I got my damned trophies and now I’m debating how far I should actually go on my third run. Also, some odd things here or there… and if I should try for a second platinum. The impression between both versions (even though I’ve only played it in subtitled) feels different for me because my hearing comprehension is super crappy.

1. I seriously cannot figure out what Sorey’s method of using polite language (keigo) is. It might seriously be subconscious decision for him based on if he respects the person or not… which is a seriously odd reason because this isn’t English – you use (semi-)polite language from everything from sarcasm to talking to strangers. There are probably other usages out there that I still don’t know of but it’d be nice if any of the fic writers pointed it out (because I still am reading a ton of fic)…

2. I got more usages of Sorey using [zo]. Like how he usually uses more rough and tumble language on crap that doesn’t count, he uses that too. The only exception was pretty much at the end of the game and yeah. Other than that, I’d say in English it’d be like he stops all iffy language like bad words the more upset he gets.

3. Sometimes (or often) the way Sorey talks can seem very childish and cute. I’m not sure /what/ this is supposed to give an impression of but I think most people just took it as omg cute puppy. He doesn’t seem to talk like that (as often) when it’s just him and Mikleo. (Thinking of early skits or inn skits.)

4. Not a whole lot to say about Mikleos speech style usage. (More about his personality, but that’s not for here.) His is pretty stable but I’m still not sure if I can hear the difference between [yo] and [zo]… (I did say I have hearing issues). Oh but he did say [kisama] when he met Zavied, so that’s pretty much the first bad word I think I can recall out of him. Kinda opposite from Sorey at that point – I think Sorey would stop swearing (or almost-swearing) the angrier he gets while Mikleo would start.

5. Edna uses the direct (masculine) command form when she loses her temper or starts losing it. In battle she uses it when her SC is dropping to almost 0 [ii kagen ni… shiro!]. She used it trying to get Lailah to assume to the lecture position about the Normins [suware!].

6. I don’t think Dezel’s changes at all. Probably just gets more rough and grating the more teeth he shows, if anything.

7. Rose… I would need to collect info on how she specifically talks to everyone and when. To her guild family, to strangers, to the team when she joins, later, and to Alisha. I’m not certain this is a matter of speech style so much as her personality. (Barring psycholinguistics, which is a kind of rare topic.)

8. Reiterating Lailah’s because otherwise I’d skip her. She uses super-polite properly when first joining the team. By the time you pick up your next person this settles down until finally it goes down to her semi-polite feminine speech style.

9. Zaveid’s seems to deteriorate the more he’s trying to act up. When he’s serious or just calm, his speech style seems to be steady.

I pretty much only wanted to do his since the only other one that would take a whole post to track is Alvin’s. Same as before: range from masculine to neutral is SM, MN, AN, FN, SF but you’ll notice that neither end will exist here.

Jude: Soft Neutral or Light/Medium Masculine

So far I dug up several interesting points. 1) He doesn't use the particle ka to ask a question. /Every/ question is softened, even when he doesn't mean it. 2) he speaks more masculine to himself (na and ka appear then) and even though I knew this already 3) without his “I” and “you”, one can’t tell if he’s a boy or girl... to the extent that I think he and Leia might have the same speech style.

Generally speaks in standard contractions, uses semi-poilte like a normal person (including in nervousness), and is apparently aware of slang even though he doesn’t use it unless forced to. He doesn’t seem sure what to take as innuendo and not (although that’s not speech style related). His speech style doesn’t seem to change in ToX2 even though his attitude and what he sounds like has changed quite a bit since the beginning of ToX.

僕 masculine self-referential しちゃったの？ casual softened FN ね AN 見えないよ AN かな AN 気がする AN してる AN contraction of している 行かないの？FN soft 危ないんじゃない？ AN んだ MN 言ってきてね AN だね MN でしょ FN soft, in this case だよ MN だよね MN なの？ FN soft や AN うん、ううん casual response なんだ MN ナシだけど AN with slang 言ってないよ！ contraction of 言っていないよ AN よ AN 助けなきゃね  I can’t remember if the original is なければ or なくては but I think its the former やめなよ SM command but feels like MN so I dunno if I should change my notes on that だな SM (used rhetorically) or at least more masculine than だね 平気？ AN だろう MN (used rhetorically) 待ってよ AN して AN 行こう MN わかんない casual slur of わからない

Because I love going over this stuff and this gets really really interesting. However I haven’t taken apart a sampling of their lines so yeah, no serious analysis yet. That being said, I’m going by sheer memory.

Sorey: You’d think his is simple, but then you’d really be wrong. He has by far, the most complicated one to analyze for multiple reasons.

First and foremost reason -- he can’t seem to use polite language to save his life. Now this is not like Yuri (ToV) who literally can’t spit it out except as sarcasm at all. He really can use polite language, which he does in several scenes. One is with the priest of Ladylake in the form of asking for a favor. The other times all seem to be related to the Lords of the Land, or messing with Mikleo (acting). The strange part is that I can’t think of any other time he does this.

Second reason is that he has the speech style that gives off an impression of a little boy. Or just boyish. He rarely uses the masculine zo and ze (need to check for actual frequency) and instead uses the masculine-neutral da or neutral yo or the feminine-neutral no for softer effect.

His self-referential is ore. He uses kimi, omae, and anata in that order of frequency for recipient-referential, but I’ll have to analyze that more closely. Name-tag honorifics vary but usually are completely dropped or if they have any at all it’s -san.

He also sometimes slurs his words “kakkee” and uses quite a bit of slang at some points but since this is ToZ we won’t question why this exists for a country bumpkin (seriously, don’t). Sometimes uses more ‘cute’ or ‘softer’ methods of reference such as wanko-chan for dog (ie, doggie) or o-takara for treasure.

Mikleo: Boyish masculine. Gives of the impression of being raised properly. Uses polite language to Zenrai (while Sorey does not).

The stronger emphasis in his language in what seems like compensation (and probably is) is not really something new for anime/manga since as I’ve said before, speech style is like another level of fashion sense and it’s not really surprising that he’d want to emphasize a more masculine approach... while still speaking in a proper manner.

[Post-analysis edit: I gotta change my opinion. He pulls it off naturally in speaking. The combination between his speech, his body language, and then his dress style is very... odd. Definitely more refined, though. Could still be compensation but now I’m convinced I wouldn’t be able to tell in Mikleo’s case.

The initial impression of stronger masculine speech style is because Sorey’s wanders all over the damned place while Mikleo pretty much only has two modes -- masculine-neutral and approximate-neutral. If he’s pushed too far he gets slightly rougher in his speech but it’s obvious he prefers not to do that. Very water-like, I guess.]

He’s more likely to use zo (but not ze) than Sorey is, but that could just be personality too -- Sorey isn’t as given to making warnings (which is what the particle is used for). He’s the only one to use the kai and dai question forms, which is purely masculine (softened, I believe) while Sorey would have used no, ka, or dropped all of the particles in question. There are enough cases where the two speak exactly in the same manner that their speech styles completely overlap to the point that it’s hard to figure out who said what by text alone and without context or other clues. Good question between the two of them who is more likely to use ne or na.

Self-referential is boku. I believe he uses the same as Sorey for recipient-referential. Almost never uses any name-honorifics ever. Probably because he almost never has to talk to anyone directly...

I believe both of them use the kureru “giving” word (I’d rather call them directional words) and ageru (as opposed to directional yaru). Commands will either be plain te, te kure, or prohibition na, na yo, or naide. Both will use the words yatsu and yaru (not directional word but the lower form of suru), I think.

Alisha: Masculine-stilted and stiff in the main game (except one point which just sounds neutral), flips between that and a naturally-sounding feminine in the Epilogue.

For the most part, I’ll just talk about her main story part. Her word choice is always formal or stilted, but her speech style is plain (not polite/formal) masculine. This means a lot of her sentences end with da, zo, or nothing at all.

Self-referential is watashi. Recipient-referential I can’t pin down too easily so that’ll take some research but I could have sworn hers sounds like the other two. name tag honorifics is another one that is gonna be harder to pin down for Alisha.

Rose: Hers, oddly enough, sounds like a modern girl’s. However, in the setting of fiction, it comes across as neutral, if not tomboyish.

A lot of her sentences end in a more feminine-neutral way, but some of them end in a masculine-neutral way. Self-referential is atashi, which is the biggest emphasis she has on her feminine style. Rarely uses polite language but has no obvious problem with it when necessary. Recipient-referential is probably anata, but hard to pin down when I can’t remember her using it.

Referred to as Ojou by Eguille.

Lailah: Lady-like, is probably the best impression I could give of her. Polite and feminine, but is not usually formal. Has a higher frequency of desu over masu, which is the only surprising thing out of her speech style. Name-honorifics are going to be hell to analyze but the easy way out is to assume she’ll use -san for the person she knows.

Self-referential is watashi. Recipient is anata.

Edna: Stereotypical feminine in speech style. Surprising, considering her unenthusiastic spoken tone and her ridiculously trendy word-choices. Command is in -nasai. Sentences end in wa, no, or other such feminine or feminine-neutral markers. She gives everything nicknames. Once in a while she’ll refer to Mikleo not as Mibo (Eng: Meebo) or some nickname but as Mikleo-chan -- another way of her emphasizing his age.

Self-referential is watashi (I’m pretty sure. She rarely uses it). Recipient is anta.

Dezel: Rough mascuilne. A lot of his sentences end with the mascuilne slur -ee (instead of ai) but not all of them. His will take a lot of work to analyze too, since it’s harder to pick up his voice by sound rather than me reading the damned text.

Self-referential is ore. Recipient is omae (and degrades from there depending on how pissed off he is).

Zaveid: I don’t even know where to go with it. Masculine, slurs a lot, and kind of flips between masculine and neutral. Both rough.

Self-referential is ore-sama, but I’m not sure if he uses ore sometimes. Recipient is... I don’t know. I think I’ve heard him use everything...?

I absolutely apologize in advance for the long post to anyone under the misfortune of following me.

It's speech style analysis again. I had to dig up and rewrite my  notes that I did for DebiSaba2 and hopefully I will be even slightly consistent in labels. About 5 hours of work.

This is a continuation of the pre-analysis post, so unless my commentary is different or added to it, I will probably not repeat myself much. Please refer to here and here for the intial stuff.

SM, MN, AN, FN, SF in that order from masculine to feminine. I will have other words accompanying to help describe the function, feel, or whatnot. Contractions won’t get any marker.

[Additional note: About さ: a friend asked me this and while I could give a decent explanation, I didn’t realize until I looked it up in Wikipedia that there’s a masculine version and a... feminine or at least neutral version. The former is a sentence ender and the latter is like “like” in a casual sentence. This explains my confusion as to what to label this thing as.]

Sorey - Masculine, Light to Medium, Casual

You’ll see the huge range and see why I had a hard time with this. Some cutesy, slang, and rough things appear here and there in his lines. The Soft part only seems to appear at certain times (like when they’re pulling his chain).

のか MN だよな SM やっぱ contraction and casual of やはり ない AN なぁ SM な SM かー MN だろう MN って AN casual (going to avoid explaining the variations of this) んだ MN 君 MN recipient-marker (said to Alisha) だから AN ！ AN けどね AN うん AN casual response, affirmative よ FN オレ rough self-marker, SM だもん AN casual ああ MN casual response (variation for this almost completely depends on tone and cannot quite count as affirmative but more like yeah) 伝えよう AN でも AN (this is contrasted with the childish だって) だもんな MN casual わかったよ AN 見ろよ！SM でっけぇ SM slur/slang of でかい かな AN (used to be MN but these days...) さ AN ほんっと kinda cutesy emphasis of 本当 でしょう！ FN 食べようよ！ MN そう AN そいつ rough of そのもの... is the closest I can get だよ MN しないでよ AN prohibition ううん AN casual response, negative しちゃって AN or FN casual かもしれない AN かも AN contraction of かもしれない だい？MN soft や (...good question on this one) マジで slang の？ FN light/soft すっげー using SM slur of すごい And these weren’t in the skits, but I remember them from lines or battle lines: お宝 using FN honorific prefix わんこちゃん cutesy slang of 犬 ぞ SM harsh... except he used this line on his cooking. Seriously? Does that even count? [Further edit: I counted three instances so far. It’s just extremely rare.]

Mikleo - Masculine, Soft, Medium to Light

Every now and then uses a literary form of a phrase or word instead of the colloquial (casual) form. I didn’t hear any usages of SM ぞ but I had a hard time making this list by ear, so I’m going to assume that there really were some somewhere. [Edit: I just realized that I currently have no evidence that either he or Sorey use ぞ at  all. I MUST look into this further. Later: I found one for Sorey so far.]

It’s probably the softness in his speech style that threw me off in my impressions. I’m sorry Mikleo.

だ MN か MN ああ casual response ranging between MN and SM versions だね MN って AN casual (same problem as Sorey’s) だよ MN ね AN だろう MN いずれにせよ literary どうだか MN somewhat stiff? ないよ AN よ FN 君 recipient-marker 僕 polite self-marker, MN かい MN, soft だい MN, soft いいよ AN べきだ MN, literary だが MN ない AN 行こう AN いい AN んだ MN 穢れてる AN (marker-less) and contraction てる used さ AN かな AN いいんだ！ MN しかし literary or formal, depending ～てくれ MN command けどね MN やつ rough of もの かもしれない blank

Lailah - Polite, Feminine, Soft

Interestingly enough, she's very formal and polite in the beginning when getting to know the two. This more or less drops later and the rest is her natural speech style. It’s obvious because she begins to mix casual words in her polite style.

のですが polite と仰って super-polite honorific 読んでらっしゃいました super-polite honorific なさるのですね super-polite honorific ですから polite ですわ SF polite ～ましたが polite はい polite response, affirmative (Lailah never seems to use the non-affirmative version) ～ますわ SF polite お二人 polite or FN honorific いらしたんですか super-polite contraction ええ polite response, affirmative でしょう polite ですね polite いいえ polite response, negative んですの？ polite, FN の added. Effect is casual. ですわね SF polite ですもんね polite (....ugh) です polite なのです polite ～ください polite command こっち casual of こちら やっぱり casual of やはり ですもの polite ～ましょう polite 聞いちゃいましたけど polite form, but a more casual construction. ～たら！ FN complaint でしょうか polite ですの！ polite, but FN の added. Effect is casual.

Edna - Feminine, Light, Soft or Neutral Medium to Light

...Well, sort of stereotypical female. It depends on how she feels. Per sentence.

ね AN そう AN いい？ AN よね AN の？ FN ？ AN ワケ？ slang そうよ AN だもん MN of もの ～なさい SF command 私 self-marker (AN for females) よ AN and FN versions both used お兄ちゃん childish 要らない AN でしょ FN 逃げちゃう AN わ SF は？ MN shock わね SF いいんだ MN けど AN だから AN だ MN じゃない AN ～たら？ FN あら SF

Alisha - Masculine and Stiff, but Neutral when not.

Her part in Epilogue will have to be added later. She adds a lot of FN to her speech style then.

Polite speech used toward the Seraphs and Maltran. The stiffness is mostly in her tone of voice. It gives the masculine military impression.

だ MN だな MN stiff なのか MN ～そう！ AN だが MN stiff なんだ MN という formal or stiff ？！ AN もらいます！ polite すまない MN (I’m trying to recall if every version of this is stiff) です polite ～てしまった stiff ですが polite でしょうか polite だと思う AN なければ formal or stiff てくれるだろうか MN stiff だよ！ AN いや stiff response (meant to change the direction of a conversation) 探そう stiff or AN I can’t figure out which 私 self-marker (again, AN for females) ご遠慮なく formal ご用 formal だよ MN ですよ polite 思うよ AN ないよ AN

Rose - Casual, Light to Medium

さ AN ？ AN けど AN ねぇ AN かも AN ね AN でしょ FN だ MN いいよ AN じゃない？！ FN in this case よね AN ない AN ムズイ slang of 難しい よ AN ってこと skipping this 何？ AN なんだ MN っしょ！ FN slur だね MN だよ MN だろう MN あたし self-marker, casual SF かもしれない AN って again, skip でっかい AN version of Sorey’s でっけー じゃないの？ FN ですけど？ (...how do you explain this usage? it’s not sarcastic or sardonic  but not a nervous tic either) そっか MN casual さぱらん　Rose’s personal slang for さっぱりわからん あいつ rough of あのもの approximately 思ってんだ MN

Dezel - Masculine, Rough, Medium to Harsh

A lot of his lines lack emotive markers, explanation or not. They do have masculine markers, though.

ない AN だ MN か MN でな SM な SM そいつ 違う AN だが MN わからん MN or SM? harsh ぞ SM harsh オレ SM self-marker お前たち recipient-marker, plural やめろ SM command, harsh じゃない AN かもしれん harsh ！ AN じゃねぇ！ SM slur of じゃない ああ response (ranges from MN to SM, I think) なよ SM negative command のか MN だろう MN いい AN

Zaveid - Masculine, Rough, Medium, Casual

A really lazy kind of talking. Sometimes.

All right, I think I finally have it. Sorey uses desu/masu form when 1) introducing himself (ie, following formula) and 2) asking for a favor. Not just asking for help, but an actual favor that he can’t exactly pay back.

I’ve heard of this usage from a guest speaker once, but never actually seen it in action before, even in fiction. I mean, besides the English equivalent of begging or pleading which really doesn’t count. Anyway, according to the speaker, the person will continue to use polite language until the debt is repaid... but in Sorey’s case, we can’t really tell if he follows that method because there’s like zero follow-up.

I’ve been reading some fic where Sorey uses ‘omae’ instead of Mikleo’s name when exasperated, but I will have to keep watching and take notes to see if this happens in the actual game. He also tends to use people’s names instead of ‘you’ more than average for an anime. This could give a lot of different impressions from being childish (names and titles over relative words) to being nice (since saying ‘you’ excessively is like pointing or staring -- rude).

Japanese speech has a sliding scale of “politeness level” which is marked literally by which ways you conjugate a word. In real life, these are highly situational and fluid. One person isn’t going to Always Use Casual Speech, they’ll swap between casual and polite (and honorific and humble, etc) as demanded by the situation. In media this is a little looser (protags, especially male protags, get away with Casual All The Time a lot) but in media which level of politeness a character uses can tell you a lot about who they are or about the situation.

Currently I’m only familiar with polite/casual and honorific/humble, because that’s all they teach you up through the 202 level of Japanese, though I think there’s even more?? These are the only ones I’ll talk about at any length though, because they’re the only ones I’m familiar enough with to recognize.

Speech Styles

> Polite: marked by desu/masu (です/ます) forms. Used for addressing strangers and especially superiors. Addressing a superior with casual is considered rude. Sometimes used by characters in media to make them sound more reserved. You’ll never use this to address you friends (if you do, it means you aren’t friends anymore!). First form they teach you in Japanese class. Example: tabemasu / 食べます

> Casual: marked by a lack of desu/masu forms. All verbs are in plain form. You see ない / nai a lot, as well as だ / da. Used for addressing your friends and your family (most of the time, depends on the family). Also used to address social inferiors but that’s fluid too (some teachers still use polite forms when addressing the class!! all of mine did!!) Example: taberu / 食べる

> Honorific: a separate conjugation of verbs (o-stem-ni naru), featuring a few words that are just Entirely New Words (the words for to go, to come, to eat, for example). Used to honor a superior, whether you are addressing them directly or talking about them to a friend. I’m not sure where it falls re: teachers (my teachers never expected us to use honorifics when discussing them, but we didn’t learn honorifics until the tail end of 202. we were told we could use honorific requests though), but I know that if you’re talking about your boss you’re supposed to use honorifics all around. Example: meshiagaru  / 召し上がる

> Humble: the other side of honorifics. Conjugation o-stem-suru (sometimes itasu, which is the humble word for suru!) Used to lower oneself, only used when talking about oneself. I’m not as certain re: all the times you’re supposed to use humble forms (it’s something like “only if your action directly affects the person you’re addressing”, so if you tell your teacher you’re coming to their office then humble yes but if you told your teacher you saw a movie last week polite is fine) but I guess that doesn’t matter as much anyway. The important thing to know about humble forms is it’s about lowering oneself. Example: itadaku / いただく

Why do you care about them?

Because which form a character uses in a scene of any media can code either their personality or the situation. I wrote a literal academic essay about how this comes into play in Kingdom Hearts.

For more information, check out:

These scans of the pages in Legends of Localization Book 1, where Clyde Mandelin talks a lot about this. He’s kind of informed my understanding of this subject, so definitely definitely check him out, and maybe buy his book if you think this is your jam!

TVTropes’ page on speech styles! Well, the focus is on keigo (which is honorific speech), but it gives an overview of other speech styles while you’re there.

Patterns of speaking characterized by distinctive pronunciation, vocabulary, intent, participants and grammatical structures.

1.Intimate - non public speech style, uses private vocabulary and non verbal messages.

= Occurs between people who have known for a long time and have shared many memories. = Style in which meaning in shared even without ‘correct linguistic forms. Can sometimes complete each others sentences and know what the other is thinking even before they say anything.

2. Casual Style - Used among friends and acquaintances that don’t require background information; use of slang is common, interruptions occur often. Used when no social barriers to consider.

3.Consultative - Opposite of the intimate, used among people who don’t share common experiences or meaning; requires 2 way participation's and interruptions occur during the communication.

4. Formal - Imparting infos speech is well (oriented) organized and correct in grammar and diction; Technical vocabulary and exact definitions are important in the formal style, such as in presentations.

5. Frozen - Formal style whose quality is static, ritualistic and may even be archaic (antiquated)