Hello!
I’ve been making a game in my spare time, and simultaneously localizing it as a way to train japanese.
Basically, it’s a fortune-telling game, with almost all of the dialog being spoken by the fortune teller.
I’m having a hard time finding a fitting pronoun and speaking patterns, however. The character, named Tarou-chan, is :
Androgynous (it shouldn’t be apparent whether they’re a girl or a boy)
Supernatural (a familiar)
Not too concerned with politeness, sometimes cheeky
Are they a cat? if they’re a cat i default to 吾輩 because of Soseki. It is very polite but I feel like you can make it ironic polite depending on the speaking pattern.
I was planning on light cat-like features (they’re a familiar after all) but not to the point of ending every sentence in nya of course.
I really like 吾輩, yeah, combined with casual speech it could make for a fairly fun effect. Though since it’s very male, I wonder if I should add some feminine sentence enders like わ or if it would be too weird.
First person pronoun: 私 and 僕 are both fine probably? This character could potentially switch between them depending on the setting and/or conversation partner. The character can also refer to themself using their own name, but this would come across as super childish (and potentially feminine depending on their visible age, but given that their name is Tarou maybe it evens out…?). I think 自分 also works as a more neutral if not super common pronoun IRL, but the only character I’ve seen actually use it in media is Gumshoe from Ace Attorney, LOL.
Speech patterns: Formal speech is the most neutral, and it’s technically still possible to make a character cheeky and/or rude - you’d have to just have the actual things they’re saying be more blunt. Casual speech can also still work since short form on its own isn’t necessarily gendered, but you’d have to be careful about using any expressions that lean feminine/masculine and try to balance them. (As a nonbinary person who read too much shoujo manga as a kid, I get told my casual speech is 女っぽい and kind of weird given the way I otherwise present, haha.)
If you’ve read Ouran High School Host Club, perhaps Haruhi’s speech patterns might match what you’re looking for? I haven’t read much of the Japanese version but I’ve heard that she tends to use neutral speech patterns especially after she joined the host club and started posing as a boy.
I think mixing 吾輩 with polite, neutral & just a touch of feminine would work great to balance the whole. Add a touch of naivety and overconfidence and that sells the 吾輩 just a bit more.
Is there a narrator voice? Giving androgynous descriptions and painting them in a light where it’s not easily apparent would just boost the above. On the other hand, then you’d have to go very easy on other gendered language, so nothing like かしら for wondering out aloud. I’d personally also skip の for sentence ends.
Is the character themself confused about this? If you go for opposites in equal measure, that’s the image I get.
Haha, well, yeah, it would be far easier by avoiding pronouns… but creativity loves constraints. I think it would be a fun prompt to try to get away with using 吾輩 for an androgynous character.
Since it’s a familiar, out of the truly archaic ones maybe 此方 would be another option? That’s not loaded. Pair it with 其方 for fun.
Edit: the ultra boring, but probably correct answer is わたし.
Is there a narrator voice? Giving androgynous descriptions and painting them in a light where it’s not easily apparent would just boost the above. On the other hand, then you’d have to go very easy on other gendered language, so nothing like かしら for wondering out aloud. I’d personally also skip の for sentence ends.
Is the character themself confused about this? If you go for opposites in equal measure, that’s the image I get.
There’s no narrator voice and no, the character isn’t confused at all.I just thought of it as “beyond” gender. But you’re right, I should avoid painting them as confused or incoherent, that’s the main risk.
Since it’s a familiar, out of the truly archaic ones maybe 此方 would be another option? That’s not loaded. Pair it with 其方 for fun.
That’s actually a very good idea. Since the game is little more than the fortune teller and the player sitting face, a back and forth of konata and sonata might be very appropriate.
It both clearly points out who’s being talked about, and even in a literally “across from the table” fashion.
I might go with that if nothing better is found, good catch.
