Phantasy Star: Fringes of Algo

Rever for reverence? I thought it was short for "reverse".

Thoul wrote:How about Flaeli? That's an oddly spelled one. I use "flail-elly," but I've never been sure about it.

I always thought that was "Flay-elli", hard to say.

Tsunami wrote:Rever for reverence? I thought it was short for "reverse".

You mis-read. Rever as in reverence, pronunciation-wise, not that rever was short for reverence. Reverse sounds about right, but reverence was the first word I thought of with rever in it pronounced the way I pronounced rever.

As for Flaeli, I always pronounced it Fleh-lay

For me, Flaeli is Flay- lee, rever is ree- ver

Always interesting to see others' pronunciation preferences! Mine tend to be:

Nei: Nay
Lutz: Lutz
Alis: Uh-lees
Gryz: Like "Grease"
Zio: zigh-oh

*shrugs* Oh, video games before voice acting, how I love the inconsistencies you cause.

PS- Flaeli? Always said it as "Fly-ell-ee" What a mouthful

Lamanai wrote:*shrugs* Oh, video games before voice acting, how I love the inconsistencies you cause.

That's the truth!

The Komrade wrote:

Lamanai wrote:*shrugs* Oh, video games before voice acting, how I love the inconsistencies you cause.

That's the truth!

Indeed!

A good thing of being a Spanish speaker is that vowel sounds from Japanese words are rarely a problem.

For us, there is an equivalence of "A" = "A", "E" = "E", and so on, unlike in English, where things have to be changed, like "I" = "ee", "U" = "oo".

But then, we may have problems with English words' vowels. As a kid I did not know I was pronouncing "Pole Position" wrong: "Poh-leh poseeTTeeon"...

Lutz= German name, rhymes with rootz
Alis= cognate of Alice (per the japnese "Alicer" cognate
Myau= Meow--most other languages dont have the complicated hard soft nasal palatable vowels English does. so its not MY-you, but, punnly, Meow. Y make an "ih" sound like "it" (Rhys isnt quite "reese" but more "rihsse" with the i in the example, found in the soft Y. Most Germanic and Slavic languages follow these vowel ules. unsure on the latin languages, but cant think of any contraindications yet for romance vowels. anyway, these silly rules ruin translations. (rhys being a celtic name --welsh, scotts, etc--doesnt play the especially american english corruptive vowel game)
Noah= obvious
Dark Falz= sure, its supposedly dark force and i can buy it. but its immature predecessor from psiv, Prophallus. ahem, is erogenous sounding and a long way to go from falz, bypass force, and jump to phallus.
Eusis= Please read my post on Eusis being a japanese corruptive translation of the name 'Jesus', with a soft J like jalapeno. and yes, S has a "lisp---lithpy" sound in many japanese loanwords.
Rudo= Perhaps they didnt want him to bear too much in common with the historical Rudger Steiner?
Hugh= Much better than Huey
Amy= (the doctor) no idea why they made Anna into Amy as a swap name. Sage has a nice allusion to a healer though.
Anna= perhaps Amia Zirski wasnt too tough sounding for a fierce polish counter hunter?
Josh Kain= my mind blanks--is it Josh Kain in Japanese? or Josh Kind/Kein?
Nei---this has always confuzzled me. does it rhyme with "feign or reign?" or more with Germanic words like "klein" "frei" and "heil"---Truth be told, I butchered almost everyone's name as a youngster, but especially Nei, who to me, is "Neee"
Neifirst----then why no Neisecond?
I use the planets interchangeably without any care. dezo is dezoris and dezolis. potato potato.
I always found it interesting how Motavia towns in ps2&4 have several spanish and Portuguese sounding names. paseo, aideo, zema, uzo, etc.

even Meseta is of latin sounding orgin, real or not.

Lets skip to psiv:
Rudy is just as dorky as chaz--so why change?
Alys, and mind you i dont speak or read japanese, but wouldnt alys be the same as alis? and even if it is, why choose a name used before already? Lyla worked well.
Hahn---forgot is thats his real give name. but i did enjoy that his best weapons bear his surname. Mahlay. "mah-lay"
Rika=="reeka?" i prefer "Fal
Gryz--another animal noise name like Myau. but much cooler. however, Pike woulda suited. its edgy.
Rune--which i guess alludes to his true magic use compared to techs--but Thray is just as cool. if i had my way, i'd call him Lutz anyway.
Demi--perhaps due to her tiny ndroid frame? a demi-droid? I prefer Frenya, but, no idea what it means.
So we have 2 people with phonetically named Alis and Alys, so now we have Wren and Wren. geeze. i would been much happier with Fuoren, as Daughter calls Wren when he terminates her. and wonder what Fuoren means, if anything.
Zio==cool sounding, almost italian, esp since he has black hair. or is goth. Either way, no idea what his name is in Japanese, but, a colleague recently pointed out to me that it could be a mistranslation of "Zero"--ie, nothin and nothingness. a void. makes sense, but, i dont know japanese.
Seth==well, its actually japanese translation of "Sass"--just kidding. no idea why the name was chosen.
Raja= Well, Raja is a title for a temple elder, so.
Kyra===I assume "Kira" but I forgot if thats her given japanese name.
Juza--too cool a name for too tiny a cameo
Gi-Fi-Larg and Del-am-Lars=====dont ask me, Phantasy Star enemy names defy my logic. well, except for Twin Arms and the obvious.
Lasheic==as said, words with S like Lassic, tend to get pronounced with a lisp or lishp. but what i do wonder, is , in japanese, is it 1 or 2 names? La Sheic, or "lasheic?

and i wonder the true names of the nameless--like the Gumbious temper bishop, and later, the 2000 year old elder who seems to recall rykros but rune doesnt.


I'd love to go into Phantasy Star 3's pronunciations and etymologies, but, gosh, its an undertaking for another day.

Rhys is actually an example of a fairly difficult or foreign sound for most English speakers, as well, at least in its native language. The "r" sound is voiceless (Welsh does this with "l", too, like in the proper name "Lloyd"), so it's an "r" sound, trilled as in Spanish, but enunciated without significant vibration of the vocal cords. The "y" is more or less like the "i" in "tin".

if only English followed the simple phonetic rules that many latin alphabet languages do.
i know several non-native english speakers lamenting at how cumbersome the grammar rules are in english.
however i lament that those same rules have tainted me when it comes to other languages. its very hard to un-learn something so native yet so sad.