Download Patch:
https://github.com/DerekPascarella/DeathCrimson2AltarofMelanito-EnglishPatchDreamcast/
In development since mid-December 2023, the English translation patch for “Death Crimson 2: Altar of Melanito” for the SEGA Dreamcast has been released! Note that both a GDI and CDI patch has been provided, ensuring all Dreamcast fans can enjoy it.
So, what’s this game all about?
Released on November 25th, 1999 by Ecole, “Death Crimson 2: Altar of Melanito” (デスクリムゾン２ −メラニートの祭壇−) is a sequel to the original “Death Crimson” game on the SEGA Saturn. Unlike its predecessor, the sequel features a full story mode, fleshing out the backstory behind the game’s numerous characters, while also introducing new ones.
It’s also important to note that this game stands in stark contrast to “Death Crimson OX”, which saw a Western release. This version of the game completely stripped out the free-roaming story mode, which feels (and controls) similar to popular survival horror games, like “Resident Evil”.
Players can use either the standard Dreamcast controller or light gun during the shooting sections of the game.
This patch is polished, leaving no stone unturned, and introduces all sorts of cool new stuff! Below is a high-level list of changes made to the original Japanese retail version of the game.
- A new ASCII font has been implemented.
- All textures/graphics have been translated into English, in addition to correction of misspelled English place names (e.g., street signs) in order to align with official Western release of “Death Crimson OX”.
- All in-game dialogue/menu/message text has been translated into English.
- All in-game cutscene videos have been translated and subtitled in English, with special optimizations made for CDI version of the patch (see A Note for CD-R Users).
- New code for VMU icon supported has been added to the game (read more in this Dreamcast-Talk.com forum post and this Twitter post).
- A bug has been fixed that prevented a certain piece of dialogue text from being displayed.
- Title screen graphics have been improved and re-rendered.
- All unlockable “Mission Mode” stages are enabled by default.
- VMU save file metadata has been translated into English.
- Missing disc art PVR has been added for GDmenu users.
- A brand-new cheat function has been implemented (see Cheat Function section).
- The built-in web browser has been replaced with special bonus content (see Bonus Content section).
- Previously this portion of the game was inaccessible to those who’ve never configured ISP settings on their Dreamcast, but this requirement has been removed.
From the list above, you’ll notice the last bullet point calling out brand-new bonus content compiled just for this patch!
To access this material, select “BONUS CONTENT” from the title screen menu, which will launch a modified version of the Dream Passport web browser. To return to the game from the bonus content section, press the L or R trigger buttons on the controller, then select “EXIT TO GAME”.
What all is included? Check it out!
- SEGA Saturn Theme Song
Take a trip to renowned video game composer Kunitaka Watanabe’s studio and watch him play the theme song from the first “Death Crimson” game on the SEGA Saturn.
- SEGA Saturn Opening Video
Watch the opening video from the original SEGA Saturn game, fully subtitled in English. Note that this video can also be encountered under special circumstances in “Death Crimson 2” itself.
- Ending Theme Music
Listen to the beautiful ending theme music from the game (“Maybe Someday”), composed by Masafumi Ogata and sung by Momo Michishita (aka MOMO), who also voiced the character of Yuri.
- Fan Messages
Browse the archive of fan support messages from Ecole Software’s now-offline official “Death Crimson 2” website, machine-translated into English.
Another exciting addition exclusive to this English translation patch is a cheat function to aid players who are interested in experiencing the story of “Death Crimson 2: Altar of Melanito” without being forced to replay numerous difficult stages repeatedly.
To take advantage of this new feature, at any point during shooting gameplay or free-roaming gameplay, a player can simultaneously press the L and R trigger buttons once. The following real-time cheats will be applied.
- Credit count will be reset to 255.
- Any countdown clock will be reset to 15 minutes.
Along with the game’s release on November 25th, 1999, an original soundtrack was sold under the title “Death Crimson 2 – Yuri Rosenberg”. The soundtrack features 15 individual tracks, all of which can be heard throughout the Dreamcast game itself. To coincide with the release of this English translation patch, this soundtrack was procured from Japan (read more in this Twitter post).
To learn more about the soundtrack, including credits for songwriters, music arrangers, and vocalists, visit its entry on VGMdb.
To download the soundtrack in FLAC, OGG, and MP3 formats, head on over to the GitHub link provided at the top of this post.
It should be mentioned that those who will be playing this patch via optical disc (i.e., burning to a CD-R) should expect some very mild performance issues, depending on the health of their Dreamcast’s GD-ROM drive.
A tremendous amount of additional modification and testing was done for this patch in order to provide those burning to disc (and not using an ODE or emulator) the smoothest possible gaming experience.
“Death Crimson 2: Altar of Melanito” is very read-heavy in terms of how it seeks and streams data from the disc. This becomes particularly aggressive during FMV playback, especially when dual FMV and audio streaming occurs (as is the case in several cutscenes).
Previous CDI releases of the game handled this horribly, with no optimizations in place in order to mitigate out-of-sync audio/video. For this English translation patch, great care has gone into encoding audio/video so that a moderately healthy GD-ROM drive will be able to read and stream this data without excessive synchronization issues.
However, players must bare in mind that despite said optimizations, experiencing this game via CD-R will still be suboptimal. Players will notice a moment or two where on-screen subtitles do not perfectly align with spoken dialogue. Please recognize that this is not a bug, but in fact a limitation of the Dreamcast’s CD-ROM reading speed.
Lastly, it’s important to note that “Death Crimson 2: Altar of Melanito” suffers from light gun compatibility issues.
In the past, it’s been reported that “Death Crimson 2: Altar of Melanito” has problems when using a European Dreamcast with certain video cables and/or certain light guns. During the development of this patch, numerous people helped to test and verify certain claims, while dispelling others. That said, many console/cable/light gun combinations remain untested. It’s worth noting that the LightConn is among the list of incompatible light guns, regardless of console region and cable type.
If players find a working or non-working hardware combination not present on the compatibility matrix, it’s asked that they submit them to me via email.
If possible, these compatibility issues will be debugged and fixed in a future version of the English translation patch. However, without physical development kit hardware, this task remains highly difficult.
In closing, I will say that working on this patch was a ton of fun! I couldn’t have done it without the help of Walnut (text translation), Filler (FMV transcription/translation), and wiredcrackpot (FMV transcription/translation), as well as all of the people mentioned in the “Special Thanks” section of the credits for their various contributions.
It’s our sincere hope that SEGA Dreamcast fans wanting to experience this unique piece of gaming history are happy with that we’ve produced.
If you’re feeling generous and want to contribute to my ongoing Dreamcast endeavors, head on over to https://DreamcastForever.com and click “Contact” for the PayPal donation link.