********************************************************************************
*                             Remote Control Dandy                             *
*                          English Translation Patch                           *
*                           by LIPEMCO! Translations                           *
*                              v1.0 (17 Nov 2020)                              *
*                                                                              *
*                        TheMajinZenki -- Translation                          *
*                               Supper -- Hacking                              *
*                               cccmar -- Editing and Testing                  *
*                             Xanathis -- Testing                              *
********************************************************************************

In 1999, twelve-year-old Mamoru Oza, heir to the largest fortune in the world, 
received two gifts from his father. The first: A simple handheld remote 
controller...which operated the fifty-meter-tall combat robot "Vordan". The 
second: Ownership of the newly-established Torino Defense Force Co., Ltd, a 
company formed to combat the "Enigmabots" – mysterious giant robots rampaging 
through the world's major cities. Remote in hand, Mamoru now finds himself the 
sole hope of survival for the people of Torino City.

Can a boy, his robot, and a single remote solve the riddle of the Enigmabots and 
save the world...without going bankrupt first?

Remote Control Dandy is a 1999 mecha action game by Human Entertainment for the 
Sony PlayStation. In a major departure from most mecha games, it hearkens back 
to giant robot shows of the '50s and '60s such as Tetsujin 28-gou, in which the 
robots, rather than containing a human pilot, are controlled from afar via 
remote. The game adopts this as its core mechanic: not only does the player have 
to contend with remotely navigating their robot in the manner of an RC car, but 
also personally run after it to keep it in sight, all while not getting stepped 
on by enemy robots.

Though the game was nominally developed and published by Human Entertainment 
(known for the Clock Tower and Fire Pro Wrestling series), Human went bankrupt a 
few months after its release, with almost all of the game's key staff members 
subsequently founding the game studio Sandlot and going on to develop the 
successful Earth Defense Force series. Thus, Remote Control Dandy is essentially 
the first Sandlot game; it bears all the hallmarks of their unique brand of 
outsize destruction, and it's received the occasional nod or oblique reference 
in their later games. Particularly, the 2002 game Robot Alchemic Drive is 
essentially a spiritual sequel to this one – and Sandlot would even go on to 
make an actual Tetsujin 28-gou game!

This patch fully translates the game into English. Aside from the text, 
subtitles have been added to scenes which were originally voice-only, and all 
in-level textures such as billboards are also translated (the ones that were 
legible, anyway). The only thing not translated is the downloadable 
PocketStation app, but since it's just a small rock-paper-scissors minigame with 
no connection to the real game, we hope this omission is forgivable.

                    ****************************************
                    *          Table of Contents           *
                    ****************************************

  I.    Patching Instructions
  II.   Running the Game
  III.  Known Issues
  IV.   Authors' Comments
  V.    Special Thanks
  VI.   Version History

                    ****************************************
                    *       I. Patching Instructions       *
                    ****************************************

To use this translation, you'll need to apply a patch to a disc image of the 
game. Unfortunately, patching disc images is inherently complicated because 
there are numerous CD image formats in use, as well as many ways that 
poorly-written disc ripping programs can mess things up and make a patch not 
work properly. As a result, this is a rather long section – sorry! But please 
read it over carefully before complaining that the patch doesn't work.

Two methods of patching are provided. Choose one of the following based on the 
format of your disc image:

  A. Directly patch a single-file Redump-verified BIN or IMG image
  B. Directly patch a multi-track Redump-verified BIN image

These options are explained in the subsections that follow.

  -------------------
  - BEFORE STARTING -
  -------------------

It should go without saying, but first, extract all the contents of the 
translation patch's ZIP to your hard drive if you haven't already.

Before you start, you'll need to determine what format your disc image is in. At 
the very least, you must have an image in BIN+CUE or IMG+CUE format; more exotic 
formats are not supported. It's unfortunately not uncommon to come across disc 
images that don't use the standard extensions used in this section, or use them 
differently from normal, which makes things very confusing. Some tips:

  - One common way of distributing disc images is the "dual CCD/CUE" format. 
This consists of four files: a CCD, a CUE, an IMG (or possibly BIN), and a SUB. 
If your image is like this, you can throw away the CCD and SUB files, as they 
aren't needed for the patch. For our purposes, an IMG is the same as a BIN, so 
any references to a "BIN" below can also refer to an "IMG" or vice versa.
  
  - If your disc image has a CCD but no CUE, you may be able to patch it with 
method A. If that fails, you'll need to look into creating or obtaining a CUE 
file for the disc.
  
  - If your disc image consists of a CUE and a large number of BIN files, it's 
in the "split BIN" format. This format is particularly used by the distribution 
available on certain archival web sites. It's possible to patch this format as 
long as the BIN files represent the Redump disc image, just split up into its 
component tracks.

  --------------------------------------------------------------------
  - A. Directly patch a single-file Redump-verified BIN or IMG image -
  --------------------------------------------------------------------

You can patch using this method if your disc image *exactly* matches the 
verified "good" image as listed on Redump.org, and if all the tracks on the disc 
are combined into one single BIN or IMG file.

First, check that your disc image contains a single file with the extension 
".bin" or ".img". If it does, verify that that file matches the following 
specifications. (If you don't know how to do that, just go ahead and follow the 
steps listed below; if you get an error, your disc image is wrong.)

  Redump name: Remote Control Dandy
  CRC32:       4574c978
  MD5:         cefdeaabd493fa85ad95cd1da2855a9b
  SHA-1:       ed3a4f0c200b3c3bed121c50d427d5b6248e69ae

See Redump for full details: http://redump.org/disc/11422/

If your disc image is a match, then all you need to do is apply an xdelta patch 
to the BIN or IMG file, then rename it and pair it with the CUE file provided in 
the download.

  1. Extract the "redump_patch" folder from the translation ZIP and open it.
  
  2. Run "DeltaPatcher.exe", which should be present in that folder. This is the 
popular Delta Patcher program for applying xdelta patches. If you're not using 
Windows, you'll need to obtain an alternate patching program for your system, 
such as the command-line "xdelta3" program.
  
  3. Use Delta Patcher (or another xdelta patching tool) to apply the .xdelta 
patch file contained in the "redump_patch" folder to the BIN or IMG file. If you 
get an error, you'll need to try one of the other patching methods below.
  
  4. If your disc image came with a CCD or CUE file, delete it now.
     DO NOT USE THE OLD CCD OR CUE FILE WITH THE PATCHED IMAGE!
     Also get rid of any SUB file if it exists. It's not needed.
     
  5. The "redump_patch" directory should contain a CUE file with a name like 
"Remote Control Dandy EN [v1.0] Redump.cue". Rename your patched disc image so 
it has *exactly* the same name as the CUE, except with a .bin extension instead 
of .cue.
     Important: If the file you patched was originally an IMG file, make sure 
that you change the extension to .bin. The CUE will not work if the extension is 
.img.
     
  6. You're done! Make sure you have the CUE and BIN in the same directory, then 
open the CUE in an emulator. Or play it on real hardware, if you have the means 
to do that (and if you do, please let us know if it works!).

  -------------------------------------------------------------
  - B. Directly patch a multi-track Redump-verified BIN image -
  -------------------------------------------------------------
  
  One common distribution of the game found on certain archival sites uses the 
Redump-verified disc image, but splits it up into separate tracks instead of 
combining them into a single file. It's easily recognized by the presence of 5 
separate BIN files and a single CUE.
  
  Before patching: 
  
  - Make sure that your disc's CUE file has a name like "Remote Control Dandy 
(Japan).cue". It's critical that the CUE has *exactly* the same name as the BIN 
files except without a track number; the patcher script assumes that it can add 
a track number to the CUE file's name in order to locate the BIN files. If 
necessary, rename your CUE file to match the BIN files. In particular, some 
distributions label the CUE file with "(JP)" but the BIN files with "(Japan)"; 
this isn't the same, so don't be fooled! Rename the CUE to use "(Japan)" 
instead.
  
  - Make sure that the BIN files are named in the format "Remote Control Dandy 
(Japan) (Track 1).bin", "Remote Control Dandy (Japan) (Track 2).bin", etc., up 
through "Remote Control Dandy (Japan) (Track 5).bin". Note that the track 
numbers should be a single digit each ("Track 1", not "Track 01").
  
  To patch:
  
  1. Copy the CUE file and all BIN files into the "splitbin_patch" directory.
  
  2. Drag-and-drop the CUE file onto "binpatch.bat".
  
  3. If all goes well, this should produce a new, single-track disc image in the 
same directory. (This works by simply combining all the tracks together and then 
applying the same patch as in method A.)
     
  4. Use the CUE file in the "splitbin_patch" directory to play the game.

                    ****************************************
                    *         II. Running the Game         *
                    ****************************************

Please note that if you run this game through an emulator, you may or may not 
need a Japanese BIOS image. Some emulators such as Mednafen require it, while 
others such as PCSXR have an option to simulate the BIOS if not available. We 
strongly recommend running the game with the BIOS if possible, as some features 
may not work correctly without it. The required BIOS image is for the 
SCPH-5500/v3.0J version (SHA-256 hash 
9c0421858e217805f4abe18698afea8d5aa36ff0727eb8484944e00eb5e7eadb); once you have 
such an image, check your emulator's documentation for instructions on how to 
configure it for use.

                    ****************************************
                    *          III. Known Issues           *
                    ****************************************

On at least some versions of/plugins for PCSXR and probably other emulators, the 
subtitles for the voice-overs in the mission "Camelon's Counterattack: Part 2" 
are slightly out of sync. This issue doesn't occur on Mednafen, which is 
generally known for its accuracy, so we assume it more closely matches the 
behavior of real hardware.

The PocketStation app that can be downloaded from the game's main menu has not 
been translated. While regrettable from a completionist perspective, you're 
frankly not missing much: it's a glorified rock-paper-scissors minigame with no 
connection to the game proper that runs on a gimmick device with abilities on 
the level of an early Tamagotchi. If you actually want to play it, you can 
probably figure it out in a few minutes even without knowing the language.

It's worth a mention that, if you go looking, you might discover some videos of 
this game that feature additional robots called "Jonney" and "Inu". These robots 
are not actually in the retail game; the game's soundtrack included a playable 
bonus disc with extra scenarios for these characters. To the best of our 
knowledge, this bonus disc has never been dumped, so unsurprisingly, we haven't 
translated it.

                    ****************************************
                    *        IV. Authors' Comments         *
                    ****************************************
  
  -------------------
  -- TheMajinZenki --
  -------------------
  
  Those who know me are aware of my love for the mecha genre, so this project 
really resonated with me. The story hits may of the classic tropes of the genre, 
from flying fists to your friendly scientist having just the thing ready because 
he "thought this might happen".
  
  From a translation perspective, it wasn't particularly hard to work on, as the 
script is fairly linear compared to, say, an RPG. The hardest part was probably 
the interface (but that's the case for most games, really). A special mention to 
my friend Fei for helping me coming up with the name for the game's antagonists, 
the Enigmabots!
I hope you enjoy as much as I did working on it!
  
  ------------
  -- cccmar --
  ------------
  
  So, this little game. I really liked Super Control Mecha MG, by the same 
company, and this one's very similar in terms of tone. It is a gimmicky mecha 
game, with a charming, classic storyline and a ton of interesting events 
interspersed throughout. Now, a couple tips - be sure to read the tutorials, 
because the game has a rather unique control scheme. You will need to know how 
to pull off various types of moves to successfully get through the game. Also, 
be careful not to destroy too many things, because you will be fined for that. 
I'd say this game is really innovative for its time and definitely worth a shot 
for those who like big robots. As for the script, the main issue is that some 
missions can only be accessed as a "punishment" of sorts, so the context at 
first was a bit difficult to get. Overall, it's a fun throwback to the 90s, and 
we hope you end up enjoying it!
  
  ------------
  -- Supper --
  ------------
  
  So it turns out that somehow, in the 2+ years I've been doing translation 
projects with mecha connoisseur and translator of all things Super Robot Wars 
TheMajinZenki, we'd managed not to actually do a single mecha game together. 
Well, we've rectified that!
  
  This project had its origins in the translation I did with Phantom for another 
Sandlot game, Chou Soujuu Mecha MG (which I wholeheartedly recommend to anyone 
with interest in this game!). A little while after it came out, I got a helpful 
report from RHDN member Delta of a bug that caused the game to crash 
occasionally. In the course of sorting it out, we had a brief discussion that 
brought Remote Control Dandy to my attention, and ultimately led to this whole 
project happening. So thanks a ton for that nudge in the right direction, and I 
hope you enjoy this game too (and it doesn't crash on anyone this time).
  
  While I've sadly never played Sandlot's signature EDF series, I was really 
impressed by the innovative style of Mecha MG, so I was pleased to find that 
this game didn't disappoint on that front either. It's clear no expense was 
spared in putting together the game's robots, making them move convincingly, and 
getting the crazy control scheme to work just right. I've characterized Mecha MG 
as an "awkward robot" simulator, and this game is in much the same vein, which 
made it a lot of fun to work on and to test.
  
  I'd done a few small hacks for PlayStation games before, but this was my first 
translation project for it. It was certainly a step up in technical complexity 
from the 8- and 16-bit games that I've done most of my work on, and while I've 
done projects for consoles as late as the DS, the PSX has plenty of unique 
headaches (small RAM, nonstandardized file formats, the general wackiness of the 
CD-XA format, etc.). As a result, this took much longer than anything I'd 
previously worked on – I'm quite certain we surpassed our previous record with 
Bahamut Senki for sheer collective effort expended over the course of the 
project – but ultimately, that was about what I expected when I took the job on, 
and I'm pleased with the results.
  
  The further along things got, the more obsessive I got about making sure 
absolutely everything was translated. At first it was just the regular game 
text, but then I ended up adding subtitles to the robot deployment scenes, and 
editing the backgrounds that had text in them, and finally painstakingly going 
through all the level textures and doing those too. The only thing that's 
untranslated is the PocketStation app, which... well, I kind of wanted to do it 
just so I could say we did _everything_, but honestly, it's a pointless minigame 
that I don't care about at all and I don't expect anyone to actually play. Hope 
no one feels too cheated.
  
  All in all, I think we've put together a decent showing with this one. I'm not 
expecting it to draw much of an audience, but I consider it some of my finest 
hacking work to date, and I hope that any hardcore mecha fans that are willing 
to give it a go won't come away disappointed. Even if the plot does kind of 
forget what it's supposed to be about halfway through. C'mon, this isn't the 
kind of game you play for the _story_.
  
  Also, since people kept getting confused about who was making these 
translations, we've felt compelled to start releasing them under a group name. 
Considering we've done like a dozen games together at this point, I guess it was 
overdue anyway. So, this is technically the inaugural game for LIPEMCO! 
Translations (because you never know what we're going to do next, and neither do 
we, apparently). Hope we'll be able to keep on bringing you more translations, 
since it'd just be embarrassing to collapse right after naming the group...

                    ****************************************
                    *          V. Special Thanks           *
                    ****************************************

As mentioned above, we owe some special thanks to Delta, who not only is a 
member of the exclusive club of people that actually played the Chou Soujuu 
Mecha MG translation (if you read this far, go play it now! You'll love it!) but 
also reported and help test an important bugfix for it, and even more 
importantly mentioned Remote Control Dandy in the process. That's the main 
reason we ended up translating it, so thanks a ton.

Thanks to Kingcom and all other contributors to the armips assembler, without 
which this would have taken much, much, much longer to make (if it had even 
happened at all). Extra special thanks for having automatic memory load delay 
bug checking.

Thanks to SadNES cITy Translations for the Delta Patcher program, which is 
bundled with this patch as a convenience.

                    ****************************************
                    *         VI. Version History          *
                    ****************************************

v1.0 (17 Nov 2020): Initial release.
