Dippeggs wrote:I always like to read your guys' stuff.
One quick thing though. I know Hanako has a stuttering problem, but I feel like she does it a little too much in her dialogue.
Just to be safe, I'll say that there will be spoilers for KS in this post, as well as for KA, for anyone who hasn't read to a4p8 yet.
Her amount of stuttering is almost always a conscious decision on my part, that a lot of factors go into. I'm aware that I've been doing it a little differently than in KS. I examined her dialogue with various characters in her route in KS, and the variances between them. Obviously, her speech is more fluid when she's talking to Lilly when no one else is around, for example, while it becomes more stilted around less familiar people. The exception being, of course, that Junichi is a boy that she's attracted to, and before that, she was getting to know him. The dynamic is different with Hisao, since their relationship was quite different. He treated her almost purely as a friend until the end, while Junichi has given her little hints of attraction, making her more self-conscious in trying to seek his approval. Stuttering once makes her feel even more nervous, which makes her stutter more, and then it just snowballs from there, especially with a feeling as unfamiliar to her as having a crush on a boy. She's formed many memories with Junichi, some of which make her heart pound more in general than what we saw of her in most of her KS route, and she finds herself in a lot of more embarrassing situations. (Hisao was generally more of a calm, kinda detached guy, so they didn't usually get into much trouble, aside from Hanako's birthday, the aftermath, and the days leading up to it.)
Foremost, though, is how she's been confronted with a unique situation where she sees that only she can help someone, even though she sorely lacks the means. She's been often pushed to her limits, and had to even surpass them, in order to inch closer to being who she wants to be. One of those ways is in speaking more often than she generally would in her KS route; sometimes much more. The KS routes skip a lot of days along their timeline, so I went with the assumption that she skipped more days of school in her route than in KA, as well as met with and talked to Hisao less than she tends to with Junichi. It's all
extremely mentally draining, and in so relatively short a time (we haven't even begun her birthday arc yet), leading to her having significantly less energy to spend trying to make her speech proper, plus we usually see her with, or having recently been around Junichi, so she's often still all wound-up. They're all things that easily exacerbate a stuttering problem. I've personally dealt with people who are in mental states where they have limited social energy, so I tried to handle things realistically, with multiple facets to it.
Not that I'm trying to shut you down, or anything. It's good to notice the differences, and I like seeing people's opinions about every little thing about KA, pretty much. Half of the stuff I typed was subconscious thoughts until just now, and I clearly love talking about it.
I've just thought about it a lot. I figured somebody might say something. Even if something is justifiable, I know not everything's gonna be perfectly in line with everybody's preferences. Still, it's too late to retcon something so ever-present, but I will try to remain consistent on the matter. I have had to edit out a fair number of stutters from my original writing, especially at calmer moments. I spoke earlier about emotional writing; I really try to get into the character's heads. I get very driven by that, and then it can be tricky to edit.
Every day is a miracle.
