Yuri Chuunige Pygmalion Released

[Fred the Barber]

6 hours ago, Dreamysyu said:

By the way, a little question to those who understands Japanese. Does anyone know what 'mima' means? In the English version they translated it as Eidos, which, I guess, is an unfitting reference to Plato, and I'm interested in what the original for that was.

Not sure what's up with your strikethrough "unfitting" there, but if I'm understanding it correctly, I think you may have missed the boat on a lot of the game's allusions. The original Japanese script heavily cribs from Platonic terminology (go look up anamnesis, for instance) and Platonic philosophy in general, and though I'm not certain, I'm pretty sure the word you're referring to is yet another example of borrowed Greek philosophy terminology and not Japanese at all. I believe the word they're saying is essentially "meme" (which is, of course, a very good reason not to just transliterate it...), and that it's actually a reference to mimesis.

Relatedly, here's a short blog post from the game's editor which talks a bit about this stuff: http://blog.mangagamer.org/2017/02/22/allusions-in-pygmalion/

 

Edited March 21, 2017 by Fred the Barber

[Dreamysyu]

21 hours ago, Fred the Barber said:

Not sure what's up with your strikethrough "unfitting" there

Well, yeah, it was a poor choice of words on my part. I didn't mean unfitting in a sense like "using Platonic philosophy in a VN about cute girls is unfitting", because, as you've said, the references to the Greek philosophy and mythology were clearly present in the original Japanese text. I mostly meant "it's based on a concept from Platonic philosophy, but goes too far away from the original meaning". On the other hand, my knowledge mostly ends at the things I learned at the university philosophy lectures, and I'm not sure if it's VN's fault. I should've used "confusing" instead.

From what I understand, Plato's Eidea were his answer to the problem of universals. He said that different properties exist objectively in the ideal world as Eidea, and the things around us are their manifestations. And souls originally belong to that ideal world, and remember those properties through anamnesis. It all would be alright at this point, but (mild spoilers)

Spoiler

wouldn't it mean that the number of Eidea relevant in the story would be much greater than just 2? I am not sure if I'm right at this part, but wouldn't the number of Eidea be, like, close to infinity. I guess, they mention that there are other Eidea that do not appear in the story, but I don't know, it still seems forced somehow.

I wouldn't think too hard about it, but at some point I noticed that the word Japanese voice actors pronounce is actually different. So, I was wondering how much the meaning of that word was changed in translation. I managed to find what Katashiro (adapted as Eidolon) means, and my guess was that Mima could also be something Japanese. I guess, mimesis makes sense, but I still need to think it through.

21 hours ago, Fred the Barber said:

I believe the word they're saying is essentially "meme" (which is, of course, a very good reason not to just transliterate it...)

Right...

Edited March 21, 2017 by Dreamysyu
Reworded some parts