory as your emulator of choice and have the same name, but not the
same extension. Do note that this is case-sensitive.  (Also, do note this soft patching is only
available using the IPS patch file, and may NOT work with the other patch file formats.)

*To make use of the same save file to get past the bugs, I'd recommend using soft patching with
the emulator and deleting/renaming the patch long enough to get past the problematic section and 
then changing the name back to continue.  I'll include a batch file for doing just that but feel
free to ignore it or not run it if you do not trust it or have no knowledge of how to use it*


e.g:  Oni-II.smc and Oni-II.ips will trigger soft patching at the emulator's run time.






Emulator Compatibility:


The game behaves itself properly in a wide range of emulators such as ZSNES, SnesGT, Mednafen,
SNES9X and Higan/BSNES.





Special Thanks:


Without these people, it just wouldn't have been possible or fun: All of the great staff at D-D.
brandnewscooby for translating the game, Bongo` for hacking, Wildbill for writing and of course
the rest of the D-D forum community!


Readme 2025 Dynamic-Designs