I say this as a professional who came up from fan translation and has friends at Sega who will likely never get to work on this officially: when you fan translate ANYTHING that was previously untranslated, you have a deep, heavy responsibility in setting people's first and typically only impression.
For those who haven't seen it. A member of the Keitai Archive community did a wonder presentation at JawnCon recently about Keitai Preservation! Its a wonderful video you should give it a watch.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=x53W...
Last year, LNRC partially preserved CROWS x WORST, a beat-'em-up keitai game based on the eponymous manga series. Today, @yuvi.app created a server, which made it playable for the first time! The game heavily relied on server data, so our copy is a small portion of the full game.
I accidentally made every NPC a Trashcan...
What a blast of a game to Reverse Engineer, I gave up many times to come back and finally get it working.
Japanese feature phones on a table at MAGFest
Are you at MAGFest? Want to try some preserved keitai games? You're in luck! Come to the Museum/LAN Room and look for @unabandonware.bsky.social's table with 20+ Japanese feature phones! Unabandonware is one of the foremost keitai game preservationists, and she'd love to tell you all about them!
@unabandonware.bsky.social is the one representing Keitai Archive and the Keitai scene at Magfest this year :)
A lineup of Japanese flip phones with information sheets describing what they are and what games are available on each.
I also need to highlight someone else’s contribution to the Magfest museum this year: a slew of Japanese keitai with games on them! These were staples of Japanese gaming pre-smartphone, and it’s rad to see them presented here on their original hardware.
Just listen to how good this sounds!
Thanks to an individual who helped implement the MLD format to a near-perfect replica. We have one of the best Keitai music players to exist now. This will be coming out sometime in the future, but I wanted to give everyone a sneak peek!
Total phones dumped: 516 Unique phones dumped: 321 Total app launches: 47084 Unique apps launched: 3851 Top 10 apps: Monster Hunter i (eng), Rockman DASH 5 Islands (eng), King's Field Mobile (eng), KH Coded, The Battle Cats, Akumaijyo CD, Corpse Part NewChapter, Rockman: The Puzzle Battle, Lost Planet, DoDonPachi DaiOuJou DX
2025 has been an incredible year for keitai game preservation! Your continued support for this small part of gaming history has meant the world to me, so thank you! Here are some year-end preservation statistics from Keitai World Launcher. Here's to an amazing 2026!
Keitai World Launcher now includes the Free-J2MEPlus emulator, which supports EZplus Java games! You can play preserved EZweb games like #Tetris Outdoor, which features Linda from Stretch Panic... an unexpected crossover! KWL will have more EZweb game integrations in the future.
After some SD card bruteforcing, the downloaded i-mode trial of Professor Layton and the Curious Village was preserved by @unabandonware.bsky.social and @yuvi.app ! Unlike the preloaded i-mode trial, this contains all of chapter 1 and is closer to the original DS game (voice acting, cutscenes).
The most highly anticipated Saturn translation has arrived! Yes, Airs Adventure is out in English, just in time to liven the holidays!!
Credits:
@hitomi2500.bsky.social - Hacking
@snowyaria.goodorevengreat.games - Translation
@nichetopic.bsky.social - Graphics
@blueskyrunner.bsky.social - QA
Screenshot of a leaderboard from Mr. Driller Aqua for Mobage
Screenshot of Gaplus for Mobage
Dozens of i-mode games with Mobage and GREE server functionality have been revived, thanks to @yuvi.app! Many are score attack variants of games like Galaga and Taiko no Tatsujin. In the near future, Mobage/GREE leaderboards will be viewable on the Keitai Archive website.
Please go support and congratulate @hilltopworks.bsky.social and @cargodin.bsky.social They are close friends of mine, and they just released their first-ever official translation work! It would mean a lot to me to see them succeed for the amazing effort they put into this!
I still cannot believe it! Congrats, really. It brings me such joy to see you working on something in a official capacity.
Happy to have helped preserve this unreleased PS2 game, “Rubu Tribe”.
This game is certainly interesting, and I could have seen it doing well if it had been released back in the day.
This contains multiple compiled levels and some test levels as well.
Biohazard: The Episodes was preserved by @yuvi.app! Lost to time until today, this mission-based game was based on Biohazard 3. It appears to be the full game, minus extra characters. We have now preserved at least partial copies of all three keitai-exclusive 3D #Biohazard games!
Now this is a collection I can get behind. Glad I was able to acquire one!
Another lot another gem..
Today find was a phone loaded with games, and one of them being
“Biohazard the Episodes”.
So far it seems to be working in full, but more testing and processing to come!
Where does Left Alive come to play here lol.
R.O.B. - Ride on the Beat!! was preserved by @yuvi.app! Released in 2005 for keitai, this is a 3D rhythm game where you ride a hoverboard and change lanes to the beat of the music. It's pretty fun! The 3D graphics are also quite good for a 2005 keitai game.
Oh hi there! Thank you for the early copy! Too bad I can’t use the switch 2 upgrade pack yet unfortunately.
I got a bit curious... SMT9 already found the text routine to control location, sizing, width, and more. So I made the text half as small compared to just how it was. Guess this game can be done after all.
Beat Snatcher the other night. I don’t think I’ve ever played a game that’s held up so nicely and honestly shocked me for how good the story is and told for a late 80s game. Honestly had a perfect pace and length. However I’m def craving more.
Glad to have this in my collection
The original i-mode release of #Bomberman 3D was preserved by @yuvi.app! Released in 2004, the game has fully 3D stages with multiple elevations. Its EZweb, Yahoo Keitai, and international J2ME releases have also been preserved to various extents.
Roughly two months ago I preserved Tales of Tactics ~Trial Version~ for iMode!
This is a crowning jewel of the games in my opinion and so happy to have at least recovered the trial version. Since the first chapter is fully playable.
youtu.be/LnCQYmIxVA8?...
ICYMI, @yuvi.app partially preserved Biohazard: The Operations, a previously-lost Biohazard keitai game! It heavily relied on missing SD card data, but Yuvi painstakingly recreated the data from scratch, resulting in all missions and online leaderboards being functional! (1/2)
