Indeed, I don't know the program either and am very very curious 
I'm quickly realizing, however, the limitations of directly editing the file - I can't change the length of strings.
You have found the biggest problem in translation 
AFAIK Oasis just shortened the messages so they would fit. But particularly on SNES translations there has been done major hackwork in some games. I'm talking totally rewriting the message subsystem and/or menu system here.
Besides hacking and partially reprogramming the game, there is another trick that might help. Usually a game that stores all its messages in one file has a table with pointers to all the texts somewhere. You can then change the lengths of the messages and update the pointer table. In that case, there is no need to alter any references in the code.
Ofcourse, if you're unlucky, every address is hardcoded and you're pretty much in for a hard job. But if you're lucky, you can actually increase the total lengths of the texts by increasing the filesize. This ofcourse depends on the amount of free memory after where it's loaded.
BiFi mentioned something about dictionaries and things that didn't entirely make sense to me. Is this something I can do when only hex editing is available to me? If so - what is it?
Using a dictionary means you assign whole words to certain bytes. For instance, the ASCII codes higher than 128 can be used. For instance, when in a game the word 'sword' is used a lot, you can replace it with code '230' and save 4 bytes every time!
However, this requires you rewrite or at least adapt the message display routines. Ofcourse you will need room for this new routine and also a list of the words in your dictionary. You will have to find room in memory for this.
May I ask what game you are working on?
I just have to continue a bit as for 8 years this program has been my most used software. (Don't let the outlook trick you, it IS great!)
- You can access all memory in all slots & Memorymapper pages
- You can export data to BASIC listings
- You can use online help to remember what this memory location, I/O port or BIOS address is ment for and edit the notes from the software.
- You can use all this functionality also in VRAM
- This adds CALL commands to BASIC (for example changing CPU mode in MSX tR)
- You can run ML programs in trace mode
- You can load / save to / from sectors, RAW files or BLOAD files
- Kanji can be read also in non Japanese computers
- You can read ML programs easyly as you can jump to any address and back by simply using Left/Right cursor keys. (in this kind of jump foreward you can also define slot)
- You can view all values in different number systems by simply pressing space
- You can easyly change editing / viewing mode by just pressing Return + cursors
- You can easyly search strings, words, bytes or assembler commands from memory (CTRL+S (Define search), CTRL+B (back), CTRL+F (foreward))
- DOS2 is supported
- You can get quickly all needed info about your MSX in simple raport
- You can take / look / print screenshot of the program
... I could still continue, but I think, that you will check this out already, if this kind of software is interesting for you.
~NYYRIKKI
GuyveR800:
Since I've never done this before, I thought I'd start with something that's been done - more english context to work with. Also, I thought the existing translation was... not good I'm translating Runemaster II. I've tried Oasis' translations, and actually, II was the only one I couldn't get to patch, for some reason. And when I played III, I found that not only was the game in English, but most enemies had 0 HP and gave me lots and lots of gold. Translating is fine... breaking the game is not 
Since Runemaster II was my favorite, I thought I'd give it a go.
nyyrikki:
I'd be very interested in using SUPER-X, but w/o a manual, I'm at a bit of a loss...
And when I played III, I found that not only was the game in English, but most enemies had 0 HP and gave me lots and lots of gold. Translating is fine... breaking the game is not
I've noticed a lot of the english patched games online are severely corrupted!
Unfortunately Oasis' patches were suicide, so finding a correctly patched disk in good condition is the only way to get a good diskimage.