ズール 魔獣使い伝説  - Zool Majyū Charmer Legend 

Released on June 11th 1999, by Pandora Box in Japan only, Zool - Majyū Charmer Legend is an obscure monster training RPG. The story concerns a young orphan boy named Leo, who lives on the continent of Zool where humans and "Magical Beasts" or Majyū coexist. There are 168 Majyū to charm and befriend in the game using your magical flute, and this is also how you instruct them to fight during battles.

On July 11th 2026, Zoinkity and I released a full English translation patch for the game.
Gabbu Hetchy gave us a few suggestions for new Majyū names.

Our patch can be downloaded here at ROMHACK dot ING.

Manual Translation and Guide with Full Majyū Bestiary

The Cutting Room Floor - All the unused and cut content that Zoinkity discovered whilst making this patch! 

It seems Pandora Box struggled with using the full potential of the N64. Characters and Majyū are depicted with 2D sprites while the worlds and buildings use 3D polygons. The game uses tank controls, which is a bit strange for an RPG on a console that has an analogue stick.  Although there are over 168 Majyū in the game, many of them are merely palette swaps passed off as different species of a single type of Majyū.  Depending on how your Majyū feels, they may ignore your instructions, which removes control from the player and makes the battle system feel frustrating at times. Japanese reviews complain that the encounter rate is too high, and the playing fields are far too vast to be enjoyable to explore. 

However, I think the story of the game is it's strongest point. There are not many N64 games concerned with the plight of orphans trying to make their own way in the world. As Zoinkity points out in the Readme, there are many musings about what constitutes a family and how having "parents" do not necessarily mean that you belong to a "family." The scenario writer, Natsuko Hayakawa (早川 奈津子) uses the fantasy setting to explore some dark themes, such as violence to children, animal cruelty, animal experimentation, alcoholism, psychoactive drugs, blood sports, the intentional destruction of nature, and murder. Which is not to say that Zool is a dark game by any means, but that the story is slightly more mature than the cover of the game would suggest.

In the Readme Zoinkity offers a few tips for anyone interested in exploring this obscure RPG.

• This is NOT a pokéclone!  (Go play Robopon.)  If you go in expecting pokémon you will be both frustrated and disappointed.

•  If you don't like text, don't play this game.  Set aside about 20 minutes from the opening dialog until the first save point.  If you don't like PSX-style flat 3D w/ sprites, also don't play this game.

• You don't gotta catch 'em all! When you finish the game the bestiary rolls over into the replay so it's not like you have to get them all in a single run.  A casual playthrough will typically collect 50% or slightly more.

•  Nothing evolves!  There are three species in each genera (not counting deities).  They can differ in stats, special abilities, and/or typecasting.  There's no reason to "train" something you don't like.  They aren't really "stronger" or "weaker" variants, just different.

• Completing the three sidequests unlocks the best endings.

•  It's a nearly-open world, like how "Final Fantasy II (Japan)" was open.  Dungeons are locked off, but the entire world map is available to you--if you can survive the trip, of course.  Use pencil and paper to map out the maze-like areas.

Once again, Zoinkity went to the extraordinary extra lengths to both fix bugs in the original game code, but also include quality of life improvements.

• Zoinkity has added 4 built in independent game saves using "SRAM x3".

• The default walking speed has been increased by 50%. This has the side effect of decreasing the encounter rate as you will be moving faster between locations. The slow movement speed and high encounter rate were the two largest complaints that the game received upon release. At the same time, it also decreases the amount of automatic healing that you gain by moving across the overworld.

• If you went to the trouble of "catching them all!" in the original game, all that would change is the size and colour of a book (the Majyū Bestiary) in the credits. To remedy this, Zoinkity has added two "intentionally obscure" bonuses if you complete 50% or 100% of the bestiary.

• A shop that has been added to the game, which allows you to rename two of the main characters and any of your Majyū. 

• The default text printing speed has been doubled

• You can now skip the intro cutscene and company logos by pressing START on the controller in the second port.

Zoinkity fixed 16 major bugs in the original code, mostly things like the wrong music or character portrait being used or obscure lines of text that did not display. However, he also managed to catch and fix a particularly nasty one;

When you complete the game, your bestiary is copied when you start a new game...unless you turn the power off, in which case it throws away the flag and data.  The flag is cleared as soon as the new game is created, so if you happen to die before saving you won't be able to start a new game with your old bestiary (or automatically have it). This has been completely rewritten for embedded saves. If you select "New Game" from the menu any complete game will be highlighted instead of white.  Starting from this game file will copy your bestiary to the new game.

Imagine if Pokémon deleted your Pokedex after you beat the Elite Four and then turned the power off!

Now that this patch has been completed, there is more information about the game on the English side of the internet than there ever was in Japanese! In Japan, copies of Zool sell for a higher price than most N64 games. I got mine unboxed for 4,000 yen, but I have seen boxed copies going for 20,000 yen. The game was never previewed or reviewed in my beloved British N64 Magazine, so I did not even know the game existed until I came to Japan and began collecting N64 games. I cannot find any Japanese guides for Zool, and there were no Japanese guide books published that I am aware of either.

デザエモン3D - Dezaemon 3D 

Released on the 26th June 1998, Dezaemon 3D is a shmup creator tool for the N64 developed by Athena. The game has a 3D polygon maker, art tool, music tool and various other suites to allow you to create any kind of shmup! There are also three example games, which are some of the best shmups on the N64!

On October 1st 2024, Zoinkity and I released a full English translation patch for the game. All 50+Tutorials, menus, tooltips, and sample games can now be played entirely in English! Zoinkity was responsible for the hacking, text insertion, image editing and proofreading.  Zoinkity has translated more N64 games than anyone; he is truly a master when it comes to N64 hacking! Thanks to Zoinkity's genius, this patch also switches the game into the "disk mode" which was created for use with the 64DD, effectively upgrading this to the unreleased 64DD version! In Zoinkity's words;

Unlike other 64DD expansions, Dezaemon disks contain only stage data and blank system files. When one of these system files is found on the disk drive the game switches into “disk” mode. This unlocks and expands several features:

• The number of stages is expanded from 5 to 10.

• Limits on user-edited images is raised from 10 64×32 images to 150.

• Limits on user-edited models is raised from 10 to 100.

• Limits on music, animations, intros and endings, etc. are removed.

• Multiple games may be saved to disk.

The patch can be found here, click the yellow translations tab! Thank you to Luigiblood for hosting our patch!

https://64dd.org/games.html

Or here at Rom Hacking Dot Net;

https://www.romhacking.net/translations/7451/

夜光虫 II 殺人航路  - Mareel II The Murder Route

夜光虫Ⅱ 殺人航路 (Yakochu II: Satsujin Koro) or Mareel II The Murder Route is a visual novel horror game for the N64 by Athena. It was released on October 22nd 1999 in Japan and is a sequel to a SNES game. Ozidual and I began working on this project in 2020. The translation is complete and you can read the entire text of the game here:

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/n64/576666-yakouchuu-ii-satsujin-kouro/faqs/81963

However, we haven't been able to get the text back into the game yet. You can read about the translation progress here;

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/916387-nintendo-64/79511619

Or at the Everdrive forums;

https://krikzz.com/forum/index.php?topic=10323.15

Ozidual is trying to preserve video game history by scanning manuals and magazines. It's thanks to him that I could translate most of information for my guides! You can find his scans here:

https://archive.org/details/@ozidual

爆裂無敵バンガイオー  Explosive Invincible Bangai-O!

Patch Link - https://www.romhacking.net/translations/7509/ 

Explosive Invincible Bangai-O! is a 2D multidirectional shmup / puzzle game developed by the legendary Treasure who also created Ikaruga, Mischief Makers, Gunstar Heroes, and Radiant Silvergun. Bangai-O is one of the best games released for the N64 that never left Japan, and has therefore become quite rare as the few copies that were made were sought after by Japanese and international players alike. On February 14th 2026, GammaTrove and RoboVerse released a translation patch for this amazing game. GammaTrove handled the translation and RoboVerse tackled the hacking. In 2025, GammaTrove asked me to have a look at his translation and do some script editing and revison. I sent him 16 pages of alternate translations and suggestions, some of which made it into the final patch. If for some reason, you are interested in reading my suggestions, you can find them here;
Bangai-O! suggestions  Whowasphone404 

Released by Imagineer on August 1st 1997, this is the 4th Mahjong game on the N64. Mahjong Wanderers Story is based on a 4 volume autobiographical novel series released in 1969 by Takehiro Irokawa. The novel was a hit and was retold in various manga and two movies in 1984 and 2019. This game is based on a 1993 manga version of the novel. The manga was also written by Irokawa and 42 issues were published. Mr Irokawa had a very fascinating, difficult and strange life, I high recommend you read the biography section of my guide which I have linked below!

The story concerns the main character Boyatetsu who becomes involved with the world Mahjong gambling after working at factory during World War 2. He is forced to become a vagabond after stealing money from his parents home. In the second volume he leaves Tokyo after becoming addicted to methamphetamines. Stuck in the post war reconstruction economy he falls into debt after borrowing even more money to play Mahjong. In the final volume he quits Mahjong to go straight but is pulled back into the world of gambling by a new main character. Additional chapters featuring Burakumin (the lowest caste in Japanese society) Chinese, and Korean mining slaves in Japan playing Mahjong were cut by the editors and hidden from the public, essentially becoming lost media.

Many of the darker scenes were removed from the story in the game, so much so, that it doesn't really make much sense. In particular scenes in which the characters gamble for "ownership" of a woman, scenes in which some of the characters take drugs in order to play mahjong better, and scenes in which some of the characters die horribly. The infamous shocking ending was removed completely. 

Part of this game focuses on the ability to cheat by “loading your hand”. This involves mixing and stacking the tiles in such a way that you get a good hand when the tiles are first dealt. These cheats are password activated. The passwords can be gained from Trickery Mode and even be used in the Story Mode. This is an old way of cheating at Mahjong since it can no longer be done with today’s automatic shuffling tables. There are various ways to load the tiles, each with various levels of subtetly and risk of being caught. This way of cheating was popularized in Irokawa's novels and manga.

The translation is finished and can be read here. We are still working on hacking the text into the game.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/n64/574520-mahjong-hourouki-classic/faqs/79178

Back of the Box

Finally “Mahjong Wanderers Story CLASSIC” is resurrected on the Nintendo 64!

Characters you are very familiar with appear, such as Boyatetsu, Dosa Ken, Jyoshu Tora, and Deme Toku. The atmosphere created in the dramatic manga invites you to experience the post war generation. Enjoy the original story to your heart’s content in Story Mode. The game also includes Free Battle Mode, in which you can freely play against any of the characters. In order to learn the fraudulent skill of “loading your hand”, the player can use “Trickery Mode”. You can enjoy the world of Mahjong Wanderers Story CLASSIC to its fullest. Can you finally learn how to trick your way to a “Nine Gates” winning hand!?