An English fan translation of the Sailor Moon PC Engine or TurboGrafx-16 video game has been released

Pretty Solder Sailor Moon - PC Engine - Title Screen

English fans will finally have the chance to play a Sailor Moon video game which was previously only available in Japanese. The game is Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon for the PC-Engine Super CD-ROM system known as the Turbografx-CD in North America. Since the game was only ever released in Japan it is usually referred to simply as a PC Engine game. The game was translated by a group of fans and released by Supper. You can read about the translation and download the patch on the Romhacking.net web site.

Pretty Solder Sailor Moon - PC Engine - Rei

So what is this game about? The Romhacking page describes it as a visual novel, a type of game which is common in Japan but not as much in North America. The story takes place during the Sailor Moon R season of the anime between the Makaiju and Black Moon story arcs, which would be between Sailor Moon R episodes 59 and 60. That said it is not branded as a Sailor Moon R game but just as Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon. The characters mostly seem to be those from the first season of the anime. The intro features Nephrite and the DD Girls.

Pretty Solder Sailor Moon - PC Engine - Cover

I’ve played a short bit of the game and as far as I can tell you are given many dialog options which all basically end up telling the same story. The player chooses one of the main five characters who progress through the same story from a different point of view. There are animation and voice clips throughout the game featuring art in a very similar style to the anime. The voice work is provided by the voice actors from the 90s anime series! This version keeps the Japanese audio but translates all written dialogue to English. This makes the game much more accessible to English speaking fans who would not have gotten much out of playing this title in its original form.

Pretty Solder Sailor Moon - PC Engine - Umino

So how does one download and play this game? The Romhacking web site does not actually include a playable version of the game. What is included is a software package which can be run on the original Japanese version of the game to modify it to run in English. The site is unable to tell you where to find the original Japanese game because that would constitute piracy! If you look around the Internet you may find a web site which would have this file.

Pretty Solder Sailor Moon - PC Engine - Minako as Artemis

I’m used to patching single rom files with a patch file but since this is a CD based game you’ll need to patch a CD image, which can come in many formats. The readme file that comes with the download will explain various options. Luckily the file I had could be patched with the first listed option “A. Directly patch the Redump-verified BIN or IMG image”. I have a Mac which always makes these things a bit difficult but I had no problem running the included DeltaPatcher.exe program with Wine. I then ran into a couple of problems. First I renamed my files which is a bad idea when using .cue and .bin files so I needed to change the file name in my .cue file. After that I realized that I needed a bios file to run a PC Engine CD game. Once again this is a file which one might find on certain web sites which host questionable software. Where you store this file will depend on the specific emulator you use. The readme file mentions this.

Pretty Solder Sailor Moon - PC Engine - Choose a character

What emulator who wish to use will depend on what device you wish to play the game on. MagicEngine seems to be a popular option for those with a Windows PC. I was able to get the game working on RetroPie, emulation software which runs on a Raspberry Pi, and on my hacked 3DS using TemperPCE.

Pretty Solder Sailor Moon - PC Engine - Chibi Sailor Mars

Here are Sailor Moon News we don’t generally endorse piracy of video games and other content. That said, the ethical concerns over such things usually relate to loss of potential revenue for the creator of that original content. While we always suggest you support the show by buying legitimate releases when possible, it is unlikely that the hard working people at Banpresto, now Bandai Spirits, will be losing any revenue over a handful of English speaking Sailor Moon fans playing a pirated copy of a game which was released in 1994. There isn’t really a way to buy this game and have that money get to the pockets of the legitimate rights holders in 2020.

Did you try this game? Did you have any trouble getting it to work? Let us know what platform you’re playing it on and what you think of the game!

Thanks to Dan Bednarski and Miss Dream on Twitter for bringing this news to my attention!

An updated English translation of the Sailor Moon: Another Story RPG has been released

Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon: Another Story - New translation - Title screen

An updated English translation for the Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon Another Story RPG has been released on romhacking.net. This game, a Japanese Role Playing Game from 1995, was only ever released in Japan on the Super Famicom. Since there was never an English language release on the Super Nintendo Entertainment System, the overseas equivalent of the Super Famicom, fans looking to play the game have been able to do so thanks to an English fan translation released nearly 20 years ago back in 1999 by Bishoujo Senshi Translation. So what does this new one have to offer that the original translation didn’t? The new team built on the work of BST but improved the translation with over 400 changes. If we look at some comparison screenshots we can see that basic elements such as fonts are based on the original patch and the script is similar but with a lot of small changes to the language. There were also some programming changes to bugs in the game. The text files included with the patch also have some new built in cheat codes for those looking to have a different game experience.

Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon: Another Story - Japanese version - Opening Scene

Japanese Version

Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon: Another Story - Original translation - Shingo

Original Translation – Glitched on some Emulators

Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon: Another Story - New translation - Opening Scene

New Translation – Fixed

So! How can fans play this game? Video game emulators require a rom (read only memory) file which is basically a dump of the video game’s data to play. The Sailor Moon: Another Story rom file itself is not included on the romhacking.net web site for copyright reasons. Only a patch file is hosted there which can be applied using a patching tool to the original Japanese rom file. Patching tools are easy enough to find. I use a pearl script because there are less tools available on Mac than on Windows PCs. If you’re looking for the rom file there are some disreputable sites on the Internet which host such files including Sailor Moon Another Story.

Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon: Another Story - Japanese version - Hell Story

Japanese version

Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon: Another Story - Original translation - Her Destiny

Original Translation

Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon: Another Story - New translation - Hell Destiny

New Translation

Have you played this game? Do you plan on checking out this new translation as a way to experience this game for the first time or yet again? I’ve restarted playing this game at least 3 times previously! The first time I played a Japanese rom before a translation was available and didn’t get too far. A few years later I emulated the English version on my Sega Dreamcast and gave up at some point in the North Pole when I found the random encounters time consuming. I later bought a copy of the Super Famicom game and played that in Japanese, giving up after a tough boss fight during Sailor Mercury’s side quest. This might be a good time to try the game out again! I enjoy doing game emulation on my Raspberry Pi and my hacked 3DS. What do you emulate games on?

Thanks to Dan Bednarsky on Twitter for the heads up.

Keep reading for more comparison screenshots.

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An English translation for Sailor Moon S for Sega Game Gear is now available

Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon S for Sega Game Gear

Great news for Sailor Moon fans who also appreciate classic video games! The 1995 Sailor Moon S video game for the Sega Game Gear has been translated into English! This seems like a somewhat odd choice of a game to translate as it’s not an RPG or something with a bunch of text, but a fairly simple side scroller. Still the translation is a useful one as it adds English to the title screen, multiple menus and even subtitles to some spoken cut scenes. This is not an official translation of a 24 year old game but rather a fan translation.

Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon S for Sega Game Gear - Title screen - English

Does this mean you’ll need to dust off your Sega Game Gear to play this? Not likely. The translation file supplied is in the form of a patch, an ips, which can be applied to a rom dump of the original game in order to make the English version. Fans would likely play this on some sort of video game emulator. Which you would want to use depends on what platform you like to play it on. Details and a download link are included on the Romhacking.net web site. This file alone will not allow you to play the game. You will need the original rom, the patch and software to patch it as well as an emulator. For legal purposes the original rom file, which is copyright, is not hosted on the site. The file name mentioned is “Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon S (Japan).gg”. I had an old file named “Sailor Moon S(jp).gg” and was able to patch it. I’ve also seen it called “Sailor Moon S (J).gg” on a site which hosted the rom. You’ll need software to patch the file. It’s not terribly complicated, but depending on your operating system it might require a bit of work. Since I use a Mac I needed to dig a little to find platform independent software to patch the game. I ultimately used a Pearl application ips.pl which can run in a Unix terminal but there are probably easier ways to do this on Windows.

Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon S for Sega Game Gear - Sailor Moon

I personally enjoy video game emulation on my Raspberry Pi equipped with RetroPie as well as a hacked 3DS I use for portable classic gaming. I tried out this game on my Raspberry Pi. It seemed to play well although I had trouble with the Rei’s Fortune Teller mini game. It just booted back to the menu instead of giving me my fortune. Speaking of that mini game! The game suffers from the Y2K bug as it is unable to take a date beyond 1999 for today’s date. This game is so old that it doesn’t even work right if played almost 20 years ago!

Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon S for Sega Game Gear - Rei's Fortune Teller - English

I originally played this game years ago as I bought the Game Gear game and a second hand Game Gear for the express purpose of playing it. The Game Gear has no restriction on playing international games. Since there’s very little Japanese text outside of the menus it was easy enough to play. As Sailor Moon games go this isn’t really the best. It’s a side scrolling sort of platformer sort of beat ‘em up game but there are much better Sailor Moon games of this type on the Super Famicom (Super Nintendo in North America). Most fans would probably tell you that the Sailor Moon Another Story RPG is the most worthwhile of the many Sailor Moon video games released on a number of systems throughout the 1990s. I certainly have enjoyed many hours with the game, though I find it has a very inconsistent difficulty curve. That game is also available in English along with the Sailor Moon R Super Famicom game. The Sailor Moon S and SuperS fighting games are also pretty fun and easy games to pick up.

Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon Another Story - Title screen

Have you played any classic Sailor Moon games? Which is your favourite?

Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon R - Title screen

Source: Silicon Era

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The new official Sailor Moon app and game are now available for iPhone but you probably can’t play it

Sailor Moon Fan Club Official App

The terrible saga of this horrible app continues. The official Sailor Moon Fan Club app is out for iOS devices. This includes a game. You will almost certainly not be able to play this game if you don’t live in Japan. Sorry. Here’s what the game you can’t play looks like.

Sailor Moon Official App Game

We’ve previously posted about the new Sailor Moon Fan Club app which was released for Android phones and then posted a review. So much to say there is an official app which is exclusive to Japan which included a game which only worked for Fan Club members, which you needed to pay for and needed a Japanese address to be a part of. I then figured out that you could log in to the game with a free account, which you can’t make anymore, but I happened to have. That method doesn’t work anymore. It also doesn’t work on the iOS version for iPhones. You pretty much can’t play this game if you don’t have a paid Fan Club account.

Still want instructions on how to get this game? You can download it from the Japanese iTunes store. This means creating a Japanese iTunes account. You can follow these steps to do it. I don’t reccommend you do because the app is a terrible waste of time that you can’t play, but you can do that.

Once you load the app you will be able to view the Official Sailor Moon Site. Click on the banner at the bottom of the screen which says “FC …”. You will be asked to log in. If you have an official Fan Club account you can play the game. If not you get this error message.

Sailor Moon Fan Club Official App can't play the game

Sorry.

Just play Sailor Moon Drops instead. It’s not terrible like this app.

A brief review of the new Sailor Moon game for Android phones

Sailor Moon Official App Game

Last week I made a post about a new Official Sailor Moon app for Android phones. At the time I mentioned that the included game was only available to members of the Fan Club. This is not technically correct. One does not need an actual paid Fan Club membership to use the game. They are in fact able to play it if they have an account for the Fan Club web site even if they never completed registration for the Fan Club, which requires a payment and for them to live in Japan, or use a deputy service. The bad news? You can’t sign up for such an account anymore. The kind of good news? I did sign up for such an account while trying to get a Fan Club membership before hitting a wall and giving up because I didn’t live in Japan. So much to say I was able to use my account to sign in to the app and play this new game. Anyone else with an Android phone who’s in this specific situation can download the app from the Google Play store. The app should be out on iOS devices soon enough.

Sailor Moon Official App Game

I had a pretty terrible time getting this game working. I tried to load it up a few times and managed to play about a game and a half. My phone is terrible and old, hence I can’t take screenshots with it and instead have photos of the phone, but the app also seems to be somewhat unreliable. I spent most of the time staring at a loading screen which seemed frozen. Once I actually got into the game I was surprised to see it wasn’t quite as much like Bust a Move as I expected. Basically you use your finger to pull back and release the orbs in the little tray on the bottom and launch them into similarly coloured orbs. The orbs disappear and you get points. You have a limited time to do this. Honestly I just played that one game. It was frustrating and after a few more frozen load screens, freezing games and finally a freezing time up screen when I completed a game, I didn’t want to play any more. The game isn’t all that great and it doesn’t have much to do with Sailor Moon, aside from having Sailor Moon symbols and characters. I hope you find my review less disappointing than the actual game.

Sailor Moon Official App Game

Thanks to Rem and Erica for leaving comments which helped me to get this game working.

A new Sailor Moon official app and game are now available for Android and they’re terrible if you aren’t a Fan Club member living in Japan

Sailor Moon Official App - Bust a Move type game against Morga

Update: July 3rd 2016: Users can sign into the app to play the game if they have a Fan Club account that hasn’t completed registration. You can do this without living in Japan. Unfortunately there doesn’t seem to be a way to sign up for a new account at this time.

News has been posted on the Official Sailor Moon site about an Official Sailor Moon app. No this is not Sailor Drops, the addictive and frustrating puzzle game which everyone loves to hate. This app is basically just an interface to the official Sailor Moon site with a built in game which it seems you can only play if you’re a member of the Fan Club, which you can only do if you live in Japan. For now the app is only available on Android devices. An iOS version, for iPhone devices, will be available soon. Android users can download the app from the Google Play store.

Sailor Moon Official App - Menu screen

I had to rummage through some old Gameboy games and NES controllers to find my old and busted Android phone which has a bad power button so I can’t take screenshots with it. That’s okay because there’s not much to see. It’s basically a wrapper around the site. I got an error at one point and it just said it couldn’t load sailormoon-official.com. There is a button at the bottom which I believe is the link to play the game but it prompts me to log in to the Fan Club which I am unable to do as I could never sign up since I don’t live in Japan. Check out this great photo I got of the app in action!

The Sailor Moon Official App is lame

All in all this app seems like a colossal waste of time if you aren’t part of the fan club. This may change in the future but for now I don’t think there’s any value in this. Have you been able to get the app to do anything but surf around the official site and Fan Club page?

Sailor Moon Official App - Fan club info

Sailor Moon Official App - Level progression

Sailor Moon Drops, the Sailor Moon puzzle game, is now available in English

SailorDrops - Gameplay

Update 2016-04-15: The game is now also available in the US iTunes store.

In September Sailor Moon Drops, a Sailor Moon game for iOS and Android, was released in Japan. An English version of the game, now called SailorDrops, is now available in the Canadian iTunes Store and Google Play Store. Since this game is free American users should have no trouble downloading it. You’ll just need to switch your iTunes store to Canada (using the link on the bottom right of iTunes) and registering a Canadian iTunes account with a new e-mail address. Don’t like having to jump through these hoops to play this game? How do you think we enjoy watching stuff on Hulu?!

Update: It seems that this game is region locked and not playable on US iPhones. Hopefully the game will be out in the US soon.

SailorDrops - Usagi and Luna

The game is all about matching sets of three symbols to make chains and complete levels by getting certain points in a certain number of moves. The mechanics were a bit of a mystery in the Japanese version but this English version with English tutorials should be quite easy to follow.

The Japanese game has had a number of events and I’m not sure what the event schedule will be for the English game. A lot of them were date sensitive so starting those later in the English version wouldn’t make a ton of sense.

SailorDrops - Friend Code

Be sure to add me as a friend. My username is Sailor Moon News and my ID is ww3a6189c. I probably won’t be the one playing but my girlfriend is pretty much obsessed with this game so if she switches from the Japanese version to this one, that account will have a lot of activity.

Pretty Kitty Fuzzy, a Sailor Moon inspired video game, is coming this summer

Pretty Kitty Fuzzy

An upcoming Sailor Moon inspired video game is looking for funding on Kickstarter. Pretty Kitty Fuzzy is a 2D shooter starring a cat which is based on magical girl anime like Sailor Moon and a real life house cat named Fuzzy. This is a retro style game inspired heavily by SNES era 16 shooters. Pledges as low as $5 can get the game, though pledging more will lead to special incentives. The game will be made for Windows, Mac and Linux if $2000 is reached, though there are stretch goals if more funds are collected. Incentives include a manga, poster, t-shirt and soundtrack. Stretch goals include an animated opening, an extra mini game and possible ports to other systems.

Watch this video for more details!

Pretty Kitty Fuzzy gameplay

To follow news about this game check out the Ninja Gate Studio home page, Twitter feed and the game’s Facebook page.

Pretty Kitty Fuzzy

Sailor Moon Drops, the new Sailor Moon Puzzle game for cell phones dropped today

Sailor Moon Drops - Gameplay

The Sailor Moon Drops Puzzle game was released today for iOS and Android devices. This free game is only available in the Japanese iTunes store but with a little bit of work you can set up an account and download Japanese games on a North American iPhone. I’ll include instructions to do so later in this post. Though the game is free it does include microtransactions meaning you can do in game transactions to buy items which will let you keep playing. To download the game use the links to the Google Play Store or iTunes store.

Sailor Moon Drops - Usagi and Luna

I’ll include a brief explanation on how to play, based on what I’ve managed to figure out. I don’t read Japanese but can infer enough about how to play just be touching around the game. Menus are easy enough to navigate. On the main screen hit the pink button then the blue button. Just tap the screen to advance through the Japanese dialog cut scenes. You’ll see Usagi meet Luna and transform into Sailor Moon. The game will walk you through going into a game screen. On the game screen hit the pink button a few times and follow the on screen instructions to make a move and make a 3 item match. Gameplay is like Bejewled and Columns. You swipe a gem to move it a single position. Make matches of 3 ore more to get points. Try to chain combos if possible. You’ll clear the level once you reach a certain number of points. Your remaining moves are in the top right corner. Filling up the pink bar on the top right gets you three stars. On the level select screen simply tap the level you want to play. In general you can advance through menus hitting the pink buttons.

Sailor Moon Drops - Sailor Mercury Gameplay

The game becomes difficult based on the number of moves you get and the shape of the level. A rectangular puzzle is somewhat straightforward but odd shapes become difficult to navigate.

Sailor Moon Drops - Sailor Moon and Tuxedo Mask

The game, being freemium, can’t very well let you play forever! The game’s currency involves hearts and gems. Hearts are needed to play and gems are used to buy hearts or other items. You start with 5 hearts and, if they are consumed, they are replenished at a rate of one heart per 30 minutes. Unlike many games you will not lost hearts simply by playing but only by losing. If you complete a level you will still have all your hearts but if you lose and want to continue Tuxedo Mask will show up and allow you to

Sailor Moon Drops - Map

On the main map you can scroll up to see where the game will advance to. Ami can be seen not far up, followed by Rei then Makoto and Minako. The map goes through a lot of Tokyo with locations such as Naru’s parent’s store Osa-p, the Hikawa Shrine and eventually into areas which appears to look like a Dark Kingdom stronghold and a Crystal Spire. After completing 10 stages I unlocked Sailor Mercury. It seems likely this trend will continue every 10 stages. Though I can’t read the text in the cut scenes it seems to somewhat follow the story of Sailor Moon as she argues with Mamoru at first and befriends the other girls going along on her journey. We also see villains such as Queen Beryl and Jadeite. It’s unclear just how far the story will go with the given map. It’s always possible that more content could be added at a later date.

Sailor Moon Drops - ID number

The game allows you to register friends. This lets you compare top scores with others you know who have the game. Each user has a unique code. To view it and add friends simply click on the green arrow on the map screen then the little picture of Usagi with a heart. You can change your name here. Your ID is unique and this is what you give to friends. Click the “ID…” button to register a new friend. Might I suggest added 4a24eec?

Sailor Moon Drops - Rank Up

Setting up a Japanese iTunes account is free and relatively easy to do. iTunes accounts are tied to a specific store. Mine was tied to the Canadian store. Many readers may have accounts tied to the US store or some other country’s store. If you happen to live in Japan then good for you the game is already in your store. If not there are a few simple steps you can do to register a Japanese iTunes account and switch the store back and forth on your phone. I followed a tutorial similar to this one and it worked just fine for me.

I don’t have an Android device on hand. If you have any trouble using the Google Play Store link try checking out this tutorial which seems to work for getting a Japanese game downloaded. Leave us a comment if this works for you so that I can amend the post.

Source: The Official Sailor Moon Site

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A new Sailor Moon video game “Sailor Moon Drops” is coming to iOS and Android devices

Sailor Moon Drops - Title screen

A new Sailor Moon video game has been announced on the official Sailor Moon site. Sailor Moon Drops is a puzzle game for iOS and Android devices being released by Bandai Namco Entertainment. Based on the screenshot, probably has gameplay requiring the player to match similar types of objects into sets of three. The most popular game this seems to resemble is Bejeweled which was itself inspired by the gameplay of a 90s game called Columns. The game will be free but it seems likely that it will have microtransactions, meaning that players will be able to pay to play longer or get some other in game advantage. There is currently no release date for this title.

Sailor Moon Drops - Gameplay

Currently the game is open for pre-registration. Why pre-register for a free to play game? Well according to the game’s official site, this will allow users to get a few exclusive bonuses which appears to be two booster sets and 10 gems. Many microtransaction games will have some sort of in game currency which is accrued while playing that can be used to unlock special functions, continue playing to bypass some sort of time out penalty or retry a stage after failing. How common and valuable gems are in this particular game isn’t something we’ll know for sure until we get more information.

Sailor Moon Drops logo

If you intend to play this game you should feel free to pre-register through the official site. First select your device from the buttons and then select to pre-register through e-mail or Twitter. I avoided signing up through Twitter when it asked for authorization to post using my account and access my direct message history. I signed up through e-mail which included filling out my e-mail address in the large white text field and then clicking the red button at the bottom of the page. The confirmation e-mail that I receive mentioned, in Japanese, that a serial code would be sent to me once the game is released which can be used to unlock those exclusives.

Sailor Moon Drops characters

Many games are region locked in some app stores, which may be the case for this. For example if you have a non Japanese iTunes account you will not be able to use it to download games from the Japanese iTunes store. Since the game is not yet released we don’t yet know whether or not it will be region restricted. Bandai Namco Entertainment releases many games exclusively for North American and Japanese audiences, though many of their anime themed games which appeal to both audiences are in both app stores. It is easy enough to set up a Japanese iTunes account in order to download free games. This page has step by step instructions for doing so. I’ve successfully followed similar steps on my Canadian iPhone and am now able to simply switch from one account to the other in order to download Japanese games. The Japanese games will play fine regardless of which account you are logged in to. Should this be necessary to install the game, I will repost the details once the game is released.