Getting sick of Japanese names

[Kato]

Who am I to stop my grandma from writing about her magical cat adventures or to stop someone from reading it?

I would read that with the intensity of a thousand suns...

[Blane Doyle]

Support good writing and research, not rather bias banning of certain things. Japanese names are just names. Frankly as long as it suits the context, what does it matter what the characters are called? Is it really going to change the story? And really even that doesn't matter if the creator is happy with what they are doing. I just avoid it if i'm not interested, I don't demand everyone fit my likes and dislikes.

I DO support good storytelling, so I think it's good to make sure the names and words you choose isn't going to distract from your story by being out of place, and I support good research so your story has more substance, but apart from that, people can tell whatever stories they desire.

(Bolded what I want to touch upon but overall this is a good quote. There is a TL;DR below.)

I agree. Effort, to me, is making the best you possible can with your own ability and that is what is important. And to do so one must do research, and when you do that it is clear to your readers. When you don't attempt to do research and do everything by the seat of your pants? It shows and that's when there is a problem.

If someone wants to make a story set in America, Russia, France, Iceland, Japan? As long as they show they have done their research into the area and culture, even if they live there because sometimes there are things you miss in other areas of the same country (seriously, apparently DINERS are only a big thing on the East Coast of America, what how did I not know that?), I think it will show and be better for it. If they want to make a story set in any place but Japan with characters with Japanese names? Again, knowing what would go into that, whether they are exchange students or travelers or their parents moved there when they were kids, I think it is perfectly ok. But a proper amount of research and dedication is necessary.

You have to do this research no matter where your game is set and who your characters are. There are absolutely no exceptions regardless of the circumstances (though I must admit, if you want to dabble in another country or culture from your own it requires far more in the long run and you had better be prepared to do that or else... well, you have seen some of the responses here and they have a point).

As I said, it does get old after a while to see games with Japanese names or settings. But that is only because there is a large amount of them. That doesn't mean they are going to be bad because of it. And that doesn't mean that games with other names are automatically going to be better. Any game, regardless of the circumstances regarding the setting and names of the characters, can be amazingly good or horrendously horrible depending on who makes it, how much research went into it, and what they do in the story. Do I want more games with other names and settings? YES YES YES.. Am I going to hate you if you make one in Japan or with Japanese names anyway just because that is what you decided would work for you? No, as long as you do what you should I really don't care.

Just... Research, do it. Doesn't matter who you are, where you are from, what you are writing about (even high fantasy demands research), that prevents many issues people have with this sort of thing.

And if you see someone portraying something inaccurately? Go ahead and tell them! Correcting them (usually as politely as you can) can do a world of good and help them improve their work in the future. They may not even realize what they are doing wrong and a gentle nudge in the right direction could inspire them to learn more on their own and that is always great.

You are not going to last long if you are just trying to please people.

Trying to please everyone is a one way ticket to failure in my experience. Because it simply isn't possible. There will always be someone you offend or annoy in some way. The best you can do? Do the best you can in as many ways as you can.

TL;DR
It's not the amount of games with Japanese setting and/or names that is the real problem and it shouldn't be considered one (though it can get old). It's the amount of, or lack of, research and/or effort that goes into individual stories that is a problem and that is one you can, and should, get angry about. There is no excuse for complete inaccuracy. The same amount of research and dedication that should go into portraying something accurately, at least as accurately as you can, should go into everything you do regardless. But it is especially important if it involves something as unique and important as another culture. Do what you want, but do it with dedication and care and love and don't just slap things together willy nilly.

You see something that is inaccurate and/or just bad? Tell them why, give them crit, and you might just help them improve.

You can't please everyone, you should't try, but you CAN show your work and love for your project. And that may be enough. I believe it has been in the past and will be in the future.

................... since when am I so passionate about this? I'm uh... I'm gunnna crawl into a ditch and die now... yeah...

[TrickWithAKnife]

What's the fastest way to spot a generic game? Look for Japanese character names, or the word "school".

"But I made a variation, so it's unique!"
Nope, a rock with a smiley face is still a rock.

If you don't want your game to be judged this way, then try making a minimum effort to not choose the most generic possible setting and naming convention.
Otherwise you're showing the same logic as people who dress like goths and then say "It's not fair, society treats me like I'm different."

If you are still convinced that your VN must have Japanese elements, at least ask yourself these questions:

• Am I Japanese?
• Did I grow up in Japan?
• How long have I lived in Japan?
• Do I know about Japanese culture better than any other culture?
  *Be careful about this one, because there are an awful lot of people who have convinced themselves they are experts without even setting foot in Japan. It's incredibly insulting to those of us who have spent years in Japan, struggling with adjusting to the culture, and who know damn well we know only a small fraction of Japanese culture.
• Could my VN be set in any of the 195 other countries?

[Lishy]

Just personally though, I'm actually worried people might mistake my VN for being generic because I have a single Japanese character. Unlike generic VNs though, it's actually justified because it comments on the War Measures act in Canada (my setting.)

I would argue it is more Canadian than Japanese, but I don't think readers care... :S

[papillon]

correspondingly, if you ARE going to tell people they're doing it wrong, make sure you actually know what you're talking about.

If your knowledge of Japanese is limited to twenty kanji and google translate, telling someone else that they're using the wrong word may not be as helpful as you think it is.

[TheGuraGuraMan]

It will depends of the place of your VN, but I do agree, 99% of the makers are using jap names, it's a little annoying in the end. Personally, I have like 1/2 jap chars in mine.

[Aines445]

Just personally though, I'm actually worried people might mistake my VN for being generic because I have a single Japanese character. Unlike generic VNs though, it's actually justified because it comments on the War Measures act in Canada (my setting.)

I would argue it is more Canadian than Japanese, but I don't think readers care... :S

What the hell are you saying? That's absolutely not generic by any standards, it'd be stupid if someone came to you and said "OMG This has a japanese character, that's sooooo cliché!!" because it's not true at all. The readers care, or at least should care because they can't dislike a game because they dislike one character (My favourite game has the character that I hated the most(Out of all games I played), so yeah.....<.<), and by such a reason. (By the way, that story sounded cool, since I'm not too familiar with Canada <.<)

But now to be on-topic, I also don't like japanese names when they don't have a purpose, and I hate japanese terms when it's all english (Without at least being translated somewhere else, come on there are people that don't know!). Maybe it's a european thing (Didn't you know? The Land of Wonderzzzz is a secret place in Europe XD), but most of the people I know give names to people based on how much they like them and not by their meaning. But I am fully aware that in Japan is kind of different (Like how they can't and shouldn't go around naming their children Akuma for example), since (I think) they care about the meaning of their names. People could also be saying this to me now: "You haven't even stepped foot in Japan, what do you know?" Well, I can't really anything, and I'm not going to be disrespectful to the point of saying that I'm knowledgeable (If I got that word right) about their culture, I only know hiragana, most katakana, and few kanji, and a thing or two about culture, (That I learned from games and anime...I find that to be kind of disrespectful, it makes me feel sorry <.< (I did do research about mythology......)) it's kind of why I don't say I want to go to Japan, I just like their stuff, so I don't think I really have the right to say that. But back on names, why would you get sick of japanese games in their own settings? People aren't going to try to direspect people to the point of not researching the meaning of the names they put, like I'm pretty japanese people would do the same if they were to make a game in another setting (I can't speak for everyone, but I'm pretty sure....<.<). It's like if I were to be sick of Korean names. "Oh but that's not even a cliché--" Lol if it's in a highschool, what's the difference? That's a total cliché setting, no one complains if it's in Korea (North or South, take your pick, I'm not mentioning one specifically <.<). Still, I don't have anything agaisnt highschool settings, which I think are much more generic and cliché than making stuff in Japan, and I'm cool with the names, they have nice meanings too (Like Miyako, Mi for beautiful( If I write it properly), ya for night, ko for child (If my understanding of japanese doesn't fail me, I'm very sorry if it did)). I'd actually be laughing my ass off if there were a ton of games with my country as a setting, to see how they'd pull it off, (I don't know maybe The Land of Wonderzzzz is a very laid-back place? XD) especially what kind of names would they put the characters (God, if they were to put names like Carina or something XD, I'm laughing already).And if someone wants to write something, I'm not going to stop them, it's their story, the story they should love, whether others freaking hate it or not, because everyone's different, so at least someone will enjoy it, so haters gonna hate, no giving away hope. ^-^

[ShippoK]

You're argument might be more effecting if you didn't abuse emoticons so much...
Maybe space out a few things, very hard to read...
Spell-check helps...
Avoiding Verbal Language works as well...
(Just saying, no hate please! :c)

[dramspringfeald]

Part of the reason no one else takes VN games seriously is because the market is flooded with half-baked Japanese wannabe-slice-of-life games.

You can make a game right now with 7 characters. 5 females, 2 males and a cat. Give them all "hair color to match their souls" drop them in a Generic Japanese School and have them argue about Which side to eat a Chocolate Cornet from and it would make $20 million.

That's like saying no more legendary books can be written because my grandma likes to write about her cat's magical adventures.

No, the issue is ALL OF THEM are about "her cat's magical adventures" in a Japanese High School. Not their own cat's magical Adventures in a Japanese High School but hers. You keep missing the point. We are fine with making games but if 90% of them are "This is my generic life in a Japanese High School." the only problem is only a handful of people here have in fact been to a Japanese High School or Japan period. The rest have never even studied Japan outside of "I watched Naruto* 500 times WITH Subtitles!!!! So I am an expert on all of Japan and Japanese culture!!11!!!1!" and it shows.

*replace Naruto with any number of other anime or hell all other anime or Jpop or game and the statement is still valid.

Just personally though, I'm actually worried people might mistake my VN for being generic because I have a single Japanese character. Unlike generic VNs though, it's actually justified because it comments on the War Measures act in Canada (my setting.)

I would argue it is more Canadian than Japanese, but I don't think readers care... :S

That counts as the Token Asian character. The Story is in Canada, the tone is in Canada, the characters are in Canada and the writer is IN Canada... no your fine.

[papillon]

... Making claims that "90% of games are just X" usually makes it very clear that the complainer isn't actually playing ANY of the games that are being released.

There's a lot of X. There's a lot of other stuff too. This forum is no longer so small that you can't find plenty of other games to look at if there's something you don't like.

[Aines445]

You're argument might be more effecting if you didn't abuse emoticons so much...
Maybe space out a few things, very hard to read...
Spell-check helps...
Avoiding Verbal Language works as well...
(Just saying, no hate please! :c)

I didn't know my english sucked that much.........When I read that I literally passed that through a lot of checks to see if my grammar was bad, I did see some typos.....I do agree with the emoticons but my excuse will be the internet (Me: "It's your fault, internet!! You let me be so casual with others like it's nothing!!" internet: "=(........" XD). But no, I wasn't offended, so don't worry!

That's like saying no more legendary books can be written because my grandma likes to write about her cat's magical adventures.

No, the issue is ALL OF THEM are about "her cat's magical adventures" in a Japanese High School. Not their own cat's magical Adventures in a Japanese High School but hers. You keep missing the point. We are fine with making games but if 90% of them are "This is my generic life in a Japanese High School." the only problem is only a handful of people here have in fact been to a Japanese High School or Japan period. The rest have never even studied Japan outside of "I watched Naruto* 500 times WITH Subtitles!!!! So I am an expert on all of Japan and Japanese culture!!11!!!1!" and it shows.

Well, let's make another example! (Yaaaaaay........XD) Imagine that italian food is now pretty popular around here, and a lot of people decided to try to make italian ice cream, what sucks is that they're not italian. So they made a lot of attempts at making it, but it always ends up the exact same way: Not the same as a true italian ice cream. Meanwhile, people at first enjoyed it, but they got sick of it because that's the only thing that's being made now, and it doesn't even accurately represent actual italian ice cream, and it's offending the people that truly studied the italian cuisine and live in Italy! At least that looks like what you're saying in a italian ice cream way (What? Italian ice cream is amazing XD). But if two people try to make the same ice cream without knowing it's exact flavor (Because I think the basics are the writing, drawing and programming skills <.<), they probably won't have the exact same taste, even if they have similarities. But that's because person A is different from person B in point-of-view. Like how Person A had a different perspective of what italian ice cream was from Person B, of course the italians would know better, but they tried because they really liked it at first. This is why I don't have an issue with all of this.

The rest have never even studied Japan outside of "I watched Naruto* 500 times WITH Subtitles!!!!

The irony of how terrible the subtitles from my country are....I mean, not when you watch online, I mean when you watch anime on TV, it's like they expect the viewers to know the meaning of the honorifics and the skills and all those words, it's worst than the VNs everyone is complaining about XD. (I'm sorry, I just had to say this).


I don't really think that when people make games set somewhere, they are going to say that they know everything about the place because (For example) they read a lot of books from there. I'm not really reducing this to Japan because it doesn't make a difference, this issue could be applied to any country, Japan just got the short end of the stick.

[Greeny]

On the flip side, Japanese people use tons of English words and cultural imports without the slightest inkling of their context or meaning.

And guess what? ...It's also annoying as fakku.

[Auro-Cyanide]

Just to be clear, personal opinion =/= fact. Thinking your personal likes and dislikes should somehow effect what other people are doing is like someone coming along and saying no-one should make fantasy because it's so last century and they are over elves. Really, it's just as ridiculous.

Plus, as someone who is making a game set in Japan with Japanese people in a Japanese high school who isn't Japanese, I'm calling most of you out for saying that people react badly to these types of games, cause they don't. It's all about the execution, which IS something we can talk about in a more objective manner. Some people aren't going to play the game because of where it is set, and you know what, I don't care. Why would I care about people who aren't going to play the game because that's just their preference? There are always going to be those people no matter what type of thing you are making because you can't make everyone happy. That's kind of extent of it.

[teacup]

No, the issue is ALL OF THEM are about "her cat's magical adventures" in a Japanese High School. Not their own cat's magical Adventures in a Japanese High School but hers. You keep missing the point. We are fine with making games but if 90% of them are "This is my generic life in a Japanese High School." the only problem is only a handful of people here have in fact been to a Japanese High School or Japan period. The rest have never even studied Japan outside of "I watched Naruto* 500 times WITH Subtitles!!!! So I am an expert on all of Japan and Japanese culture!!11!!!1!" and it shows.

I can give you SEVERAL links to visual novels in production that aren't in a Japanese setting. How about you stop whining, and go comment on some of those threads? Instead of complaining, why not be supportive and cheer on the games you want to see finished?
You are whining. That isn't going to solve the "problem" you know. And I put problem in quotation marks because there really isn't one. Just because you personally dislike something, does not mean other people should change what they are doing to please you.

[ShippoK]

I didn't know my english sucked that much.........When I read that I literally passed that through a lot of checks to see if my grammar was bad, I did see some typos.....I do agree with the emoticons but my excuse will be the internet (Me: "It's your fault, internet!! You let me be so casual with others like it's nothing!!" internet: "=(........" XD). But no, I wasn't offended, so don't worry!

As long as I didn't offend.
People get riled up in arguing that they don't think what the type about sometimes.