Well I'm bored...pronunciation discussion?

[JCry]

PSO2 has to offer tons of mobs, items and quest with unique names and such. Not exactly sure where this is leading but sometimes I question how I say certain things. In this case I think Darkers get the most attention in this situation.

I've Voice chatted with tons of people who play PSO2 and it seems almost all of them have a different way of pronouncing names believe it or not. Example would be Zeshrayda. When I first seen him I read it as zesh-raa-duh but after talking to some friends I ended up reading it as zesh-ray-duh. I Still have this problem with Goldrahda. I Seriously switch between how I pronounce the name of this mob. Gol-ra-duh to Gold-dra-duh. It's a force of habit and sometimes I forget this is a Japanese game so pronunciation is probably even more confusing between english and japanese. There's plenty more I have but these are just some examples. I've heard Vin-cul-lum and Vi-nic-u-lum and I can't decide which is right, wrong or even closer lol. Just some thoughts I guess.

inb4 im just stupid

[ArcaneTechs]

average Tuesday in the West :wacko:

[Mattykins]

Everything's pretty much pronounced how it's spelt except Fundarge(foon-DAH-jee), which I think the translation team were on crack when they decided on that spelling.

[JCry]

Everything's pretty much pronounced how it's spelt except Fundarge(foon-DAH-jee), which I think the translation team were on crack when they decided on that spelling.

that's a shame. the "hda" in darker names vocally appear different from majority people I speak too. I guess I just thought about it too much. I still think vinculum is debatable though.

[AlVaRo0515]

Gwana= J-Waohnuh :wacko:

[Mattykins]

Nah, pretty sure vinculum is, well... vinculum

[Hysteria1987]

Not to start another good ol' fashioned country war, but I've noticed that American players in general pronounce things differently to how I hear people from other English speaking countries pronounce stuff- must be something to do with how languages are developed/taught/physically spoken etc.

First noticed this on the old PSO- some American friends of mine would pronounce Zonde almost as Zon-day (exaggerated a bit to get the pronunciation across) where I would say Zond.

Megid was another nice one - my friends' mej-id to my mee-gid.

Also, Rag-Knee :wacko:

[kurokyosuke]

Japanese borrow words from multiple languages, so translating one of these borrowed words into another language can be confusing at times. However, sometimes they just get things wrong, like how we know that Pisces is pronounced pie-sees, but Japanese pronounce it as piss-kess (seriously, are there even any other languages that pronounce it this way?).

But I digress. For the most part, names in this game--be it for characters, enemies, areas, items, anything--are completely made up, so coming up with "100% accurate" translations is for the entirety of the game is literally impossible, unless you came up with the words yourself, so the best thing you can do most of the time is work off of the Japanese pronunciation.

Also, Vinculum is an actual word, and is pronounced vin-kyu-lum. The Japanese spelling uses the classic Latin pronunciation, using "win" instead of "vin". Both are correct. Other pronunciations are just wrong.

[Nyansan]

Nihongo uses mostly long vowel sounds and most of the words are very syllabic in nature, which is quite similar to my native language that I've never really had any problems with pronunciation.

[Sandmind]

English is only my second language. You guys would find it funny or hit your head to the wall if you heard my use of french pronounciation with some akward english pronounciation thrown in. :wacko:

[Anduril]

Despite American English being my first language, I personally tend to pronounce most of the names with a mix of Spanish vowels and hard consonants. For example, going off of Hysteria1987, I pronounce Zonde as "zon" with the o pronounced like "oh" and the "de" like dentist, and Megid with "me" as in men and "gid" as in Gideon; Ragne as Rahg-neh, Agrani as Ah-grah-nii. This also reminds me of a conversation I had with someone in PSU where they said they pronounced Kakwane (http://www.pso-world.com/beastiary/psu/1/108/kakwane/) as cock-wayne versus my cah-quah-neh.

[Kondibon]

I think The g in megid is hard and the e in zonde is long, not silent.

I prounounce Zonde like Zondeh though. ._.

[Z-0]

Zonde is correct, because it's ゾンデ in Japanese which has the "de" pronounced. (zo-n-de)

Megid does indeed have a hard G, because of メギド, which pronounces the G hard. (me-gi-do)

If you're having trouble with the pronunciation of things, you check the original Japanese. While translations are not pronounced exactly the same as the source for original names, they can give you a better idea of how things are supposed to be pronounced in English.

[Dnd]

I just call Goldrahda's bomb-bugs if im talking on voice with someone (Or even typing, I mean, they are bugs with bombs on them afterall), because when i actually say it its like Gol-dra-da or gol-da-ra-da (Hey i even /add/ letters to make it even more wrong!) and when you're mad at a td mpa its too many syllibles to put into an angry rant.

I've heard megid being said as meh-jid before, i just prefer meh-gid and with zon-de its just that aswell.

ragknee is best tho, same with its rare form 'Agranny'

[Kondibon]

I just call Goldrahdas Goldras.

Zandilion, Filet Mignon, and Barista Son. :wacko:

Also I call ragne Ragu-neechan

And don't forget Breadichadas. :3c

[Anduril]

As a primarily solo player, most Darkers are "godamsonuvabichwhyarentyouthemobimlookingforseriou slywhattheactualhellman" to me.

[NoobSpectre]

well I never pronouced them in anything other than what they look.

Dagan (rare)/Krada = exp
El arda/Breedha = flyer
Ragne (rare) = cockroach
Vibrace (rare) = Vib (sometimes beetle, but that also very long)

Kucklonada/Cycloneda = giant (sometimes mace/ball)
micta (rare/ahl) = shellfish
Krabadha = crab
And fishes, which I kinda forget the name but kinda obvious

Tyrandula/Stradha = bird
Then another which I also forget is called middle bird
Luda sorcerer = scythe
Malluda (rare) = claw
Ringaldha (rare) = centaur[/SPOILER-BOX]

Hunar is still hunar, Angel is... welp, angel

So is Elder and Loser, though I prefer to call [SPOILER]Dorumble as clowns (Castle for True form) while Profound Darkness as flower.

[Selphea]

If Ragne is a roach, what's a Vidoluda? :wacko:

[starwhisper]

Rare drop = "leh ah dolo" you guys never got how to pronounce your own language seriously, thankfully japanese got it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ddqRwsZ6p0k

[kurokyosuke]

Random fun fact: Megid/Megido is also a spell in the Megami Tensei series.

[NoobSpectre]

If Ragne is a roach, what's a Vidoluda? :wacko:

bug for me, though yes, it did also a bit like cockroach too, but it dies before I notice its pressence often, so maybe... also another called exp.

anyway, I forgot to mention big and small ninjas, but I assumed people know what they are since its one of the most irritating mob to handle.

[Hysteria1987]

If Ragne is a roach, what's a Vidoluda? :wacko:
That one's pronounced "annoying-ass-stun-roach-that-somehow-never-misses-ARRGHIHATEYOUSOMUCH" :wacko:


Random fun fact: Megid/Megido is also a spell in the Megami Tensei series.
I think it was used in Golden Sun too, or something named similarly. It's latin for death or something along those lines. A lot of the names of weapons and stuff from the old PSO came out of old mythologies and stuff from around the world, actually.

Also for pronunciation:
Wolgahda: Fish-man
Double: Crackheads (have you seen how they run? And their faces? Definitely keen for more pingas)
Nyau: THAT BLOODY CAT AGAIN WHY ARE YOU HERE
Oodan: Booma
Gigur Gunne-Gam: Giggle Gundam-Man
Anjhadu-lili - Hot Wheels

Seriously though, there's a good chunk of Kuronites that I just look at the name and go... ok, I'm calling you what you look like from now on. That said, like someone further up said, there's not too much that's difficult to pronounce, though there's a few that look like they translate into languages other than English (Besides Kuronites, Fjorgalla comes to mind).

[yoshiblue]

As a primarily solo player, most Darkers are "godamsonuvabichwhyarentyouthemobimlookingforseriou slywhattheactualhellman" to me.

I just call them bugs, because the only good bug is a dead one. Unless they submit to me. Then they get a minimum wage of 99¢ a day.

[wefwq]

Pronunciation aside, anyone find enemy names being more stupid on each update?
What are those enemy on Kuron called? i never remember any of their name up until today... and those new toy darkers, biketa what?

This stupid little thing bugging me out everytime i want to do MB.

[Anduril]

I think it was used in Golden Sun too, or something named similarly. It's latin for death or something along those lines.
It's actually derived from a place in Israel, Tel Megiddo (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tel_Megiddo), where the Book of Revelations says an apocalyptic battle will occur, ie. Armageddon. This is why in the past MMO Phantasy Star games it had the chance to OHKO.

[Numie]

can we talk about how "Yukigaras" instead of "Yukigarasu" is stupid

i mean it's obviously a swap of Yamigarasu, so why would katakana magically change this

translators pls
While we're on the subject, can we NOT label Tradicion/Nacht "Haseo's Scythe" anymore?

[Hysteria1987]

What are those enemy on Kuron called? i never remember any of their name up until today... and those new toy darkers, biketa what?Some of them sound almost like Italian sportscars to me lol



It's actually derived from a place in Israel, Tel Megiddo (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tel_Megiddo), where the Book of Revelations says an apocalyptic battle will occur, ie. Armageddon.After I posted that, something was bothering me in the back of my mind about it being something apocalyptic, but I couldn't quite put my finger on it :P Thanks for the correction.

EDIT:

can we talk about how "Yukigaras" instead of "Yukigarasu" is stupidWhile we're at it, change Gadianna back to Guardianna pls.

[TaigaUC]

Japanese syllable pronunciation is super simple and consistent.
As long as you know what the sounds and letters are, it's easy to pronounce stuff. No confusion.

The problem is when they try to write foreign words using their own letters.
Some English sounds simply don't exist in Japanese, and sometimes they use different letters/sounds for the same words.

SEGA has a habit of being terribly inconsistent.
Quick example off the top of my head:
Tail = Te-ru, Teiru are both present.

[KLMS1]

Some of them sound almost like Italian sportscars to me lol

Wouldn't be particularly surprised if that was exactly what they used for inspiration. But then I've watched the entire Nanoha franchise...

Also to quote a random chat comment: "Bert Schbunker sounds like a soccer player"

On another note, I'm honestly kinda impressed how off the beaten path some of the naming references are. Eg. Verethragna (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Verethragna) definitely isn't the most widely-known mythological figure... and I have no idea what "Gur Bazga" refers to; closest equivalents I found on the Wiki were Iranian place-names and a personal name from NW India...

[AmanoMai]

and those new toy darkers, biketa what?



i think orota biketa is somewhat deviated from the japanese word for 驚き (odoroki, means surprise) and びく ("biku!" which is the sound effect for it )

similarly , bonta bakuta takes from the word 爆弾 (bakudan for bombs)

[Hysteria1987]

"Bert Schbunker sounds like a soccer player"While we're on launchers, I took a holiday in St. Kilda once :wacko: it's a bit of a trendy suburb in Melbourne. Unfortunately 'trendy' at the time meant one of those little-bit-run-down, almost college-ish feeling areas, which aren't really my sort of thing but it was a nice enough place.

No idea what it's like nowadays mind you, but there you go :P

[Mattykins]

Random fun fact: Megid/Megido is also a spell in the Megami Tensei series.

So is Zan and they're both Wind

[Kondibon]

i think orota biketa is somewhat deviated from the japanese word for 驚き (odoroki, means surprise) and びく ("biku!" which is the sound effect for it )

similarly , bonta bakuta takes from the word 爆弾 (bakudan for bombs)Shhh, don't bring logic in here, we have to hate things we don't understand.

(that's really interesting though)

[SilkaN]

Well I shout every enemy name angrily because I am German

[KLMS1]

While we're on launchers, I took a holiday in St. Kilda once :wacko: it's a bit of a trendy suburb in Melbourne.

Seems to be quite a few places (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St_Kilda) actually. God only knows where the fig (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St_Kilda,_Scotland#Origin_of_names) the name originates... :-?


Well I shout every enemy name angrily because I am German

If you're not goose-stepping at the same time you're doing something wrong.
Also game totally needs an enemy called Fegelein. :wacko:

[kurokyosuke]

can we talk about how "Yukigaras" instead of "Yukigarasu" is stupid

i mean it's obviously a swap of Yamigarasu, so why would katakana magically change this

translators pls
While we're on the subject, can we NOT label Tradicion/Nacht "Haseo's Scythe" anymore?

You reminded me of how ジャ・グチ is (was? haven't checked to see if it was fixed) translated as Jacuzzi, when it's clearly Ja･Guchi, which, when removing the dot in the middle, is the Japanese word for faucet (and the item is clearly a bathhouse faucet with a lamp and mirror). If anything, Faw-Set would've been a better translation.

[Dnd]

Well I shout every enemy name angrily because I am German

Not gonna lie, i love this comment

Vidoluda is just stunbug to me because it fits and is easy, but, whilst we're on the topic of stupid names - What about those UQ darkers, the translated names just seem a mess so personally I just say Yuga(insert other name here) like Yugabombbug or predi-yuga etc

[GoldenFalcon]

can we talk about how "Yukigaras" instead of "Yukigarasu" is stupid

i mean it's obviously a swap of Yamigarasu, so why would katakana magically change this

To be fair, Yamigaras is just as viable of a name.

Dialects drop the ending vowel to sound different sometimes.

[kurokyosuke]

"muh TOY."

No. She's MY toy.
...
......
.........
:wacko:

[Nyansan]

To be fair, Yamigaras is just as viable of a name.

Dialects drop the ending vowel to sound different sometimes.

Well traditionally japanese doesn't have a standalone 's' sound, the closest being the 'su' sound. The dropping of the vowel is a recent thing and used to make word pronunciation 'smoother', so to speak.

[Yamishi]

Megid was another nice one - my friends' mej-id to my mee-gid.


Not sure if this has been addressed, but in Phantasy Star Universe, Magashi pronounces it Meg-id. Like Megan, but with "id" on the end.

[Zanverse]

Eh, some tech names I've gotten used to saying

Foie = Foy
Zonde = Zone-day
Grants = Gurantz (I really don't know why I pronounce it this way.)
Megid = Me-jid

As for bosses:

Rockbear = Rock-A-Bear
Dark Ragne = Dark Rag-knee
Dark Vibras = Dark Veye-bruss (People still use Bibarasu or Vibrace??)
Zeshrayda = Zesh-ray-dah /Zeshy
Bal Rodos = Bal Ro-dus / Ro-dose (Seen people write as "Val Rados", don't know why...) / Money Rodos
Big Vardha = Big Var-dah

etc etc.

Funny enough, when it comes to Ult. Nab names, I tend to forget them all:

Bayaribbles = Bey-Ya-Ribbles / Bayari / Bayoribs / Bayonetta / Luchabear
Plosiorgles = Plo-see-org-guls / Explosi / Del Blamoth
Anga Fundarge = An-gah Fun-darj

The only name that really doesn't roll off the tongue well is Matoi. "Muh-Toy"? "Mah-Toy"? "Mah-To-Ee"??? I dunno, such an awkward name.

[LonelyGaruga]

It's funny how katakana literally shows how to pronounce something but because most western players don't know that, they get the pronunciations completely wrong. This has even been pointed out a couple times already.

Let's take Megid for example. メギド = Me-gi-do (drop the o at the end here). It's メジド that would be pronounced me-ji-do (again, drop the o). Ragne is derived from Arachne so it's pronounced rather similarly, ラグネ = Ra-gu-ne. Whether you call it Vibras, Vibrace, Byblos, or whatever, it's written and pronounced as ビブラス = Bi-bu-ra-su. Though this is also where Japanese can be confusion because l and v do not exist in it, and instead r and b are used as substitutes. So ビブラス could be Bi-bu-ra-su, or it could be vi-bu-ra-su, or it could be bi-bu-la-su. Regardless of how you spell or say it, the pronounciation is most similar to words like brass or lass, not something like brace.

And so on. Just look up katakana on Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katakana) or something, check a word on swiki, then match up the kana and see what you get to identify how to say things. Pretty simple.

[Numie]

To be fair, Yamigaras is just as viable of a name.

Dialects drop the ending vowel to sound different sometimes.

That still doesn't excuse it. The only similar thing that comes to mind is Karas (the series and character), of which the name was romanized that way for the sake of style.

In this case, dialects dropping the end vowel doesn't mean jack if the name is an obvious referencial counterpart. Context is key here.

[LonelyGaruga]

Yamigarasu = Dark Crow
Yukigarasu = Snow Crow

I don't know why garasu was written as garas for the camo.

[Hysteria1987]

Bayaribbles = Bey-Ya-Ribbles / Bayari / Bayoribs / Bayonetta / Luchabear
Plosiorgles = Plo-see-org-guls / Explosi / Del Blamoth
Anga Fundarge = An-gah Fun-darjNewer names can be a pain to remember :P Luchabear is now a thing though, I am stealing that unashamedly. For a good while, Anga Fundarge was Angry Fandango to me.


The only name that really doesn't roll off the tongue well is Matoi. "Muh-Toy"? "Mah-Toy"? "Mah-To-Ee"??? I dunno, such an awkward name.Matoi actually says her name at some point, I can't quite remember where. Beginning of Ep3 maybe? She really stresses the syllables, but if I'm not mistaken it was something like "Muh-to-ee". She's Ma-Toy to me, though.

Any pronunciation will do for me really though, tbh. I'm not really all that interested in the Japanese pronunciations- I usually just go for how I believe the English word would sound based on how it looks, since it's translated into another language now and all.

[kazuuya]

It's funny how katakana literally shows how to pronounce something but because most western players don't know that, they get the pronunciations completely wrong. This has even been pointed out a couple times already. [...]


I wouldn't quite call it as simple as that because you have to consider the overall difference in phonetic pronounciation between languages. All you said is of course correct, but some people just have problems to correctly pronounce it.

When I speak english for example I often have a really hard time to pronounce certain things just because german is phonetically completely different from english. I also have moments where I accidently keep slipping back into german as well. I've been learning and speaking english for over 13 years and I'm still not good enough in my opinion! Meanwhile my dad is from poland and he has often problems while speaking german due to the same reason. The same case with japanese people speaking english and having problems to pronounce words correctly.

Sure there's people who can perfectly speak english and pronounce english words who aren't from an english speaking country, but alas I am not one of them. The same can be applied in this case and in general. People aren't able to correctly pronounce something because either they can't due to difficulties or maybe don't understand/know like you said, and thus they pronounce it differently in a easier way for them.

[Zyrusticae]

Despite American English being my first language, I personally tend to pronounce most of the names with a mix of Spanish vowels and hard consonants. For example, going off of Hysteria1987, I pronounce Zonde as "zon" with the o pronounced like "oh" and the "de" like dentist, and Megid with "me" as in men and "gid" as in Gideon; Ragne as Rahg-neh, Agrani as Ah-grah-nii. This also reminds me of a conversation I had with someone in PSU where they said they pronounced Kakwane (http://www.pso-world.com/beastiary/psu/1/108/kakwane/) as cock-wayne versus my cah-quah-neh.
This is exactly how I pronounce every single one of these.

It never once occurred to me to read the 'g' in 'megid' as a 'j' instead. The words in English where that happens are exceptions rather than the norm, so I don't get how folks jump to that in the first place...

[Angelo]

Katakana literally makes it impossible to mispronounce any noun since the whole system is used to pronounce foreign and fictional nouns phonetically.

This thread shouldn't exist.

As for the 'spanish sounding' argument quoted above that's actually called 'romance vowels' since Spanish is a Romance (from 'Roman') language. Katakana can be read using Romance vowels since that's basically how our language is viewed to the Japanese.
Our letters in Japan are called 'Romaji" or 'Roma letters'. Roma being Rome. A good rule of thumb is to keep that in mind.

[Rupikachu]

Just call them the way sega calls them internally..like doodlebug

Also apparently goldrahdas are cockroaches..wtf

https://github.com/PolCPP/PSO2es-Translation/blob/master/json/NameTextActorEnemy.txt

[KLMS1]

"Kung-fu roach" is what I tend to think of them as. Which definitely doesn't have anything to do with the way they keep roundhouse kicking me all over the place. >_>

That aside, "RappyDragon"? Now I'm curious.

[Anduril]

"Kung-fu roach" is what I tend to think of them as. Which definitely doesn't have anything to do with the way they keep roundhouse kicking me all over the place. >_>

That aside, "RappyDragon"? Now I'm curious.
What immediately came to mind is the seasonal Dragon Rappy in the playpark version. Though it does seems kinda odd that it would be in PSO2es' data.
[spoiler-box]http://i.imgur.com/br4Uvhe.jpg[/spoiler-box]

[Rupikachu]

What immediately came to mind is the seasonal Dragon Rappy in the playpark version. Though it does seems kinda odd that it would be in PSO2es' data.
[spoiler-box]http://i.imgur.com/br4Uvhe.jpg[/spoiler-box]

Theres a lot of mobs that arent in es that are mentioned internally in there... heck even the profund darkness has been for ages there