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It's gonna be a wiz day, Drekheads. Some three decades on from its original release, the Sega CD port of cyberpunk RPG Shadowrun has finally received a long long-awaited English translation, courtesy of homebrewer Erebus, better known in the shadows of the Megacorps as "MadMorigan."
MadMorigan's new translation sees the 1996 adventure localised in English for the very first time, restoring a lost piece of Shadowrun lore to the universe's global canon. Developed by Compile, the Sega CD edition sports a sharp anime aesthetic that sets it apart from the acclaimed SNES and Sega Genesis releases - both of which feature a darker, more Americanised tech-noir tone.
In addition to this unique visual style, the Japanese release features gameplay closer to that of Shadowrun's pen-and-paper source, with decisions and combat decided by the roll of virtual dice, rather than the run 'n' gun elements of its contemporaries.
Set in Neo Tokyo, the story follows a party of mercenaries - including street samurai Rikudo, Shaman girl Mao, and hired help in the form of turncoat executive Shuin and talented decker D-Head. The gang embark on a series of deadly missions-for-hire in a world that mixes the technological with the fantastical, with all parties and races pushing back against everyone's enemy: Capitalism.
MadMorigan's localisation translates all menus, on-screen text, and in-game dialogue to English, and testers have reported that the file can be burned to disc and played on a European Mega CD, or a PAL-enabled Sega CD. MadMorigan is currently working on an NTSC edition of the game for native U.S. hardware.
The localisation of Shadowrun Sega CD has been an endless stop-start project, with various modders attempting to translate the rare release before ultimately going dark. Perhaps the most recent example is the Iwakura Productions project, which was in development for some years before going quiet in the early 2020s. MadMorigan also generously spotlights another homebrewer, RetchE, whose own localisation is apparently nearing completion.
Shadowrun was the final worldwide release for the Sega CD, North America having shuttered production a year earlier with action-platformer Demolition Man. But thanks to the hard work of MadMorigan and other deckers, one more piece of obscure gaming history has finally been resurrected, decades after having been considered 100% gakked.
Catch you at Maria Mercurial tonight.