Characters and speech: A tutorial

[Lunarea]

Dialogue: Thoughts on developing character speech

Character development is crucial in the creation process of any story. Poor character development can make even the most interesting idea seem bland and unnoticeable. On the other hand, good character development can bring a new twist to the most cliché of stories.

A character is developed through action, reaction and speech. Though all are important in creating a believable character, this tutorial will focus on the speech portion of character creation/development.

Sections:

• Vocabulary
  
• Accents
  
• Colloquialism
  
• Dynamic Dialogue
  
• Inner Monologue
  

Vocabulary:

Vocabulary is defined as the pool of words or phrases which a particular individual or culture draws upon when expressing ideas through oral or written speech. Or, to put it more simply, vocabulary is the words and phrases we use to talk.

Vocabulary of a person depends on the following:

• Level of Education/Upbringing
  

The “formula” (so to say) to follow here is that the higher the education level of the character, the larger and more complex their vocabulary is. A scholar, for example, will have a tendency to use more complex words and phrases and will usually speak in “proper” English. They may, for instance, say “Let us go” rather than “Let’s go.”

A character’s upbringing is also a factor in determining their vocabulary level. If a character was exposed to reading books or talking to other educated characters (such as philosophers, teachers or priests), their vocabulary may also be very large and complex.

As a rule of thumb (and there are a few rare exceptions), the character who had formal education will be better versed than a character who was “self-taught”. The reason for this is that characters with formal education have more resources and people available for learning. A self-taught character will have fewer books/teachers and may even have outdated information. The exception to this rule is a case of a very rich person that is able to travel frequently and buy many books.

• Economic Standing
  

Whether a character is rich or poor will also make a contribution in their vocabulary level. By default, a character that’s rich would have a bigger vocabulary than a character that’s poor.

The reason for this, to put it simply, is tied to the education level. The rich are able to afford better education and more of it. They can also enroll in such things as classes for good manners and proper speech. Because of this, it is socially expected of nobles (especially royalty) to have a rich vocabulary. It would be strange for a noble who was born rich to have simple and poor vocabulary.

On the other hand, poor characters are expected to have simple speech. A poor character would use a lot of colloquialisms (i.e. slang) and often make grammatical errors. The poverty of the character would prevent them from getting an education or learning themselves the proper way to talk.

There are a few exceptions to the rule:

1. A noble who fell on hard times and is now poorer than a mouse will still have rich and flowery speech.
   
2. A country bumpkin that inherited a mansion will still have simple and erroneous speech.
   
3. A character that is out of their usual environment (i.e. a rich person who pretends to be poor or a poor person pretending to be rich) will have an odd combination of simple and flowery speech.
   

• Environment
  

You’ve often heard that Eskimos have a thousand words for snow. This, of course, is an urban myth, as Eskimos only have a few words more or less than the English language does (depending on which Eskimo language we’re talking about). However, it does illustrate a great point. The vocabulary of the people (and consequently of a character) is tied to the environment. Someone brought up in a sandy continent might have words or phrases for sand storms that another person from a snowy continent would know nothing about. Likewise, someone brought up in a port town would know a lot about trade, ships and the sea.

But the environment isn’t only limited to the physical place of living. It also includes the people that live around us. Whether we like it or not, we are affected by the people that surround us. As such, we may pick up certain phrases or ways of expressing ourselves from those around us. This happens whether we like it or not and it’s something that you should be mindful of when developing character dialogue.

A good example would be a poor character brought up in a port town that spends a lot of time reading and thus speaks “proper” English. To make that character more dynamic and to explore his background, there should be a time where he slips up. For instance, when this guy gets upset, he starts using simple speech and curses worse than an old sailor.

A special note should be given to characters that have traveled extensively, especially those that are a bit older. These types of characters have been in many different types of environment and have interacted with many different cultures. As a result, their vocabulary and mannerisms will probably be the richest of all possible characters. They have, basically, learned through experience and thus are able to adapt their speech to many different situations.

Accents:

As a person living in a multicultural world, you’ve undoubtedly noticed that there are many accents people have. And some of you have probably thought that it’d be cool to include some of these accents in your game. But this is not an easy process and many writers find themselves failing at it.

There is no formula that will instantaneously make for great accented speech. The process is one of trial and error. It involves a lot of testing, changing and adjusting. The key is to understand the subtle inflections and translate them into speech through unique or different spelling.

Here’s an example of accented speech from a Southern character:
“My maw an’ my paw raised me proper, ya know. They tells me to always be good to them ladies. An’ I don’ care what y’all say, I ain’t gonna be lookin’ at’em fer no reason when they’re takin’ a bath!”

Although I can’t tell you how to model your spelling for all the different cultures, I can offer some tips on how to plan for and write accented speech.

• Research a particular culture, both in accent and vocabulary.
  

Even if you’re creating a unique culture with a special accent, practicing on an existing culture still benefit you as a writer. You want to pay attention to letters and syllables that are omitted or replaced (for example, an English person may say “gov’na” instead of “governor”). You also want to keep an eye out for any colloquialisms or metaphors that are prominent in that culture. Through this, you are trying to learn how to model your character’s speech so that anyone that plays your game can say: “Wow, that person is definitely [insert culture of choice here].”

Also keep in mind that speech and vocabulary change through time, so select the right time period when you’re doing your research.

• Pay attention to how other writers convey accented speech.
  

Scout your reading material for dialogue or monologue with accented speech. In particular, you’re looking for writers that use accented speech or that have accented narrative voice. Examples of good authors vary depending on your preferred genre and the culture/time period you’re trying to emulate. An example of a good author for modern setting could be Stephen King, while Shakespeare could be used for a more traditional medieval/renaissance setting.

The important thing here is to get an idea of how these authors use words/spelling to convey a particular accent.

• Try translating accented speech from movie/TV characters into written speech.
  

A good way to practice writing in accented speech is to practice writing character lines from a movie or a TV show. The ultimate goal would be to have anyone reading the re-written lines sound like the character that said them.

Alternatively, you might find the following website useful: http://accent.gmu.edu/ . The speech accent archive is a collection of accented speech. Contributors are invited to read a paragraph (you can find it on the site) with various accents. This can give the writer an idea of how to model their characters’ dialogue.

What not to do:

• Do not change the spelling of every single word to be accented.
  

A writer doesn’t need to be overzealous when using accented speech. While accents can spark an interest and add flair to the character, their speech still needs to be understandable by the player. You don’t want the player to spend a long time trying to decipher what a character is saying. The player will either become irritated by this, or they will just skip reading the dialogue altogether.

The basic rule of thumb is that it shouldn’t take more than 10 seconds for the player to understand the message than if it were written in plain English.

The only exception to this rule is writing a dialogue for a character that no one understands. In that case (and that case only), feel free to go crazy with accented speech.

Here’s an example of what not to do:
“Oi gov’n! ‘o’ a’ yew t’s ev’in’. Aye w’et tew ‘el’ yew ‘ou’ ‘e ‘ew ‘est.” - this is just unreadable, and unless you knew what the character was saying beforehand, it would be near impossible to decipher.
Here’s an example of how the same few lines can be changed to be usable in a story:
“Oi, gov’na! ‘ow are yew this ev’nin’? I wonted to tell yew about th’ new guest.” - this phrase still gives the illusion that the speaker is English, but it the player will still be able to understand it.

• Do not change the level of the accented speech of a character without a very good explanation.
  

Although it is encouraged to have characters that are dynamic and changing, their speech should remain pretty much the same throughout the story. The reason for this isn’t that speech never changes, but rather that it takes a lot of time and effort to change it. So, unless your character is actively trying to change the way they talk as a part of the plot, it is safer to stick to the same level of accented speech throughout the story.

That is not to say that they’ll never slip and use a word that they never used before, or that they may not talk differently in parts of the story. Your character could slip up and say another party member is rubbing off on them. Or your character would carefully try to hide their accent because it would put them in danger. These situations, however, are exceptional and would be a good explanation as to why accented speech might temporarily change.

But it is never advised to permanently change the accented speech of a character. If you went through the trouble of giving your character accented speech, either let it carry all through the story, or get rid of it altogether.

• Do not copy expressions, metaphors or ways of spelling if you don’t want to be associated with the original.
  

This is a trap that a lot of writers can fall into when they use an existing character as inspiration or research work. A beginner writer especially needs to be careful as it is far too easy to accidentally end up with a poor copy of another famous character. While the catchphrases or metaphors that a character could use may be super cool, steer away from them unless you’re okay with defending yourself against plagiarism and copyright infringement.

• Do not pretend that bad spelling and grammar are actually accented speech.
  

Using “u” instead of “you” or saying “your” instead of “you’re” isn’t accented speech, it’s just poor spelling and grammar. And while I (or the player) can appreciate that your characters could have bad speech skills, hiding behind your own poor spelling and grammar isn’t the way to go.

Before you can successfully convey the unique spelling and grammar of accented speech, you need to be able to write in “proper” English. In other words, brush up on your spelling/grammar and write out the dialogue without fault in English first - and then change it to accented speech.

Colloquialism:

Colloquialism is defined as informal or everyday speech. It is, basically, the speech that you’d hear from people in a casual setting.
Examples:
Formal speech: “Do you want to go to the movies with me?”
Informal speech (colloquialism): “Do you wanna go to the movies with me?”

Colloquialism doesn’t always follow the proper uses of grammar or spelling. Words can be omitted or added depending on the accent and the culture of the speaker. Colloquialism also includes the use of slang, including swearing, proverbs and catch phrases. As I’ve already touched on researching accented speech (which is also considered colloquialism), I will only focus on swearing and proverbs in this section.

• Swearing:
  

What’s acceptable when it comes to swearing depends entirely on the comfort level of the writer and that of the reader/player. You will find that the opinions about swearing vary from person to person. Some writers and readers consider swearing to be vulgar and have no place in writing while others think of it as a necessary part of any culture.

So, how can we incorporate swearing into dialogue?

The first step is to gage your comfort level. What swear words are you comfortable with? What insults are you comfortable with? How frequent would the swearing need to be before it bothered you?

The second step is to guess the comfort level of your target audience - readers/players. What swear words and insults do you think they’d be comfortable with? How much swearing would it take before they felt bothered? In most cases, the answer will be that there’s at least one person that wouldn’t be comfortable with any swear words or any instance where swearing is present.

So, now is the time to bridge the gap between the two. Ask yourself how important the swearing is to character and plot development? For example, if one of your characters is a rugged sailor with a habit to swear when they’re angry, it wouldn’t make sense to remove all swearing from the story. Likewise, if your character was an educated priest brought up in a monastery, they wouldn’t be swearing left and right.

Once you know how important the use of swear words is, think about a possible creative way to portray them. Maybe you can think of a swear word that’s particular to your character’s culture, or maybe you can think of an insult unique to your character’s world.

If being creative just seems to spoil the mood of your story, stick with an uncensored version of the swear word of your choice. If you’re wondering why I’m suggesting uncensored version, it is simply because censoring swear words gives the same effect as creative swearing. It makes dialogue and plot tame, and if you’re trying to avoid that, you don’t want to censor words (such as saying $h*t, for example). While you might think it’s a good idea to censor words so that your audience isn’t offended, it does absolutely nothing for your dialogue/story. The people who would be offended with the uncensored version will still be offended with the censored one while others might even be annoyed by the random symbols and letters.

Personally, I like reading unique and creative insults/swears because they can be funny and very expressive. They can become something that sticks in the mind of the player as well as give character and uniqueness to your story.

• Proverbs:
  

Proverbs aren’t always used in writing and character development, but I find them to be an invaluable source of cultural identity. Because games try to create a world, I find that it’s important to leave some room for proverbs. Whether they are important to the plot or not is entirely up to the author, but, when used right, they can tell a lot about a town or culture that the hero is visiting.

“Don’t count your chickens before they’re hatched” is an example of a proverb. It means that you shouldn’t make plans for something until you know that it’s real, and not just guess. Most proverbs are written in this fashion: somewhat vague reminders of things considered to be common sense. When making your own unique proverbs, keep in mind that proverbs will be metaphors drawn from immediate environment and experience. In other words, there won’t be a proverb about snow in a hot sandy area that’s never seen even rain.

There are several ways to include proverbs into dialogue/story. One is as a reaction to an event - such as a character saying “All good things come to those that wait” when they get a reward for their patience. Another is education - such as books and libraries, or a scholar studying anthropology. And yet another is in NPC speech or advice giving - in particular, the elderly might be likely to mention proverbs in their interaction with the player.

Here’s a link to Chinese Proverbs:
http://www.quotationspage.com/quotes/Chinese_Proverb/
And here’s another to English Proverbs:
http://www.quotationspage.com/quotes/English_Proverb/

Dynamic Dialogue:

A dialogue is a verbal exchange between two or more people. It is an invaluable tool in character development. Making a dynamic and interesting dialogue is more than just coming up with great writing. Take a look at how you can make your dialogue more fun for the player:

• Through Message Scripts
  

Message scripts such as ccoa’s UMS have many functions that allow for a flowing and dynamic dialogue. Here are some ways to enhance reaction in dialogue:

- Use of avatar pictures.

Obviously, this is the simplest way to show a character’s reaction. The avatar at the side of the screen that designates who’s speaking can also show facial expression that gives tone to the dialogue.

There are great face maker programs out there that can help you create avatar graphics. Otherwise, taking a bit of time to edit the existing avatar graphics might make a big impact on the enjoyment players get out of your game.

- Use of speed in letter-by-letter message display.

Adjusting the speed of the letter-by-letter display can add a lot of drama to the game. For example, if a dying character were to say “Forgive me” very slowly, it would set a sad and tragic mood to the story.

- Use of auto-close and slave windows.
One of the things that is more difficult to display is when a character is interrupted while speaking. The auto-close function makes this possible. It can be a very useful tool in creating conflict or an action sequence.
If you are using ccoa's UMS, note that it supports the possibility of slave windows. What these essentially do is allow 2 message windows to be displayed at the same time. This is an extremely effective way to show when a speech is interrupted or when multiple people are speaking at the same time.

- Use of positioned windows.
A window that appears over the head of the speaker can be very useful in conveying emotion or a reaction. The window’s position prevents any confusion as to where the reaction is coming from. Furthermore, the ever popular ellipse (…), exclamation point, question mark or one-word expressions can be used more effectively.

• Without Message Scripts
  

Same of the ways to display reaction aren’t dependent on the message system itself. These tips are useful for all game creators, whether they’re using a specialized message system or not:

- Use of pause (wait command).
Pause can be your best friend. Not only does it set pace for the dialogue, but it can be the most powerful way to convey emotion. For example, the heroine asks “Do you love me?” There is a long pause after which the hero replies: “I don’t know.” The pause before the hero spoke said more than his words.
But you need to be careful with pausing as well. Any pause (no matter how small) will slow down the pace of the game. If the pauses are too many and too frequent, the player might grow bored and stop playing. So, save pauses for when they’re really important.

- Use of character graphics.
Matching graphics to the dialogue is a great way to enhance the mood of your game. Regardless of the graphical style you’re using, consider adding a little extra to your character that helps convey their reactions better. It can be as simple as adding an icon with a heart over their head to show they’re in love or as complex as making a brand new action pose to show that they’re mad.
If you’re having trouble with graphics, take a look at the various poses and styles you have available.

- Use of pictures (show picture).
If you’re graphically talented (or if you have an artist willing to help), adding a picture or two can really spruce up the dialogue. This is just an extension to the avatar tip mentioned above, but for those that aren’t using a message system, it can be a great alternative.

- Use of dialogue-enhancing action.
Lastly, using movement and action to spice up the dialogue can make even long exchanges pleasant for the player. A static screen with scrolling text can get tedious and could encourage the player to rush through it without really reading. But when some movement or graphical change is added, the experience becomes like watching a movie and that captures attention better.

Inner Monologue:

Including inner monologue in a story is entirely up to the writer. Good inner monologue can be great in developing a character or the world that the character lives in. Through inner monologue, one can get a better idea of the motivation and the values of a hero. On the other hand, misplaced or pointless inner monologue can turn players off and make a character annoying.

There isn’t a perfect place where inner monologue should be used. Some game makers like using inner monologue when giving the player a choice in performing an action.
For example:
While standing in front of a drawer:
.o(Should I open this drawer?)
Yes
No

Other game makers like to use inner monologue to show the character’s true reaction.
For example:
While talking to an old man:
[Old Man]: Hey, baby, wanna dance?
[Heroine]: .o(What a pervert!)
[Heroine]: No, thank you.

And, finally, some game makers use inner monologue when a character interacts with inanimate objects to show the character’s impressions.
For example:
Hero touches a dress:
[Hero]: .o(This dress feels silky soft. It reminds me of the dress Matilda wore to the wedding.)

There are 3 simple rules in making good inner monologue:

• Your character thinks the same way they talk.
  

The same vocabulary and the same accented speech of your character should be used when writing their inner monologue. Inner monologue is essentially the character talking to themselves, and thus they would use the same words as if they were talking to someone else.

Besides, the vocabulary and the accented speech you chose for your character is something that defines them. It is what makes your character unique and memorable. The player may be confused if the character thinks and talks differently.

• Your character interacts with speech, not thought.
  

While it’s interesting to see what a character thinks, it shouldn’t be used as a replacement for actual speech. Unless specifically noted, NPC’s and other characters the player interacts with are not mind readers. As such, make sure that inner monologue is either followed with a speech segment from the hero (even if it’s just a condensed version of the thought) or that it is at the end of the interaction.

• Your character doesn’t need to have an opinion about everything around them.
  

It is tempting to write a quip or two about all the different objects and people the hero encounters, but too much of that can get tiresome for the player. Save inner monologue for thoughts and feelings that are pertinent to the plot or to the character development.

You can also use inner monologue to inject a little humor into your story - especially if your character has strange reactions to objects or people. But be mindful of how important that is to your game and if your time and effort might not be better invested elsewhere.

Conclusion:
I hope that this tutorial will help make your writing experience more enjoyable. If you have any questions or suggestions, comments are welcome!