Japanese names to English?

[Nazo]

Re: Japanese names to English?

I really wish they'd let us type in Japanese in the English clients, having to try to communicate with Japanese in romaji is really unsatisfactory and makes me feel even more of an outsider in a JP party

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: Japanese names to English?

I really wish they'd let us type in Japanese in the English clients, having to try to communicate with Japanese in romaji is really unsatisfactory and makes me feel even more of an outsider in a JP party

Well, after seeing how abused the translator is for [fun][hole] jokes and nonsensical stuff like [May][Bee] I can't say I blame SE for their decision. I always thought [All right!] was an affirmation until last week, then one of my friends explained to me it actually meant something more like "good job" in Japanese and I was likely confusing the hell out of the JP player inviting me to PT.

[Party] [Do you need it?]
Good Job!
[Um...] EXP PT?
Good Job!



If you want to communicate in Japanese, importing the Japanese version is probably in your best interest. Yeah, its more money to pay and you'd have to reinstall and w/e, but its probably the only way you'll get what you want.

[Raydeus]

Re: Japanese names to English?

Romaji isnt used very much in Japan at all. you may see it on street signs every now and then. But most of that is for product recognition. That or a US military base is nearby like Okinawa. in downtoan Tokyo you may see it. But in magazines and books in Japan, You wont see it at all. You'll see hiragana, katakana and furigana.
All japanese may know romaji, but when it comes to forming a legible sentence, it sucks so no one uses it. There are literally thousands of characters used in JP daily life. 2000 in common practice.

Lets take Ｒｅｉ for instance.　霊 【れい】 (n) soul; spirit; departed soul; ghost;
you have multi meanings, and if your context isn't 100% dead on you can confuse folks by using romaji.

I personally hate using it ^^.


EDIT: I lived in Japan for two years in Sakuragi-Cho.

Yep, that's pretty much what I thought about it, when I say it's extensively used I mean that they type Roman words all the time, however they will never use romaji to type japanese words.

Japanese itself will always be written in well...japanese.

[Taruun]

Re: Japanese names to English?

I'd love to be able to type japanese in FFXI.. but would getting the JP version allow me to type the kanji/katakana/hirogana using the american keyboard?

[tazirai]

Re: Japanese names to English?

I'd love to be able to type japanese in FFXI.. but would getting the JP version allow me to type the kanji/katakana/hirogana using the american keyboard?

Kinda If you go to the game setup section , We have examples of how to set up JP version of FFXI. And how to install the IME needed to type Asian fonts. Without it all you would type is a bunch of ??????????, and thats not good ^^

[Feenicks]

Re: Japanese names to English?

Well, after seeing how abused the translator is for [fun][hole] jokes and nonsensical stuff like [May][Bee] I can't say I blame SE for their decision. I always thought [All right!] was an affirmation until last week, then one of my friends explained to me it actually meant something more like "good job" in Japanese and I was likely confusing the hell out of the JP player inviting me to PT.

[Party] [Do you need it?]
Good Job!
[Um...] EXP PT?
Good Job!



If you want to communicate in Japanese, importing the Japanese version is probably in your best interest. Yeah, its more money to pay and you'd have to reinstall and w/e, but its probably the only way you'll get what you want.

That's not entirely accurate. [All Right!] using the translator goes to やったー！ in Japanese which really means something along the lines of 'we did it!', 'I did it!' or something like that. The connotation is celebratory, not congratulatory. It can still be used in the example you gave, but it's still a little bit strange because it's like 'yay! I got a party, all right!', but it comes off like you're congratulating yourself for getting a party. Which is strange because you were invited - it's no real effort on your own behalf.

[Standablaze]

Re: Japanese names to English?

On my server, my attempts at communicating with romanji is usually met with indifference; I don't think JP players like reading those.

In fact, sometimes, they don't even realize I'm actually using (mostly) correctly formed (simple) sentences straight out of text books. Had this one party which ignored everything I typed not using autotranslate for an hour, until the party leader suddently realized I understand Japanese. ^_^; Then she used romanji for everything, making it hard to read for me. ._. I much prefer Hiragana + Kanji for Japanese.

I have the feeling NO ONE in Japan use romanji, gaijin aside. >_>


For the record, the English alphabet isn't easier to learn than Hiragana or Katakana--I know this for sure, since I am a naitive speaker of neither.

Yes, the English alphabet is hard to memorize until you've memorized it. No, I'm not joking; English alphabet is not easier than Japanes kana's. I can assure you I spent a lot of time trying to remember those very foreign shapes and sounds in American English. -_-;

Anyway, the main points are A) JP players don't like Romaji in my experience, and often don't even read them; and, B) It's not easy for them since it's unlikely it would've been taught in school (it's useless in Japan), and they have little incentive to learn it outside of school (no one in Japan uses them).

Heck, even I don't like reading romanji Japanese--I wish I can type in real Japanese instead. Only people who like romaji are the people who were taught Japanese with it. I feel sorry for them... All it does is making it harder to learn real Japanese.

Thats more less 100% true.

I've been learning Japanese for a few months now, I've gotten through Hiragana and I suprisingly picked it up very fast. I might make a mistake here or there with る、る、れ、だbecause they look similar, but overall its a lot easier I would imagine than the roman alphabet.

From my own experience, most Japanese will not pay attention to roman lettering other than "LS, NM, LOL, BRB, and FFXI". I tried to use roman lettering when I first started learning and its annoying to read, it would be like typing the English Language in the cryllic (russiian) alphabet if I knew it. The Japanese language wasn't designed for use with roman lettering.

I wish SE would install an IME. They make a game that is not segregated between countries and regions the way games like Diablo II are (2 US servers, 1 EU server, 1 Asian server), but expect us to communicate with an auto translator that doesn't even have words like "Wait" and "You". If they were serious about having english and japanese speakers playing toghether they would let the english speakers who know japanese communicate easier.

Some of the auto translator functions confuse the hell out of Japanese players. Right, you get Japanese players who abuse it for fun like we do, but things like (May) (Bee) come up as (5th month) (Bumble Bee), and I've actually seen English speakers use this to Japanese players and being very serious.

[tazirai]

Re: Japanese names to English?

Yeah FFXI is great But the system of comunication is horrid. I've been In PT's with English, Japanese and spanish all in one, and had to communicate with all 3,, It made my brain hurt..
Im not expecting a spanish translator, But a better way to communicate with the 2 main languages would be nice.

[ItazuraNhomango]

Re: Japanese names to English?

Nope, when I talk about Romaji (Romaji meant as Roman (character) Alphabet) it includes English, Spanish, French and all those Roman derivated languages, it isn't english only.

Fine, you caught me failing a multicultural PC test. >_> Regardless, the "romanji" we're talking about are the characters used to represent Japanese phonetically by westerners--and all these characters are in English. Also, English classes are mandatory in Japan's public schools, so of all the languages using Roman alphabets, English would be the one they are most familiar with.

Sue me for taking a shortcut, why don't you. >_<

But anyway, my point is it is easier to learn

And, I'm telling you it's not necessarily so, and I speak from first hand experience. >_>; It took me longer to get the hang of English alphabet than Japanese hiragana and katakana. You may understanding what I'm talking about if you're not a native speaker of any language using roman alphabets. ^_^;

Fewer doesn't always mean easier; Hiragana is actually more organized and more regular, making memorization less painful. In comparison, English alphabet (the only roman alphabet I'm familiar with) is a total jumble.

If this attachment shows up, you can see that only the "y" and the "w" columns are irregular, while the rest are very easy to place. (I'm sure you must have seen this before...) If there's a way to organize English alphabet, I don't know it.

* * *

ANYWAY, the real point is that there's no good reason to expect all Japanese players to read romanized Japanese sentences, whether you think romaji is easy for them to read or not. I'm sure it's not hard for them--if they ever practice it--I just don't think they would practice it, for lack of any reason to do so.

If you managed to find plenty JP players who would converse with you that way, good for you. I'll just go stand in corner and sulk about lack of a way to type Japanese in FFXI myself.

[tazirai]

Re: Japanese names to English?

Fine, you caught me failing a multicultural PC test. >_> Regardless, the "romanji" we're talking about are the characters used to represent Japanese phonetically by westerners--and all these characters are in English. Also, English classes are mandatory in Japan's public schools, so of all the languages using Roman alphabets, English would be the one they are most familiar with.

Sue me for taking a shortcut, why don't you. >_<

To a degree English Is mandatory based on loation of the school and neareast Military base. Also English is mandatory to get into university. But once in University it's quickly forgotten unless you really need it or plan to travel. Near Osaka, Okinawa Sakuragi, Yokohama, Tokyo, Yokota, Misawa Etc.

It really depends on where International Business, Military, foreigner Hubs are.

[bside]

Re: Japanese names to English?

Fine, you caught me failing a multicultural PC test. >_> Regardless, the "romanji" we're talking about are the characters used to represent Japanese phonetically by westerners--and all these characters are in English. Also, English classes are mandatory in Japan's public schools, so of all the languages using Roman alphabets, English would be the one they are most familiar with.

it's not just public schools; Japan's compulsory education (up to 9th grade) includes 3 yrs of English training, which private schools must also comply w/ by law, and another 3 yrs should we decide to move up to high school (10th-12th grades in Japan), also mandatory for both public and private schools all over the country.


btw, as for the question someone brought up, whether they teach Romaji in schools, at least back when i was an elementary kid (80's), yes they did. (note that in elementary schools it's the Kunrei Romaji that they teach, or taught, whereas what we use in our daily lives is the Hepburn Romaji, which we get to learn in later lives, mostly in Junior High. the difference of Kunrei and Hepburn is explained in this thread.)

[WishMaster3K]

Re: Japanese names to English?

[All Right!] America! Go-Go-Gadget-Webster!

Japanese players physically type out "/laugh" right? Or is there some kata/hira version of it?

And when they type out a "game recognized" emote (emotes that give entire sentences for just one "/" is it displayed in Japanese?

[tazirai]

Re: Japanese names to English?

They type /laugh /poke etc

[bungiefan]

Re: Japanese names to English?

I'd love to be able to type japanese in FFXI.. but would getting the JP version allow me to type the kanji/katakana/hirogana using the american keyboard?

A keyboard is a keyboard is a keyboard. The only reason you have a QWERTY keyboard is that that's what is painted on there. What actually determines what each key types is how your computer reads the input from the keyboard, based on what keyboard layout you tell it you are using. If you have the IME available and have Japanese input enabled, you can tell it you are using QWERTY or Japanese keyboard layouts and it will allow you to input Japanese text with them, in either direct kana mode for the JP keyboard, or romaji input method which converts to kana every 2-3 keystrokes automatically for a QWERTY keyboard. All modern OSes support multiple keyboard layouts. Also, some places that teach typing or want more security have keyboards with blank keys so that you can't see what you are typing and have to memorize the layout.

I wish SE would install an IME. They make a game that is not segregated between countries and regions the way games like Diablo II are (2 US servers, 1 EU server, 1 Asian server), but expect us to communicate with an auto translator that doesn't even have words like "Wait" and "You". If they were serious about having english and japanese speakers playing toghether they would let the english speakers who know japanese communicate easier.

When the US version came out and JonnyRam started his petition, the answer we got seemed to be that the license for the IME software was too expensive to justify having in non-Japanese releases. Square doesn't have their own IME for FFXI, they use ATOK's (at least on the console versions) which is about $60 US per license. Also, it would likely generate more expense for SquareEnix in terms of increasing tech support calls from players that don't understand Japanese and accidentally switch their input mode to Japanese. It's simple to understand the input method if you know hiragana and katakana, but if you don't it's very confusing to get into that input mode or know how to change it back, since the Japanese IME has about 6 different modes, and two input methods. The number of non-Japanese players that understand Japanese is fairly small, so they figure if you can understand Japanese and need to type it, you'll just buy the Japanese client.