Riya's RPG Side Blog

Introduction

Eikichi has three personalities in the game. His first personality is Michel who is a cocky rockstar, second is Eikichi who is the head of Kasugayama High, and lastly, Eikichi who is the future owner of a sushi restaurant.

While it is clear that he reacts differently according to those personalities in English, the way he presents himself is actually more nuanced in Japanese.

As usual, I will be explaining all three according to his word choice and speech patterns.

Disclaimer: I am NOT fluent in Japanese. I can understand Japanese enough to play games but I do not speak the language. I learned from consuming Japanese media through the years so I do not have professional or academic training. If you'd like to correct me, feel free.

Michel

(I need to directly translate this to explain. It says "Mr. Small Person in my stomach is crying beeep beeep in my stomach. I can go anything that's no sushi. LET'S GO EATING!")

Honestly, just by using his hunger line, I can already explain just how particular Michel is.

First, lets talk about the pronoun he uses. Michel refers to himself as ボク"Boku" in Katakana. While "Boku" is generally a polite term used by younger people, it changes due to its writing. Usually when something is written in katakana (and it's not an actual loan word from a diff language), it's a stylized version of said word. Basically, Michel is trying to present himself as "cool". It has a sort of edge to it, as if this person is eccentric or unique in how they present themselves.

Second thing we can point out is how Michel uses the honorific "san" to refer to the "small person" or "imp" (as the English says) in his stomach. "San" is a respectful honorific and you use it to those who are older or in a higher position than you. That is not the same case I'm this usage.

Here, Michel is talking very childishly. To teach children to be respectful, adults refer to animals and magical creatures with "San" so they can practice. Santa Claus will be called "Santa-san", a giraffe will be called "Kirin-san" and Michel's stomach imp will be called "Kobito-san".

Next thing we can see here is Michel uses onomatopoeia to emphasize words. Instead of just using the simile of "crying like little birds" in English, Michel does the crying sound for them. This is again a habit done by little children. Since they have limited vocabulary, they tend to use sounds to describe their experiences.

Lastly, Michel's last line is essentially in English (Let's go eating!) but since it's written in Katakana, it shows that he actually isn't fluent in English. He just likes using it to seem cool.

To put it shortly, when Eikichi talks as Michel, he talks childishly. Sure, he uses kanji here and there but his general speech pattern and word choices are childish but it's not to seem like a child. It's to show just how eccentric and youthful his persona is. He is a carefree guy who wants to pursue his dreams and he believes in said dreams. What's more youthful than that?

Eikichi, Head of Kasugayama High

Eikichi actually talks vastly different so I'll be using multiple examples from this point on.

First thing is how Eikichi refers to himself. Here he starts using "俺ore". Ore is casual masculine pronoun used to refer to yourself. Eikichi uses it in kanji (the highest form of writing in Japanese) which means that he is referring to himself properly. He isn't really trying to put on a show or a personality, this is just how he is.

Second, he uses manly sentence enders in as Eikichi. "だda", "だろうdarou", and "だよdayo" are examples of these. These are also casual enders and the way Eikichi uses them shows that he has authority. He uses it to assert his point and to show the logic behind his words. By being casual, he is inadvertently showing that he doesn't need to refer to these people in a high manner. It's not rude, just casual.

When Eikichi gets shaken up, he tends to slur his words. You can see it in how there's smaller characters next to his enders and he repeats a lot of the ending sounds. Instead of just ending with "だda", it becomes "だぁdaa". He uses harsh words like "てめえ"temee so it really drills his emotions in.

In media, they do this for yankee speech but Eikichi also does it when he's shaken up about Kankichi scolding him. I think it's just him being really emotional.

Eikichi rarely uses respectful speech towards anyone but I'd like to point out two specific instances in which he uses polite speech towards people.

First is this one, he calls Miyabi "Hanakouji-san". Using "San" is already respectful but he also chose to refer to her with her last name. He calls his peers with just their last names (and Lisa with "Ginko") so this highlights just how gently he treats Miyabi.

Second instance was when he was discreetly asking about Jun's whereabouts. He doesn't use extremely formal speech but he ended his sentence with "ッスかssuka". This is a casual way of using "ですかdesu ka?". While it isn't the actual formal speech, it is still a change from his usual emotional and harsh speech pattern and shows that he is humbly asking people for help.

Eikichi, Heir to Gatten Sushi

Due to his father being strict, Eikichi uses formal speech around his father. First he refers to his father with "お父さんotou-san". He first tries with "ダッデイdaddy" and "親父oyaji"(old man) but those are informal ways to refer to your father and it was just him not being able to immediately recover from the whiplash of seeing his father.

He also uses formal speech with his father as seen by his usage of "ですdesu" as his ender. No more of the "だda", "だろうdarou", and "だよdayo" because he can no longer be casual nor can he assert his authority.

He also starts using polite language towards those around him. He calls Tatsuya "Suou-kun" and uses formal speech around him by ending his words with "ますmasu" and "ませんmasen".

Basically, Eikichi around Kankichi is a proper boy who respects all those around him.