November Recap + Big Changes Going Forward
November Recap + Big Changes Going Forward
Hello everyone and happy Thanksgiving week to all our readers in the US! It has been a monumental 3 months. After great consideration of what has worked with the site and what hasn’t, we have decided to formally announce big news going forward. ROMHack Heaven is switching gears in a big way for the future.
First thing’s first. I, Ryu, would like to take a moment to celebrate ROMHack Heaven’s victories. We managed to squeeze several Halloween-themed projects into an October release window. We’ve featured downloads for several amazing hacks which got ample attention such as Secret of Mana Plus. We’ve helped the scene somewhat regain footing during uncertain times.
However, once again it’s also important to reflect on what has gone wrong. Unfortunately, two co-owners either disappeared or became unexpectedly busy. I have essentially been performing triple my workload and then some for months. I am afraid I have bitten off more than I can chew and don’t feel suitably equipped to keep ROMHack Heaven around as a large-scale community website. I am officially closing this site’s queue for more general purposes. There needs to be a united front for the average ROMhacker, and GitHub pages are also important for keeping old versions of patches readily available. As such, I strongly encourage everybody to post their project pages on both GitHub and ROMhack Plaza going forward.
So, what is the fate of ROMhack Heaven if we aren’t going offline?
The site is still valid for a couple years at least. As such, we have opted to give it a more unique function. From here on out, RHH will serve as a sort of personal blog where I (along with other staff members) post “greatest hits” of the ROMhacking scene, with permission from the authors of course. Pages will link to their official project URLs, with backup downloads underneath for the sake of preservation. This is being done gradually, but an example can be seen here.
So, what is allowed in the submission queue from here on out?
- Translations
- Restorations
- Major quality of life hacks
- Homebrew games
- Updates of previously submitted hacks
In essence, hacks that can outright replace the original ROM for the majority of players. RHH staff will also post future hacks as timed-exclusives here.
Since we are narrowing our scope, the following hacks will not be accepted going forward.
- Title screen fixes
- Costume swaps
- Music swaps/MSU-1 packs
- Minor text fixes
- Sprite swaps
- Easy mode hacks
And so forth. This is not to insinuate hacks like the above are “low-effort” or lesser (indeed, some are extremely impressive) but rather to prevent bloat. Further fragmentation in the community is unneeded, and there are more suitable hubs for these hacks now. There are simply too many hacks in the above vein to fit with RHH’s new, more curated direction. As such we are once again directing hackers to the Plaza and GitHub.
So, what’s next for me? Well, this is far from my sendoff as a ROMhacker. I very much look forward to releasing future projects. Indeed, I still have many contributions to the community as a whole planned. Most notably, I have teamed up with BillyTime! Games to release a definitive patch of Gunstar Heroes (Genesis) with various improvements bringing it more in line with the 3DS port.
To end things on a positive note, here are some new releases for the month, never before seen on RHDN:
- Altered Beast Arcade Edition
- Bomberman Thanksgiving
- Co-Op Super Metroid (Tank Controls)
- Deja Vu Restorations + Fixes
- Dracula II: Noroi No Fuuin Translation
- Elemental Gearbolt Unworked
- Fridge Quest
- The Great Gatsby
- Mega Man Xmix
- Playtime Paradise Translation
- Secret of Mana Plus
- Streets of Rage 2 – XP System
- Super Street Fighter II (XP System)
- Super Street Fighter II – Evil Ryu
See you next month with more exciting news.
