Most of my questions regarding basic usage of katakana and hiragana can be - and have been - answered with a quick google search. However, there are a few cases that I haven’t been able to clarify on my own - specifically, small vowels that follow the same sound instead of modifying another. (So not like フォ or that sort of thing.)
These already end in the same vowel sound, so what are the small versions for here? I’ve seen ルゥ, ギィ, and クゥ in particular, and I’d like to know what they’re for, and what difference they make on pronunciation.
I’ve mostly seen them in monster names written in katakana - ルゥ appearing in the middle in a couple of different names, and the other two at the end of a couple of names.
It seems like it works the same as extending the sounds with ー, but in some cases indicates what the English/romanized spelling is intended to be, like in Kirby’s name, it means his name should end with ‘y’ instead of ‘i’.
I’ve also seen this phenomenon in slangy speech, like てめェ, ねェ, etc. I think it’s just a stylistic choice, but tbh I’m still not sure what nuance it’s supposed to evoke.