Nekomata Okayu: Coolness and Lack Thereof

[@Pentaoku]

Okayu's Super Mario Bros. 2 playthrough was a lot of fun to watch, with plenty of moments were clipping. One of the more amusing things to come out of it was Okayu's talk about her idea of being a "cool and composed" character. Expand for translation notes. 0:01 - Right off the bat, I want to mention that Birdo's Japanese name is "Catherine," so that's what you're hearing Okayu say. Furthermore, in Japan, the game "Super Mario Bros. USA" is what the US release calls "Super Mario Bros. 2." There are various other changes throughout the game, but the JP re-release actually keeps the English names for enemies during the credits, for whatever reason. It's not a big deal in this video, but I thought I'd point that out. 0:14 - Okayu's word here is 絶命, which is like "total annihilation" and other such things. However, since this is a clip, it's hard to give full context, showing her losing each of her lives, so I thought it'd be best to just change it to "Game over." Writing "Annihilated..." would put too much emphasis on the recent Birdo fight, which isn't what Okayu is referencing, and her point is just to express that she's lost all of her lives. Hence, "Game over." Alternatively, I could've written "No more lives..." or something instead, but I think "Game over" fits what she's expressing here just fine. 1:00 - A common theme throughout this video, and throughout a lot of Okayu's recent streams even, is "Okayu saying something that raises a flag, only to immediately trigger that flag seconds later." In Japanese, this is called "フラグ回収," meaning "flag retrieval." In English, we talk about "death flags" but not so much other types of flags. In Japan, "flags" can refer to a lot of other things, and I think they're heavily influenced by VNs and dating sims. But yeah, the pattern of Okayu saying she's got it, only to die a moment later, is preeeetty common recently, and it's also really funny. 2:21 - This was honestly pretty tricky to translate. Okayu says "テンションの振れ幅がやばい," which, literally speaking, means that her range of emotions she expresses is very wide. Essentially, she can be calm, and then swing to screaming and whimpering within the same stream, sometimes within moments of each other. 2:29 - This is a common thing Okayu likes to mention about herself. She thinks she has a deep voice. So do a lot of people who watch her, honestly. Within hololive, there honestly aren't that many people with voices that can be considered "deep," and people usually think of her and Towa when they think of deep voiced members on the JP side. Her image as "cool and composed" is also pretty easy to see, especially if you watched her play games like Jump King or Getting Over It. That said, when you watch her for a long enough time, you can notice moments of her freaking out during horror games, screaming during action games, and just having a wide range of emotions, and not really being composed all the time. She can be both! 3:23 - During Okayu's members only poll about their first impression and current impression of her, the overwhelming majority of her members' first impression was cute, with around 20% or so thinking "cool." As for current impressions, the amount of people who think she's "cool" as their strongest impression of her dwindled down to where it didn't even have a number show up, while "cute" gained an even bigger majority of people's strongest impression of Okayu. That said, there are people who definitely think "cool" is their strongest impression of her, which makes me wonder if that group of people don't watch her as much or have a different definition of "cool." That said, my strongest impression of her is still "Funny," followed by "Kind." 4:01 - A few other members who have mentioned voice acting lessons include Mio and Noel. Some members are even voicing acting in video games now, like Polka, Fubuki, and again, Noel. In the future, we may even see Okayu voice act a character in a game or something in the future! 4:41 - I actually 100% agree with the voice acting teacher, I don't think Okayu's voice is actually low. At lowest, I'd say it's like, medium. It's _lower_ compared to most hololive members, and she _can_ sing low notes in songs very well, but in general, I don't think I'd call it a low voice. My idea of a low voice from a Japanese woman is more along the lines of like, Miyuki Sawashiro, or Romi Park, and maybe that's what her teacher is thinking too. Though, I'd also argue Okayu's voice has changed a bit since she first started, and her voice is noticeably higher than back in 2019, or 2020, where it was a bit lower (you can actually hear it getting higher from 2019->2020, and 2020->2021!). The chat's response to this had some people just as surprised as Okayu at first, but the overwhelming response after that was "Yeah, actually, your voice isn't low." coupled with stuff like "You've finally realized it, huh?" I'd go as far as to argue that within hololive, her voice is even higher than Suisei's is now, especially since Suisei now speaks with a much lower voice. That said, within hololive, the only JP members who are lower than her are like... Suisei, Towa, Kanata, Subaru. Maybe a few others? 4:48 - The original line was "it was like lightning striking in my head," which is supposed to be like those scenes in manga or anime where a character hears something so shocking, lightning falls. It's kind of a pain to illustrate that, so I just went with her speaking in hyperbole since it's similar. 5:30 - I thought it'd be neat to include a comparison between 2019 Okayu and 2021 Okayu for a small idea of how she's changed a bit. The way she says her greeting, her outfit, her mic quality, the tone and pitch of her speech, etc. etc.

[@highlight0001]

Thanks for the translation! Okayi set herself with all those flags of saying saying a level/boss was easy lol Also appreciate all the notes for each time stamp, always a nice read as I'm watching the video

[@reverieneko]

I fall into the category that voted "cool" as my first impression of her, but those were from the very first clip I watched of her, and that didn't really last very long lol She's definitely more on the cute and funny side, and always kind. But never fails to find a way to tease others when the opportunity shows itself. That said, she does have her cool moments, especially when she sings.

[@Temari_Virus]

The stages of Okayu: Stage 1: what a cute catgirl -with a hot collarbone- Stage 2: so she's actually a playful harem master with on remorse Stage 3: her range is actually pretty wide and damn her singing is *chef's kiss* 👌 Stage 4: cute, cool, silly, scared, hoodie, sailor, etc - all forms of Okayu are the best! Stage 5: Oshio's Okayuism

[@principalflame5199]

Okayu's voice isn't so "low" as it is "smooth"; even when she gets higher pitched and loud, she doesn't usually get shrill like Miko or Korone. For a (great) example of a (fantastic) female VTuber with a naturally low voice, listen to Ryugasaki Rene of Sugar Lyric (part of 774 inc). She has a big vocal range but her natural voice is authentically deep.

[@pfune3811]

The EN fandom is very hungry for Okayu clippers so i am very grateful. Thanks for the translation, notes at the comments, clear subtitles, etc.

[@nitrix6538]

Okayu's tone has definitely changed from last time. I feel that last time she was more chill and relaxed compared to how excited and hyper she is now. And I love both sides so much

[@Okatogurui]

sounds like she's having an identity crisis

[@mitsudrops]

Her voice, become more high

[@cat-three]

I didn't know about the voice acting teacher noticing her voice isn't actually low, now I know I'm not crazy...

[@Rehan-ir8xv]

Thank you for the clip