Imagine that you read about a foreign guy for a number of years, developed your own idea of how to pronounce his name, and then finally heard it spoken and found out that your idea wasn't at all concurrent with the way he and the people around him pronounced it. You wouldn't say, "I don't care. My way is right." And the same should be true of this stuff.
No, I wouldn't say that, because that would be a living human being just like myself, and he has lived his own life and has in his name his own identity, and it should be pronounced how he says so. In this case, however, we're referring to characters and a creature from a computer game which you take control of and you play the game according to how you play these games, you make the decisions about what to eqiup them with and stuff like that, it is essentially your game. Therefore I'm quite happy pronouncing their names the way I like.:D
The problem is, it shouldn't be presented in a manner that you'd be pronouncing it wrong in the first place :/ Whatever symbols they use to depict Yuffie's name, when they translate/romajinize, they should make it something like Yoofy or something if that's how they want it pronounced. Granted I guess I'm preaching to the chior since you've already said to blame their romanization. Basically I'm just saying "I do blame them". They need to make it more user-friendly or whatever.
The point is that these things have always had certain pronounciations and just because you weren't aware of them and invented your own pronounciations doesn't make you any less incorrect.
When did I say I wasn't incorrect? I wasn't trying to imply that Square-Enix was wrong and that mine were right, I was trying to say that that's how they'll always be to me. I just prefer them that way.
I like it YOO-FEE.
BTW there is a bit of irony. You spelled pronounciation worng
Silly jilly ultra nuggets.
My sig was deleted.
So did youOriginally Posted by vampirepiggyhunter7
pronunciation
It's pronounced "yiffy"
Welcome to Yiffy Lube ;D
Final Fantasy VII = Made In Japan
Okay everyone, Japanese lesson.
There are no short and long vowels in Japanese. There is only one pronounciation for each 'letter'. A 'letter' in Japanese is a consanant and a vowel (such as 'ka', 'to', 'na', 'ni', and 'yu'). There are exceptions, such as 'shi' instead of 'si', because of the way it would need to be said, but for the most part this is correct. The six exceptions to these are the base letters--five vowels ('a', 'i', 'u', 'e', 'o') and the only Japanese 'consanant': 'n'. Finally, one character can be used to make the next 'consanant' sound double. This is used in YuFfie--the double F.
These are taught in the order of 'a', 'i', 'u', 'e', 'o'. [ka, ki, ku, ke, ko, sa, shi*, su, se, so, ta, chi*, tsu*, te, to ...etc.--the stared* characters are the special exceptions noted above.]
Now... Let's go back to 'a', 'i', 'u', 'e', 'o'. As I said, there are no long/short--only one pronounciation of each:
A = ah ['A're]
I = e [M'e']
U = ou [Y'ou']
E = E [L'e'ft]
O = O [G'o']
Since this was made in Japan, Kingdom Hearts is correct. Yuffie is pronounced with the Japanese pronounciation of 'Yu': You.
Kaycee says (12:06 AM):
whos' obama?
The problem is, RKumono, how we pronounce those letters. I understand romanization has strict rules. But that's just straight romanization. They should then English-ize it. If you get my meaning. Not to mutilate the original word. But for pronunciation. Because I think pronunciation is more important than how close you spell it to its original language. Because as you can see, spelling it close is going to result in mispronunciation. If there was no writing, and everything was vocal. We would have never said her name wrong in the first place. So yeah, saying it right is better than spelling it right. They should focus on spelling it so it will be pronounced correctly. :D
Well, in that case, since I live in Texas, we need to translate Shakespeare into 'Southern Hick'.
After all, "y'all" should make sure it's spoken how I would say it if you're going to perform Hamlet here in Texas. We should take classical English and "Southern-ize" it.
...
Get the point? You won't change Shakespeare because it was written that way, and it is still spoken that way.
...just as you shouldn't change the way you speak a name in a game.
It came from that language with that pronounciation--and it should stay that way. It was created with a Japanese cultural basis, and should keep it.
It's why so many games have them eating rice and drinking sake. They were made in Japan with a Japanese mindset, and should be left that way. Other games, such as Wild Arms and Valkyrie Profile, were designed to be based on different 'cultures', and thus are pronounced as they would be in those cultures, but Final Fantasy was not. Respect how it was made.
I pronounce it Yoo-Fee. And plus in Kingdom Hearts they say her name.
Shakespear was written in "old english" you don't have to change it to understand it. There's no "translating" it. Merely "updating" it if you took that route. So there is a difference. We don't get romaji in games. It has to actually be translated. So I understand the point you were trying to make, but it's kinda moot
I wasn't saying we should "Americanize" the names. I was saying we should spell them based on our pronunciation, so that they get pronounced the way they pronounce them. Its not sacrilige to want to say it right or anything. The problem is our pronunciation is different from Romaji. And not every gamer knows this. I think they'd like to know how things are pronounced from the start instead of having to get corrected in some follow-up game that actually has spoken dialogue.
I think you misunderstood where I was coming from
As you can see in this thread, the word "yuffie" is going to be pronounced by a lot of people the way a word spelled like that would be pronounced in English pronunciation rules. The Japanese would pronounce it like "Yoofy" therefor it should be spelled that way. Its nothing against them to spell it that way because our spelling has no bearing on (or against) them. They don't spell it "Yuffie" that's how Square made it. They spell it with Hiragana/Katakana symbols. It'd mean nothing to them for us to spell it "Yoofy". But it would mean something to us. It would mean we'd all be pronouncing it the same way they are. The way it should be pronounced. Which sounds like what you want too. So I hope you understand what I"m saying this time. Us, catering to them, based on the limitations of our language.
Last edited by Vyk; 12-19-2005 at 03:20 AM.
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
