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kaialone · 5 years

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Kirby 64 Translation: Official Character Bios

Nintendo's old Japanese website for Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards is still up today, and it has some very neat sections.

One of them features brief bios which introduce the main characters, and they are especially nice because they are written in-character.

Each character personally introduces themselves, giving us some insight into the way they talk, which is interesting to see considering the actual games feature very little real dialouge.

So, in this post I will translate each of the bios and explain some of the details regarding their different speaking styles.

Head under the cut if you're interested!

カービィ

はぁ～い、ぼくカービィ！リボンとはお星さまがふる夜に出会ったんだ（これって運命？）。ぼくの新しいワザ「コピー能力ミックス」があれば、どんな冒険もへっちゃらさ！リボンのために、ポップスターのなかまたちと力を合わせて「クリスタル」を探し出すよ！

Kirby

Hi~, I'm Kirby! I met Ribbon on a starry night (is this fate?) With my new 'Power Combo' moves, any adventure's gonna be a piece of cake! I'm gonna team up with my friends from Popstar and find the 'Crystals' for Ribbon!

Notes:

Yes, Kirby actually talks here. This was actually pretty common back in the day, several manuals and websites of early games had dialouge from Kirby himself, sometimes he'd even narrate most of the manual. Though I believe Kirby 64 was actually one of the last games to do this so prominently.

When speaking, Kirby uses the first-person pronoun ぼく/boku to refer to himself, which is masculine and mainly used by young boys and more soft-spoken men (especially in fiction), but is sometimes used by other as well. Aside from that, his overall speaking style is also casual, giving me the vibe of somewhat energetic little kid.

You can see him introduce himself with "Hi~!" here, which could be considered his catch-phrase in the games, rather than "poyo", which is from the anime.

リボン

妖精のリボンです。わたしの星「リップルスター」がまっ黒な雲におそわれてしまったの！早く戻ってみんなを助けなきゃ大変なことになっちゃう！そのためには「クリスタル」を元通りにしなくてはならないのだけど・・・。

Ribbon

I'm the fairy Ribbon. My planet, 'Ripple Star', was attacked by a pitch-black cloud! If I don't hurry back and save them, everyone will be in serious trouble! To do that, I would have to put the 'Crystal' back together...

Notes:

Ribbon used the first-person pronoun わたし/watashi to refer to herself, which is polite and gender-neutral, but is pretty much the standard pronoun for girls and young women (especially in fiction). Comparatively, it's used only rarely by men (especially in real life).

Her overall speaking style is slightly more formal and soft-spoken than Kirby, but in a way that isn't uncommon for girl characters.

ワドルディ

（みなさんこんにちは。ワドルディです。カービィには危ないところを助けてもらいました。カービィが楽しそうだったので、ぼくも冒険についていくことにしました（でもちょっぴりドキドキです）。ぼくの活躍にも期待してね！）・・・と、言っているらしい。

Waddle Dee

(Good day, everyone. I am Waddle Dee. Kirby saved me from a dangerous situation. Kirby seemed to be having fun, so I decided to join the adventure as well (though I am a bit nervous.) Please look forward to my contributions, too!) ...is what he appears to be saying.

Notes:

It's interesting to see that Waddle Dee here is portrayed as not speaking. Notably the anime would also not have Waddle Dees speak, but in modern times we have had examples of Waddle Dees that talk, particulary the PPP Channel crew, and then there's the quotes of the playable Waddle Dees in Star Allies.

Waddle Dee's "speaking" style here is formal and polite, pretty much standard, dictionary Japanese. Though it's unclear if this is just a result of the words being "translated" for us.

Waddle is portrayed in this text as also using the pronoun ぼく/boku. Even in formal settings, わたし/watashi can be considered too formal to use for boys and men, so they will often use ぼく/boku instead.

Note though that this Waddle Dee isn't specified to be male, the usage of ぼく/boku combined with formal language simply makes it seem likely.

アドレーヌ

わたしアドレーヌよ。いつものように絵の勉強をしていたら、ひとつ目の黒い雲がおそってきたの。カーくんが助けてくれて良かったー。さぁみんなー、出発しよ！悪いことをするコはこらしめなくちゃ！ちなみに、わたしの描いた絵は本物になっちゃうのよ。

Adeleine

I'm Adeleine. While I was practicing painting as usual, I got attacked by this black cloud with one eye. Good thing li'l Kirb was there to save me. Alright everybody, let's get going! We gotta teach those evildoers a lesson! By the way, the pictures I paint turn real.

Notes:

Adeleine also uses the first-person pronoun わたし/watashi. Again, it's pretty standard for girl characters. Her overall speaking style is more informal than Ribbon though, and also a bit more feminine than Kirby.

A fun detail is that she calls Kirby by the nickname カーくん/Kir-kun, which I decided to adapt as "li'l Kirb".

(There's some interesting details regarding her using this nickname, which you can read about in one of my posts regarding the connections between Ado and Adeleine, if you feel like it.)

デデデ大王

オレさまがデデデ大王だ！黒いやつに操られていたとはいえ、カービィなんかにやられちゃってくやしいぜ！クリスタル集め？ホントはそんなのやりたくないけど、あいつらだけじゃ心配だな。しかたがない、オレさまも手伝ってやるぜ！

King Dedede

My name is King Dedede the Great! I was being controlled by some black thing, but getting beat up by that darn Kirby is so frustrating! Collecting crystals? I really don't wanna do that, but I'd be worried if those guys went on their own. Guess I got no choice, I'll help out, too!

Notes:

King Dedede's speaking style here is informal and masculine, kinda assertive.

Adding to that, King Dedede also uses オレさま/ore-sama to refer to himself. オレ/ore is a rather informal and masculine pronoun mostly used by men, and さま/-sama is a suffix used to show great respect.

オレ/ore is already considered rude outside of casual situations, and adding さま/-sama to oneself makes it pretty arrogant and boastful.

In some earlier instances, and also later in the anime, Dedede actually used ワシ/washi instead, which is mostly used for older people in fiction, but by now オレさま/ore-sama seems to be the standard for him.

I'll take this moment to point out that these first-person pronouns aren't really "fixed", it's completely normal and expected that you would use different ones depending on the social situation and whom you are talking to.

But in works of fiction, especially ones without much realism, it's common to just have a specific one for a character.

And those are all the character bios from that page. I hope you enjoyed them!

If people would be interested, I might look up other instances of such in-character introductions and dialouge from early websites and manuals like that, and make some more translations like this. Feel free to tell me what to think.

As always, thank you for reading!

#kirby #kirby of the stars #kirby 64 #kirby 64 the crystal shards #adeleine #waddle dee #king dedede #kirby translations #my translations

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