If you want to experience the whole breadth of video game history, not just the narrow slice that publishers are willing to sell you on a given day, chances are you’re using emulators. Retro consoles are cool and all, but emulators give you even more control as to what classic blasts for the past you can (legally) play on your PC.
Emulators can even offer modern conveniences those old games lacked like online functionality or generous save states. And now a nifty new 1.7.8 update to RetroArch (coming soon to Steam) uses machine learning to translate Japanese console and arcade video games in real time. Check it out!
As reported by Kotaku, the feature is called AI Service and offers several different translation tools. It can pause the game and display English subtitles for the Japanese text. Or it can use a text-to-speech program to read the text to you. It even works across multiple languages in both directions.
Translation handled by an algorithm rather than a human is never going to be 100 percent. But considering the hilariously bad translation work of many classic games you probably won’t even tell the difference. And even just making obscure foreign games, games that never made it overseas, more legible to a wider audience furthers the goal of games preservation that emulators are so useful for.
For more on retro games check out the upcoming throwback consoles based on the Sega Genesis and the TurboGrafx-16. Or consider the retro arcade machines from Namco and Capcom.
