hello anon! im sorry if i sound like im just repeating what i said to my previous anon but its totally okay! i really appreciate your message and your concern but in the end i definitely prefer to change things to make people more comfortable if need be akjddfssl and it wasnt a very large change so i didnt mind all that much!

but thank you for the kind words anon ;v; .... this project means a lot to me bc starting it picked me up out of a really bad depression slump post-grad and helped me actually do something with my time and meet lots of new people! i didnt at all expect the reception i got for it. its seriously the biggest project ive ever taken on and i think a good representation of everything ive learned over the past years so im happy to just put everything out there tbh! i seriously appreciate all of the messages i get and the tweets i see and of people reacting to the story and the art i see that quotes my tl its all a huge honor really!! and thats way more important to me in the end c:

hi anon! thank you so much for the kind message and its totally okay! its just a small change really and i welcome suggestions and corrections from people since thats how ive gotten better at tl over the years anyway alkfjsakf i had a feeling that choice would be too much for some people so i chose to err on the side of caution and change it to make it easier to digest for lack of a better phrase...

but thank you so much for the concern anon, youre really the sweetest and i really really appreciate it ;v; i hope i can get epilogue out quickly and safely for everyone!

OH THANK YOU ANON... i have no idea how my autocorrect/spellcheck didnt catch that at all omg ill fix it soon! youre the first and only one to catch it actually aljfklasf but ty for letting me know and i hope you enjoy the rest of my l4mps tl!! ;o;

hello anon! aaaa im really happy to see that youve been with me for so long ;v; a lot has definitely happened since then so im glad to see that youre still around and reading my stuff !! hopefully epilogue will be a nice little lid on the entire thing akjhdjgkf its been a long journey...

hi anon! thanks for the message and i totally get how you feel! tbh i was kinda iffy on it myself when i released it but i decided just to go with it but i def see your argument so ill change it real quick ! ty for your thoughts :0

hi anon!! im glad i was able to help you out! >:0 i know theres a big 18trip discord server right here! https://discord.gg/18trip im in it but im not very active myself so i dont really know what its like akifsikf but i think its the biggest 18trip server out there!

hey anon how the actual hell did you guess this right literally how did you do that

hi anon! most people i know get their stuff from this folder of assets: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1HciAvKjB4YLQ0K-kpfaZmUx3Tgmd5_ow

i dont really remember who put it together :c but it updates pretty often, basically right after every update!

all good anon! it's not on the app it's actually right here!: https://shindan.18trip.jp/

hihi anon! honestly i think most of the advice i have for making tls sound natural is the exact same advice youd hear from your english teachers about writing essays and stuff KURDJGF

number one for me is definitely like ... read your tls out loud, or mumble them to yourself or something. if you can, do the whole thing or do it in large chunks after youre done with it! i find that reading it loud kinda sets my inner alarms off if something doesnt flow well or if something sounds like its missing

bear with me for a bit because i dont know linguistics, so ill be lacking a bit in my technical explanation UKDRGHJF but one thing i tend to add a lot as im reading my tls out loud is like... transition words? idk how to describe them, like take this exchange between kafka and shunin from r1ze a2 for example:

s: I’m the chief?! You’re just deciding that right off the bat?!

k: Well, I get to decide things as president. Let’s make this a good one, Chief. ♪

that little "Well," is basically what i mean. when youre talking to someone you tend to add little words like "well," "yeah," "you know," etc etc in the front of your sentences to kinda like... lead up to your thoughts almost? i hope that makes sense IUYERKHJFD but thats just one of the things i end up adding to make conversations sound more natural. just read things out loud and if it feels like something is missing throw it in there! it helps if you have proofreaders who could give you pointers too lol

and for ね？, there are a few different options, depending on the character's personality. tbh i usually go with "right?" but here are some others i might use depending on the chara!: correct? (more formal tone) yes? (even more formal, kinda antiquated? i use it for mashiro and sakujiro but wouldnt use it for muneuji for example) yeah? (feels kinda rough to me, i use this for ryui and daniel for example. would probably work for characters who say な？ instead of ね？) did you?/will you?/did it?/arent you?/is it?, etc etc (pretty neutral, you can use this for a bunch of characters!) huh? (this one might not work depending on the situation, but its nice and casual if it does work!) hm? (i rarely use this if ever, but to me it feels kinda elegant or almost teasing, depending on the character and situation) there are probably others that i cant remember atm... but just lmk if you need any more help anon !!

hi anon! dont worry about it, id love to talk more about!

youre right in that they dont have anything SUPER unique going on in their japanese so theres not much for me to analyze in that manner. they do have differences between them though!

i mentioned it in my muneuji answer but muneuji and yukikaze speak kinda similarly in the sense that both of them speak in a masculine, firm, and mature tone, but yukikaze isnt quite as formal as muneuji is. im actually VERY adamantly against making yukikaze speak incredibly formally (i think i just feel strongly about it as a yukikaze oshi HUDHTJRGF) because i feel like that just doesnt feel that way to me. hes polite, but hes not formal if you get me... like he wouldnt be the type to say "shall i help you prepare dinner," hed be like "would you like some help preparing dinner". if you ask me, he has a straightforward way of putting things, but not in a cold and blunt way, just in an honest way. thats why his weird compliments and words of affection sound so shocking coming from him, because he cuts no corners KUERHJGDF.

kafka on the other hand (especially when he talks to shunin) is more hmmm... i wouldnt say cutesy (but he does get like that on rare occasion with shunin) but more down-to-earth i suppose? and definitely playful at times. when he's in business mode though he definitely has this air of confidence about him. i dont do anything particularly special with the way he speaks but i do try to pay attention to writing him when he speaks business because i want to use phrases and wordings that make him sound like the confident leader he is when hes like that!

hi again day2 anon!! im glad to hear that you liked how i translated ushio akujghds he's always fun for me to tl when he picks little fights ilke that UKHRDJG sure i can tell you about kiroku and nanaki!

for kirokus texts being in lowercase with no punctuation, its more of a vibe thing than anything really. i feel like the combination of the two expresses something kind of... timid? which i definitely get from him, even through his texts. plus, when he texts in the japanese he doesnt really use punctuation in the first place kajhf (see: 提灯アートも全然進んでませんすみません, theres no period between 提灯アートも全然進んでません and すみません, just a line break in the game) so to me it almost feels like its like... a stream of consciousness on his end when he types? and i think lowercase + no punctuation expresses that well too!

nanaki, especially after ch a13, is a lot more polite and kinda shy around shunin, like when he talks to them i still make him sound like a typical teenager but hes not as casual as he is with akuta (i have him calling akuta "dude" a few times for example) and not as prickly as he is with ushio. esp in early day2 story when he talks to ushio you can feel an underlying aggression in his tone, although its way less direct than ushio is to him KJSHJRGFD

hi anon! tysm for the question and im really glad you like my day2 translation!! ㅠㅠ they were my favorite group to translate so im happy to see that other people like the way i tackled them as well!

for me all of day2 kind of speak like the average teenage boy (save for akuta, hes a bit more exaggerated) with small nuances between all of them to differentiate, so i can discuss the differences i applied for muneuji and ushio here!

so for muneuji, he definitely does speak more politely than the others, and more maturely as well. he doesnt use a lot of slang or shortened words. sometimes the way he speaks almost reminds me of yukikaze in a way? like he has this gentle but also firm, mature tone to him when he speaks. i think "dignified" is also a good word to describe the way he speaks to me? like he speaks with a muted, humble assuredness, which makes sense with his upbringing and his unconscious position as day2's mediator/organizer!

i try not to go too overboard with the fancy vocab and polite speech with him, since he doesnt use SUPER complex words in the japanese, nor does he really go in on keigo or anything. i just use slightly elevated words and phrases, like day2 mainsto a19, he says "Ushio, I also advise you to remove anything fragile from your body." if he were just a regular teenage boy id probably translate this as "Ushio, you should take off anything fragile you got on too," but since muneuji has just that twinge of politeness, i opted to use fancier words, for lack of a better term aifjaiflk

the thing about ushio on the other hand is that he speaks very pointedly. even when he's not actively fighting against others and being sarcastic, he always has an underlying passive-aggressive tone to him. you can especially tell when he speaks in sarcastic polite tone to the people hes arguing with, like in day2 a3 when hes arguing with shunin: "Do you have a personal ID card, staff ID, or a visitor’s permit? I’ll only tell you my name if you show me. I don’t want my info in bad hands, so I’d like to see your identification, please, and thank you." like... sure it kinda sounds polite, hes using his pleases and thank yous, but you can tell that hes using prickly language and that hes hostile from how straightforward he is. curt and blunt is the key with ushio

other little quips for ushio is that i like to use "ugh" "jesus christ" and "ew" for him a lot, just because i think those especially express how exasperated he can get with others KURHJGDF and i do slip in some curses sometimes, especially when hes yelling! hes one of only like two characters iirc that i make say "fuck" on the regular

hihi anon! i just answered one about chihiro you can see here: https://neospring.org/+r/059b2c87bb so i can talk about kuguri here!

tbh kuguri im also not entirely confident on kUERHGJDF I SWEAR IM NOT LIKE THIS FOR EVERYONE i just got hit with my worst characters three times in a row /nm JDHTFGMNVC

so id describe kuguri's speaking as flowery but not... fancy. do you get me? like he likes to describe things like hes writing a novel but hes not shakespeare or anything. its not totally over the top like, for example, oshisha-sama. he just likes to describe things in a dramatic fashion and uses a tone that makes him sound hmm... like dark and mysterious? i said this once to a friend and idk if thisll help describe how he feels to me but i think he talks like hes the snake who seduced eve in the garden of eden, not like a monarch from the 1700s. i hope that kinda makes sense IKRSHJFD basically hes dramatic and cheeky but not lordly and grand. thats how i like to tl him at least!

so to work with this sometimes i do find myself changing around the words he says in japanese to make them sound more descriptive and dramatic, especially when he has long pieces of dialogue. for example, ev3ns mainsto b12, he says to raito 特別強い感情を向けられると嫌悪する, which more directly translates to "you feel disgusted when people become strongly attached to you," but i decided to translate it instead as "you feel bile rising up in your throat when people become strongly attached to you," because i feel that him describing the actual imagery of what it feels like to be sick provides more drama that suits kuguri well

but yeah! outside of his more dramatic scenes, i do find myself gravitating towards more elegant words for him, like "why hello" instead of just plain-old "hello," "perhaps" instead of "maybe," "is that so?" instead of "really?" i also occasionally tack more words onto his nicknames for people, like "my dear maci" instead of just "maci," because it sounds more elegant and almost condescending? kjshajksd thats also why i opted to translate his nickname for nayuki as "little one"!

hello anon! tysm for the question c: sure thing!

chihiro is another one im not entirely confident on... the way he speaks in japanese is easy to analyze, but i think i lack the proper creativity to fully translate it over to english if that makes sense kUHRJGF

so its pretty clear that chihiro talks like a gyaru! at times excessively so, where he almost makes up words and uses gyaru slang WAY too often, for comedic effect + bc hes overcompensating for his chii persona. when hes speaking as chihiro (and not chii), he doesnt really use a lot of gyaru slang but he still similarly speaks with a casual and friendly tone

so for me the largest note i have for my interpretation of chihiro is to avoid using modern slang words as much as i can. i try to use older slang from the 90s and 2000s, like "the bomb dot com" and "totes magotes" and "wicked" because... thats what hes into and what he uses in japanese! i do use SOME modern slang for him, like "pop off" and "cutieful" but i generally try to hold back on those. youve noticed i also make him say text lingo out loud, like O-M-G and bee-tee-dubs

really though the mindset i have in mind for chihiro is just "make him sound like a 2000s valley girl" KJEHRTGDF so i do things like make him use "like" excessively (ex. "Ohh, so, like, I’ve got over a million followers, right? So I guess my job around here is to improve the prison’s image or something? It’s, like, a special job just for me.") and making him use words like literally, totally/totes, super/supes, etc etc really often

thats ^ all for his chii persona though! when he speaks as chihiro its just kinda that but way toned down akljrstidgkf

hi anon! tysm for the support and the continued questions!! as bad as i am at answering them i do like talking about this kinda stuff kafjkasf sure i can try to talk about my process with netaro a bit!

now truthfully netaro was like ... really hard for me KUTHJGF i had to go through a few different iterations and hes the major reason why i had to rewrite my l4mps translation after i finished it. i still dont feel like my netaro is up to par so i cant speak as confidently on him as i did akuta but!

in the original japanese netaro does indeed speak strangely, and this shows itself in multiple forms:

1. using strange vocab (ex. using "elastic" to describe salmon roe instead of "bouncy")
2. describing things weirdly (ex. calling akuta's movie night invite to him a 怪文書, lit. a dubious document)
3. going into some japanese knowledge here, he uses weird particles. mainly, he uses じゃ instead of だ and わ instead of は. using じゃ as an ending particle kinda like... almost makes him sound like an old man lol??? and using わ instead of は is straight up grammatically incorrect, its an error that a lot of little kids or those brand new to learning japanese might make

to incorporate all of this i just... basically make him talk like a mad scientist kinda as one of my friends described it KIAJSDF like hmmm he's decently verbose and uses large words, but not in the same way sakujiro would do it. whereas sakujiro's usage of words makes him sound refined and classy, i make netaro use words and sentence structures that are just a bit TOO verbose, too antiquated, to the point where they sound strange (e.g. "i am in agreeance!" instead of "i agree!")

one thing i like to add to netaro that i get from some of the things he says is that he almost has this chlidlike innocence to him at times, which i like to incorporate by making him say almost... cartoony? exclamations? like wahoo! and phooey! (which does translate over to japanese as well, he often says cartoony sound effects out loud KUTHJGF) and very very occasionally making him say things in almost singsong (only VERY occasionally though, see chapter a6, where i make him say "thank you very mucheries!")

on occasion i also like to make up words for him to combine both his weird mad scientist voice and those childlike tendencies, i think a good example of this is my favorite line ive written for him: l4mps mainsto a13: "If you watch one, then you can longer go back to a state of not-watchedness. It is irreversible for the have-watchers, thus, I have the advantage." not-watchedness and have-watchers are, of course, not real words and they sound kinda strange, but i think it really suits netaro to invent new words on the spot here by just mashing together random prefixes and suffixes and chunks of different words together

i hope this made sense anon! again truthfully i struggled with netaros voice a bit so i may not be the best on this front akuhjrsgf

hi anon! yes yes yes of course!! thats super sweet of you to ask and id love to become oomfs !! sorry if i havent talked to you or followed you before ;o; i usually oomf people who i end up talking to in my replies but sometimes people slip thru bc i forget to reply or something akuhgkjdf but youre free to send me a dm or reply to this tweet or something and id love to talk with you more !!

KHTROUJFGKL its kinda hard for me to explain my process but its really just a combination of what nuance i pick up from the japanese + just kinda the...vibes of what i get from the characters KUDTHJGF i could probably talk all day about it tbh but it really depends on the character...!

if you want an example i think my process of how i tl akuta could be an interesting one for me to explain! in the japanese he of course speaks very casually and inserts a lot of exaggerated/excited wording and onomatopoeias into his speech + he very occasionally talks almost like ... like hes playing a role in a movie lol? (see day2 mainsto a22, when he talks to nanaki like hes a samurai: お願いがあるでござる！)

so to tl his casual and energetic speech into english i write him with simple words, shortened words (e.g. "wanna" instead of "want to," etc), run-on sentences (e.g. he says stuff like "[word] and [word] and [word] and [word]" a lot, esp when he gets excited), a healthy handful of intensifiers that i feel suit his character (i really like using "friggin'" and "as heck/as balls" for him KDJTHGF), and what i really like to do is tack on a "bro/dude/my friend" onto his sentences for that extra little teenage boy-ism

the other half of how i tl akuta is where the vibes come in... akuta reads as an excitable little kid to me so thats why, for example, i consciously make the decision to never make him say any curse words and instead opt to make him say "kiddie" replacements for curse words, like fudge or frick instead of fuck, holy cow instead of holy shit, etc, just because i think it fits his lighthearted and whimsical vibe more. i usually dont make him say a lot of modern-day slang words for a similar reason but theres definitely more room for flexibility in that realm kUDTJHGF

so... yeah! def varies by the character, i mostly just try and catch the details from the jp and transfer those into english as naturally as possible and then add some flavor based on the character's personality and image. if theres anyone in particular youre curious about anon just lmk!

omg thank you anon but wait WHAT?? like they changed in the game itself??

hello anon! tysm for the message and no worries at all!! if anything i feel like i come off as repetitive bc i always say the same things in response to anon messages but i really really do appreciate all the kind words more than you can imagine ;v; i really only picked up translating 18trip on a whim because i wanted to start translating again after being away from it for like 2 years so im really happy that it led to me meeting some really cool people and putting out stuff that people like !! im really excited to put out l4mps side b and the epilogue so i hope youll stick around for it anon!! tysm ;v; <3

WHO IS THISBFKGBFKD

hi anon! this is actually something that my friend (the site developer) and i have brought up once so it's on the list of options KDBFJFN i just can't 100% tell you if it'll be implemented. if there's enough demand for it then maybe over winter break! i could put out a twitter poll to see if people want it :o

we'll get it next time anon... that yukikaze motg card will happen one day

hi anon! this IS actually a really hard question OSHDKDND so i brought it up to my translator friends and a lot of us just kinda agreed that it's... based on vibes LOL i know that's not all that helpful but hmm... we also talked about how a lot of it based on the media you consume and the people you talk to, like how i don't know many people who speak with a southern american accent so it's difficult for me to write koharu. in a way it's also kinda based off of like... tropes(?) of certain characters and how they usually speak if that makes sense?? like oh ryui has kind of a delinquent vibe and in japanese he speaks roughly and rudely so i elect to translate that into him cursing a lot and using more casual words in english

mmmm i feel like it would be easier for me to explain by explaining my personal choices for each 18trip character one by one rather than talking about how i do things in general AIAJIDND so if you're curious about any character in general you could let me know anon! i know this probably wasn't all that helpful 😭 but thank you for the question anyway !!

aaaa hello anon! thank you so so much for your message and it really makes me happy to know that you and your friends like my tls :') i'll keep on working hard so i can deliver you guys the rest of my main story and more stuff in the future if you're interested !!