Recently, we reported on the sad news that ROMHacking.net was closing down, leading many people to ponder where such hacks and mods would be found online in the future.
We've got a bit of good news today, however, as it has been announced that the ROM hack site RHDO has changed ownership and has rebranded as RomHack Plaza, promising "a platform free of gatekeepers and mod intervention."
BenjaminCM, also known as Kando on Twitter, has issued this statement:
Spike, former owner of the site, has decided to leave the site and transfer ownership of the platform to someone else. I, Benjamin, have taken over the project to give it a new lease of life. As a result, RHDO is no longer affiliated in any way with prepatched ROM platforms such as CDRomance.
Spike, the outgoing owner, had this to say about the handover:
It’s a transition period that will take some days to get done. Under [BenjaminCM]'s control the site gains a great guy as admin, much more knowledgeable and capable than I am.
I’m fine with this, I set to do something and I did it, there’s no point on keep pushing to be part of a scene I don’t belong to.
[source x.com]
Comments 12
I don't quite understand the... Seeming animosity to providing pre-patched games.
Have you tried patching anything above the 16-bit era?
PS1, PS2, GC, DC, are all ludicrously convoluted. Demanding byte perfect data rips, bizarre framework installations within Windows, and sometimes command line interfaces. It's 2024, there is zero reason not to have a graphical user interface.
I hope CD Romance continues doing what it does, because CBA on the mess that is manually patching CD and DVD games.
BenjaminCM is not me, he's a seperate French dude xD
Thank you for the post!!
@Sketcz
ROM hacking and "do it yourself" patching can operate cleanly; requiring users to provide their own dumps instead of illegally downloading ROMs unpatched OR pre-patched.
This is why it was necessary for Spike as the operator of CDRomance to step aside from operating a patches-only site.
You can't really say the patches-only site is clean under that management, and we need a clean site for the practice of ROM hacking to keep going unabated.
@Sketcz Yeah, it can be a real hassle to get certain patches to work, even with some cartridge ROMs.
Though I can see why, legally, it's safer to offer just the patches. And, of course, it's a lot cheaper than hosting full CD and DVD rips for people to download.
But I've noticed a certain paranoia and zeal, even, in some circles, where even a hint or reference to anything tangential to piracy is handled harshly. By that point, it's not a legal issue, but... a moral one? Or a misplaced sense of loyalty? I'm not even sure.
They can change owners all they want but if they still don't allow sexually explicit content then who even cares? I hate feeling limited to non-sexual content, it's so arbitrary to decide not to allow it in this day and age. There's BDHN at least, though I've heard less-than-stellar things about them (and rightfully so, it seems to be an alt-right cesspit).
Didn't these people sabotage RHDN several times, is this supposed to be a good thing?
@angel68
No, the Story isn't that simple, but the biggest Hit to get the Rock rollin down Hill was a Person with seemingly much Hate towards RHDN, he was Part of the RHDO Team but got kicked out because of that, as the Team just wanted an more modern Alternative and less Restrictions.
The Rest is a Mix of Misunderstandings, different Perspectives and bad Reactions.
@dconstantine I mean, I hate to sound like a prude, but SERIOUSLY, your complaint about romhacking.net is "there's no porn?" Um. Can you provide...like, an example of a hack that should be but isn't part of the site? Because I am having a LOT of trouble even imagining what you're talking about.
It’s back, baby, yeah! 🍾🕺
@happydeathman that's honestly the most rational response to this hill I'm apparently dying on that I've heard so far. There's very little in the way of "quality" erotic romhacks and I think it might be because the most popular sites just don't allow it. I do not endorse or recommend trying it for multiple reasons including it's dog *****, but the only real example I have is Pokemon Girls Hunter. Gameplay sucks, writing was done by someone who has never had a sexual encounter in their life, and doubling down, gameplay sucks (you get thrown into a jail that's seemingly impossible to escape if your whole party ever faints). Once again I do not like or recommend that trash, but it's the only sexy romhack with decent effort put into the sprites that I'm aware of.
@angel68 No, just reddit slander.
@LowDefAl
They were blocking translations of adult games?
That's bad. Extremely bad. Some of those adult Japanese computer titles are genuinely quite excellent as actual "games". Sengoku Rance springs to mind, as a complex and deep strategy title - it's for PC not PC-98, but if anyone wants to know a good erotic game, that's one. Got a fan-translation, and then years later an official licensed and localised release.
But my point is: it's very adult in nature, but it's also a solid (lol) game in its own right, and there are many others across the platforms. No one should gatekeep the translations of these.
(Sengoku Rance is so complicated, your first playthrough will likely fail and should be considered an extended tutorial.)
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