What is up with this

[Yuffie514]

1) looks better
2) sounds better
3) ...and thee shall be her given name

[G SpOtZ]

Like my friend G Spotz once said: Aerith sounds like you have a lisp.

I remember seeing scans from the japanese version of the game in a magazine back in 1997, and everything was in japanese except the names, and her name was Aerith there. I found that pretty strange back then.

Funny, I was about to bring that up until I read that! Damn straight bro, damn straight.

[Aralith]

As everyone in here has said, it was a mistake, but I've noticed no one has explained why it was a mistranslation, so I'm going to. In Japanese roomaji (the Arabic letter representations of Japansese hiragana and katakana) Aerith is spelt Earisu. Unfortunately, the Japanese katakana has not yet come up with a symbol to represent the "th" sound (and probably never will because the Japanese people can't pronounce it anyways), so they use the "s" sound instead. Hence, the localization team for the U.S. mistranslated Earisu as Aeris, instead of Aerith as it was supposed to be. Understandable. Man, it's a good thing they didn't make the same mistake with Sephiroth. Can you imagine that? Having people call him Sephiros? That's just so wrong on so many levels. *shudders* Anyways, that's why the name Aeris circulates, but it is incorrect.

[Kawaii Ryûkishi]

roomaji (the Arabic letter representations of Japansese hiragana and katakana)

You mean Roman letters. The word "romaji" itself is an abridgment of "Roman ji," where ji means characters.

Unfortunately, the Japanese katakana has not yet come up with a symbol to represent the "th" sound (and probably never will because the Japanese people can't pronounce it anyways)

They're perfectly capable of doing so. It's just not intuitive. Same deal with English-speaking people trying to roll their Rs.

[Aralith]

roomaji (the Arabic letter representations of Japansese hiragana and katakana)

You mean Roman letters. The word "romaji" itself is an abridgment of "Roman ji," where ji means characters.

Unfortunately, the Japanese katakana has not yet come up with a symbol to represent the "th" sound (and probably never will because the Japanese people can't pronounce it anyways)

They're perfectly capable of doing so. It's just not intuitive. Same deal with English-speaking people trying to roll their Rs.

Your first point is very true. I just realized my mistake. I was thinking Arabic numbers being the ones we use, instead of Roman letters (don't ask me why, I can just get stupid sometimes). But I'm pretty sure they can't say "th". I've met several Japanese people, and one of me and my friends favorite things to do was to purposely tell them to say English words that we knew they couldn't pronounce. At least not correctly. It was pretty funny, but one of the words we would always tell Shige to say was earth. He always pronounced it aas (which is strikingly close to the actualy katakana pronunciation aasu). The same way they can't pronounce "v" and so use "b" as a substitution (yet they for some reason have a v-dan in their katakana which is never used. Never understood the point of that, but whatever).

[Ryushikaze]

Rolling R's isn't intuitive to a native english speaker? Well, I can understand that. I've met several people who can't, but for many others, r rollling was as simple as breathing. meh.

[Aralith]

Very true. Perhaps there are some Japanese that can say "v" and "th". You bring up a good point, Ryushikaze. I have been forced to change my standpoint to some can and come can't. Thank you for pointing that out.

[G SpOtZ]

I'm half Japanese. Therefore, I'm awesome. I can roll my Rs easily, I can prounounce English words easily and correctly, as well as pronounce Japanese words easily and correctly. Multi-talented much? Yesh.









I still prefer "Aeris", though. Besides... her last name is too long. Might as well keep the first name at least 1 letter shorter than the "correct" version. Gainsborough... or whatever the hell it was. Wtf?

[Dr. Acula]

Isn't "Aerith" pronounced the same as "Aeris" anyway? Cause in Japanese, "th" is pronounced "su", so it's like, Aerisu (Earisu). Another spelling is Earith. I heard that Aerith is a Japanese interpretation of Earth or something, but i could be wrong.

[Thorn]

Yeah, but I think Aeris is better.

True. Aerith...Aerith...Aerith...Nope, dont like it.

[DarkLord]

I prefer Aeris, and this debate is pointless, Neither is particularly incorrect, although Aerith is the official one. There are debates about whether the tetragrammaton (god's name in the original bible scrolls) should be translated Yahweh of Jehovah, It's all really inconsequential, although making a decision on whcih one to use is still difficult. Don't go arguing about which one is 'right'.

Also, Aerith is more original than merely naming here after a star-sign

[Jessweeee♪]

I say Aeris.