hi, I just found your blog (crazy enough through official citation on the deltarune wiki??) and I wanted to ask about a couple scenes since I'm trying to do character analysis but don't know japanese nearly well enough to do so (I hope you're okay with people asking, I'm not sure if you still answer these)
mainly, I wanted to ask if there was anything that stood out in two scenes: the scene where tenna and spamton reunite and tenna doesn't recognize him (ie how spamton addresses tenna, vice versa, if the text shows tenna does recognize him and is just lying, how tenna refers to the pipis, basically anything that isn't conveyed in the english text), and I was also curious about the dialogue in the manhole dungeon on the secret board 3 where tenna talks about spamton? like specific verbiage and anything unique
if you take your time to answer this, thank you very much and I appreciate it a lot!! I've been struggling to find people doing genuine analysis of the japanese text of dr (and some of the translations you did do actually are making me think a lot)
(JP translations + transcriptions in Alt Text)
Something major that stands out about how Spamton addresses Tenna here is that he uses casual speech instead of keigo (honorific speech). For reference, Spamton generally speaks with the formality levels of a salesman, so pretty much every line Spamton says throughout the game is always in keigo. The fact that he breaks out of his persona here to address Tenna really emphasizes that he sees Tenna as someone who is an equal to him, and not just a potential customer.
His last line here is also interesting. He trails off, and because of how Japanese word order works, we don't know the specific verb he was going to say, but the no koto implies that it would describe how Tenna feels about Spamton emotionally. The English version of this scene of course uses the verb "care," so we could assume that that is also what Spamton would have said here, but the choice to leave it unsaid can also allow for other interpretations.
Instead of saying variations of "mamma mia," in Japanese Tenna repeats variations of "why," "how," "wait," and "it can't be," so it definitely gives a stronger impression that Tenna might in fact recognize Spamton here!
Once Tenna asks what Spamton is and appears to not recognize him, however...
...Spamton switches back into keigo, addressing Tenna as he would a stranger.
Tenna refers to the Pipis in pretty much the same way as he does in the English version, with one added detail. When expressing a number of something, Japanese uses grammatical particles known as counters, which correspond to the noun being counted based on the nature of the noun and often details like its shape. For example, if you're counting people, flat objects, and round objects, you would add a different counter to the number in each case.
Here, when Tenna says that he kept "one Pipis," he uses the counter 匹(hiki), which is the counter used when referring to small animals. This explicitly confirms that the Pipis is a living creature, or at the very least that Tenna believes that it is.
Something that stands out about how Tenna talks about Spamton in the manhole dungeon is that he directly quotes Spamton in this line. Spamton here again uses casual speech instead of keigo, and it's interesting that Tenna specifically remembers Spamton telling him to wait for him while he went to answer the phone. Whether you believe Spamton was being genuine or deceiving Tenna here, telling him to wait gives the implication that he was going to come right back after he took the phone call.
oh my god. somehow, it's even worse than in the english! spamton trailing off about how tenna does feel a certain way... tenna what, spamton?
there's so much to unpack here. I was wondering if the casual speech could've been a matter of rudeness, but hearing from a proper translator it emphasizes they're equals says a lot! not second in command or lackey or employee to tenna. equals. and not some sucker to scam to spamton, equals. oh my god I'm gonna be thinking about this all week
another point to maybe recognizing spamton, or maybe being just THAT freaked out...
ADDRESSING TENNA LIKE A STRANGER OUGHHHHHHHH oh that makes the "never doing that again" line hurt so much more oh my god
so tenna is aware the pipis is alive... huh! oh my god
and directly quoting spamton, that's the craziest part for a few reasons cause it means several things
it indicates he did used to always speak normally and not with bracket text before whatever transformed him
he seems unafraid of the phone, or unaware of what's about to happen. like he had no idea that he was in danger of being cut off.
he said implicitly he was gonna come back to tenna... oh my god...........
thank you so much. I'm not gonna be normal about this for a while. I didn't know the jp translation could somehow be worse about those two!
Here an addison talks about how Spamton started bragging about big TV deals, among other things.
In Japanese, this line is instead localized to "big television programs."
JP: 「ビッグなテレビ番組」だの「ビッグなクルマ」だの「ビッグなCM」だののじまん話を⋯
Romaji: "biggu na terebi bangumi" dano "biggu na kuruma" dano "biggu na cm" dano no jiman hanashi o...
ENG: Bragging about "big television programs", "big cars", "big commercials"...
In the Castle Town cutscene in the 2025 winter newsletter, Tenna talks about Spamton and slime. Like normal people do.
in Japanese Tenna says this:
ROMAJI:
suraimu mo ne! hahaha! wasure chaikenai shike shike suraimu!
sou... wasure chaikenai... shike shike suraimu.
ENG:
The slime too! Hahaha! Can't forget the glooby slime!
That's right.... I can't forget... the glooby slime.
In the Japanese version, Tenna specifies that the slime is glooby, calling it "shike shike slime". "シケシケ" (shike shike) is the Japanese localization of "glooby".
"Shike shike" is a made up Japanese onomatopoeia. It's a word that phonetically imitates or suggests a sound. Onomatopoeias are very often used in Japanese to express things, and there are even onomatopoeias in Japanese for things don't make sound. An example of this would be "kira kira", it's a onomatopoeia suggesting something shining. It's the same with "shike shike", which is supposed to imitate the feeling of "gloobiness" rather than anything that makes sound...
Of course, "the slime" also connects with Spamton basically calling himself slime in his introduction in Chapter 2.
Spamton says "slime" in Japanese as well!
ROMAJI:
tomodachi mina kamatte kurenai ka anta [[beto beto suraimu]] kimoi kara
ENG:
YOUR FRIENDS DON'T HANG OUT WITH YOU, BECAUSE YOU ARE GROSS [[Sticky slime]]
As you can see... Spamton says "beto beto slime" instead. "Beto beto" is also an onomatopoeia, imitating the feeling of something sticky.
It seems Spamton equals slime. Tenna calls the slime glooby, while Spamton calls the slime sticky. Does that mean Tenna sees Spamton as glooby slime and Spamton sees himself as (gross) sticky slime?
"So I say... why don't we go between the lines?" in Japanese
フム。おとぎ話は美しい。
Hmm. Fairytales are beautiful.
キラキラと輝くものを信じるのも悪くない。
Believing in things that sparkle and shine isn’t so bad.
じゃがあの言葉は少々まぶしすぎるようじゃ。
But I think those words are a bit too bright.
真っ青な道…それしか見えん。
A pure blue path... It's all you can see.
ワシは…行間を読んではどうかと思うぞよ？
I think... Why not read between the lines?
そこはもっと暗いはずじゃ…ワハ…ワッハッハ…！
It should be much darker there… Waha… Wahahaha…!
As you can see, Gerson is specifically talking about "reading between the lines". The specific Japanese phrase being used is 行間を読む (in Latin script "gyoukan o yomu"). "Gyoukan o yomu" very literally translates to "reading the line spacing", so reading the gaps between lines of text. It's a phrase often used in context of books, and finding the unsaid implications.
Associating darkness with implication and subtext is interesting. So Gerson is basically saying you need to move to the darker subtext, instead of the bright text.
Isn't it funny? How none of them ever stood a chance? Isn't it hilarious? How none of it could've been prevented? Isn't it comical? How it was all so much bigger than themselves? Isn't it just hysterical? How it was always gonna end like this?
It's been just over a year since Deltarune chapters 3 & 4 released! I did the 3D work, which mostly means Tenna 📺 I figured it's been long enough to share some "behind the scenes" stuff, starting with a look at the Maya file for his static poses...
I'd individually render the poses to get that early 3D shine ✨ Here's some of them at their original resolutions! I would work from text descriptions from Toby, and sometimes there'd be a Paint sketch to help out. Gigi drew the concept that I modeled from and some poses too!
I had a lot of fun pushing myself to match the dynamic poses Toby had in mind for Tenna - making him so crazy and expressive was something I couldn't have done without his prompts. He'd draw the faces on afterward too, which really brought Tenna to life!
(lots more after the Read More cut...!)
Here are some of the Paint sketches Toby drew to help me with specific Tenna poses! I love seeing his drawings LOL, genuinely really good and evocative 👍
There was a time when I was struggling to capture what he wanted for these specific Tenna poses… Until Toby acted them out himself, and I thought, "Ah, it's like that. I understand." and then I was able to make them just how he pictured them.
When looking through the renders and choosing what to share, I laughed at these two… Remember when Tenna had a gun? Remember when he bent over in a very specific way that might remind you of another, different image? No? Maybe you don't…? Well. Don't worry about it.
These ones are cute… Tenna is pretty cute sometimes! Has anyone ever thought this? Actually, before people knew he was going to be a strange 3D sprite the Whole Time, I was worried people wouldn't like the style and it'd sour people's views on him. I'm glad that didn't happen.
Toby thought it would be funny to have Tenna do some really smooth, mocapped animations sometimes - specifically free to use ones that often pop up in other things. An extra funny part to me is how many frames these take up in the game, and how his tails are stuck to his legs…
Speaking of mocap, Toby wanted Tenna to use custom mocap animations as far back as 2016 - Ten(na) years ago! I got an Xbox Kinect at the time and learnt how to set this up, but then never used it. Here's a look at messing with mocaped stuff again in 2022. So Normal.
Don't bother trying to help him here, he's just being dramatic 🙄
I particularly like these poses - I think I improvised most of these just based off the context they get used in… I always liked posing his tie and coat tails as if they were also parts of his body he could move. Which I guess they are?
After I rendered out the individual poses in high quality, I'd force the color palette to be limited to just a few shades and then I'd shrink the result down to pixel sized sprites. Like these! I'd tidy them up a little, but they'd really get improved on at the pixel scale by Clairvoire.
As well as Tenna's sprites, I also worked on his intro "movie"…! Seeing people be completely overloaded by this on first playthroughs would always make me laugh. In game, there's a ton of extra editing done by Everdraed, but my unedited cut looks like this ⬇️
This was the entire storyboard I had to work from, and I'm realizing now that there's the note "put him in car etc" that I never did and actually don't know what it would mean exactly. Working on this had me listen to the accompanying audio many times, but it's good so it's okay.
Here are a bunch of random clips of the Maya project for Tenna's intro movie. This is how movies get made, I think!! Yeah… Just like this.
Say it with him, folks!!
For the 3D Ralsei clip from the intro, Toby really wanted it to look a certain way, and drew more sketches for guiding me with this part than any other. They genuinely helped.
Remember how Toby's original storyboard has the note "covered in slime and shrinks"? That meant I had to learn how to make 3D slime. You can see my tech advancing here.
I'm really happy with how the final Tenna animation at the end of the intro movie turned out! It wouldn't look as good if it wasn't for some 2D animation to reference from SmallBuStudio, so thank you to them for the help! Tenna is cute… Huh, I already said that…?
Phew!! That's a lot of Tenna. I hope it was fun to look through my posts! Oh, one more thing - the Fangamer Mr. Tenna Figurine just straight up uses the 3D model I made, which I think is really funny and cool and nice. Check it out if you want! Thanks for reading!
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