Regula van Hydrus (potential spoilers until the end of Heavensward)

[Daralii]

If anyone I think Varis is based on Golbez. The figure, cape, and helmet(crown in Varis's case) are similar enough that I don't think it's a coincidence.

[Cooperal]

Regula does indeed have a male voice actor in the EN version. Has anyone checked JP?

Either way, though, as devil's advocate I feel I need to remind that this wouldn't be the first time we've been surprised by the removal a Garlean helmet.

I'm struggling to figure out which Garlean you're talking about here.
If you're talking about Nael Van Darmus, he was still well-established as a male in his original life, so their was nothing misleading about his name or voice provided in 1.0. His essence was merely placed into a female vessel at the Coils and they simply kept the same name. Probably thinking people would think of Nael as a seperate character if they swapped it.

[Arixtotle]

In regards to the naming conventions, while the Garleans do have Latin-esque names, they aren't always straight-up Latin, and there's always the quirk of having a feminine name despite being male.

With the exception of Nael, which is Modern French or Arabic, Cid, who was named after the various other Final Fantasy characters, and Midas, which is Greek, all other named Garleans have Latin names. Gaius, Nero, Livia, Lucia and Regula are all known Ancient Roman names. Solus and Varis are both Latin words but I can't find evidence that they were used as names.

Also, I'm not too sure that quirk exists in Japan like it does in the US.

I'm struggling to figure out which Garlean you're talking about here.
If you're talking about Nael Van Darmus, he was still well-established as a male in his original life, so their was nothing misleading about his name or voice provided in 1.0. His essence was merely placed into a female vessel at the Coils and they simply kept the same name. Probably thinking people would think of Nael as a seperate character if they swapped it.

We're talking about the new Legatus introduced in Heavensward.

[-Krypyonite-]

as said before, nearly all garlean names are from Latin, even their ranks (medicus[medici], hoplmachus[hoplomachi] )

Regula can be translate to ''rule''

Even in some latin and non-latin langauges regula, for example, is a form of the verb that translates to regulate. I think regula can also be an adjective given to someone bossy.

To be honest, i think it fits regula, I, for some reason found him a bit cocky and bossy.

and again, its way of behaving (well, 1.x nael didn't gave it away either) but due to is dialogs and voice acting (ive heard it in game in both english and japanese the Aethereocmical...... facilty fight and sounds male to me.)

[Daralii]

I'm struggling to figure out which Garlean you're talking about here.
If you're talking about Nael Van Darmus, he was still well-established as a male in his original life, so their was nothing misleading about his name or voice provided in 1.0. His essence was merely placed into a female vessel at the Coils and they simply kept the same name. Probably thinking people would think of Nael as a seperate character if they swapped it.

I mean Nael's not that cut and dry. Moose had a good post talking about the ambiguity.

[Arixtotle]

and again, its way of behaving (well, 1.x nael didn't gave it away either) but due to is dialogs and voice acting (ive heard it in game in both english and japanese the Aethereocmical...... facilty fight and sounds male to me.)

I'm sorry. I'm a bit confused. Are you saying Regula "acts male" and therefore is male? There's no such thing as acting male or female.

About the voice acting, that's personally why I'm so confused. All the voice acting is male and yet the name is female. I just can't imagine NO ONE noticing the discrepancy during development or Localization.

[Cilia]

I'm sorry. I'm a bit confused. Are you saying Regula "acts male" and therefore is male? There's no such thing as acting male or female.

About the voice acting, that's personally why I'm so confused. All the voice acting is male and yet the name is female. I just can't imagine NO ONE noticing the discrepancy during development or Localization.

While societal perceptions of it can be different, there are traditional male and female social roles. If the Garleans are based on the Roman Empire, Regula is definitely acting like a male...

... and if your theory is "Regula is a feminine name, therefore van Hydrus must be female," well, things aren't always so cut and dry. There's no evidence to support this either, just the quoted inference. Conversely, there is a considerable amount of evidence pointing the contrary.

For the naming quirk of male Garleans possibly having feminine names, I don't see what Japanese has to do with this. Their names are based on Latin, as you pointed out yourself. Besides which, there are gender-neutral Japanese names, so using this to support your argument is a no-go.

[Arixtotle]

While societal perceptions of it can be different, there are traditional male and female social roles. If the Garleans are based on the Roman Empire, Regula is definitely acting like a male...

... and if your theory is "Regula is a feminine name, therefore van Hydrus must be female," well, things aren't always so cut and dry. There's no evidence to support this either, just the quoted inference. Conversely, there is a considerable amount of evidence pointing the contrary.

For the naming quirk of male Garleans possibly having feminine names, I don't see what Japanese has to do with this. Their names are based on Latin, as you pointed out yourself. Besides which, there are gender-neutral Japanese names, so using this to support your argument is a no-go.

If they were using full Roman societal rules then Livia nor any other female would be in the Imperial Army. If you really look around the game there are no set gender roles except in Miqo'te societies. You cannot say that someone is "acting male" or "acting female" in this game where every gender usually does everything.

I would say the evidence pointing to the contrary is equal to the evidence for it. And yes, having a feminine name is evidence. Just as much as having a masculine voice coming through a magiteck helm is evidence. And one piece of evidence, the voice acting, is not considerable. Especially when the helm worn by the NPC is magitek and could easily disguise or even flat out change a voice.

This isn't about gender-neutral names. This is about gender specific names being given to the opposite gender. And no other Garlean male has a feminine name. Just like no Garlean female has a masculine name. They all fit the gender name "rules". Except for Regula.

[Anonymoose]

If you're talking about Nael Van Darmus, he was still well-established as a male in his original life, so their was nothing misleading about his name or voice provided in 1.0. His essence was merely placed into a female vessel at the Coils and they simply kept the same name.

I mean Nael's not that cut and dry. Moose had a good post talking about the ambiguity.

Looks like I'm to get involved with this thread after all, lol. I'll elaborate a bit on Darnus, first, for the sake of it completeness.

Not every language got the explanation Urianger gave us in English. In fact, French and German did quite the opposite (as far as I can tell, I could easily be mistaken). It seems that Nael's gender was something for which no information needed to exist - which became something for which there was no agreement - which then required some clean-up. Retrospectively and retroactively, you're correct, it seems that (in English, and perhaps now Japanese according to Yoshida at Fan Fest) Nael was a man and was resurrected inaccurately by Bahamut for an unknown reason. But... (and keep in mind that I'm no translator, so my specifics might be mistaken here...)

かつて……弱き少女であった余が、そうであったように……。
Once... I was a weak young girl, such was the case...

I'm reading it right, 余 is an archaic-but-male pronoun and 少女 is "little girl," so he's saying "I (male) was once a weak little girl."
French jumps right on board with this.

Moi aussi, jadis, j'étais faible... une faible jeune femme.
I, too, once, was weak... a weak, little girl.

Likewise, where in English Urianger flat out tells you Bahamut botched his resurrection, in German I think he corrects himself on Nael's feminine gender.

Legatus Nael van Darnus, die „Silberschwinge“, Kommandant ... Kommandantin der berüchtigten VII.
Legatus Nael van Darnus, the "Silverwing", Commander(m) ... Commander(f) of the infamous VIIth.

We can really only say a few things concretely:

• Version 1.0 Nael van Darnus was rendered upon an Elezen Male skeleton.
• Version 1.0 Nael van Darnus used Elezen Male emotes (visual and auditory).
• Version 1.0 Nael van Darnus was assumed to be male in English, but had very few gender clues in Japanese.
• T9 Nael had a Female Garlean skeleton.
• T9 Nael was seen as Female.
• T9 Nael was handled differently by language.
• It appears as though the English team put in some solid effort to make it function as a whole.
• The English retrospective may be the closest to concrete, finalized canon we might ever get (and Yoshida seems to agree).

We can't even say for sure whether he was or wasn't Elezen between the fact that his name is (arguably) French(-ish) whereas the Garleans with Roman names are still rendered upon Elezen skeletons that have had their ears replaced and have been given third eyes.

AS FOR REGULA, this entire conversation so far has been based on their name. Those saying Regula is often a female name are correct. Those saying Regula has used a masculine-sounding voice thus far are in my opinion also correct. For one thing, the masculinity and femininity of names isn't any more absolute than gender norms and stereotypes. I don't think we've seen Garlean helmets used to disguise voices before, but they do have radio and we've never seen a helmet with orange LEDs in it, either, so... debate away!

Just don't forget - SE left plenty of hints either way for Nanamo and went with the she's alive route even after heavily weighing the playing field against it by capitalizing on her death as a dramatic ending. You can only push the "it's probably this" and "this is most likely" so far based on apparent information as of the moment and theoretically established patterns that can easily be overturned.

[Cilia]

Let's break this down.

If they were using full Roman societal rules then Livia nor any other female would be in the Imperial Army. If you really look around the game there are no set gender roles except in Miqo'te societies. You cannot say that someone is "acting male" or "acting female" in this game where every gender usually does everything.

That's why the Garleans are only based on the Roman Empire. For the most part they are very similar, having highly advanced technology compared to their enemies and a love of conquest. However in the same breath they are not Romans - they have their own naming conventions, conscription policies, etc - that differ from those of the Romans. "Garleans = Romans" is not a fair assessment. It's more like "Garleans = ~Romans."

While the miqo'te tribes are the only ones with strict gender roles in the game, that doesn't mean there aren't societal perceptions of male and female behavior. As we know very little about Garlean society outside of their military, I don't think it's unfair to say van Hydrus carries himself in a typically masculine manner. (Such distinctions are largely unimportant in the military anyway.)

I would say the evidence pointing to the contrary is equal to the evidence for it. And yes, having a feminine name is evidence. Just as much as having a masculine voice coming through a magiteck helm is evidence. And one piece of evidence, the voice acting, is not considerable. Especially when the helm worn by the NPC is magitek and could easily disguise or even flat out change a voice.

Having a feminine name is not evidence that van Hydrus is a woman. In spite of the feminine name, everyone refers to him as a man and he has a clearly masculine voice and bearing. He has a male voice actor in every language. If van Hydrus were a woman they probably(?) would have gotten a woman to do him and modulated the voice to make it a surprise. They... didn't.

Voice changer? Maybe. I'm not going to believe he has or is using one until the helmet comes off, though. Despite their grand magitek achievements, we don't know if they have voice changers, and I'm not going to base an argument on the assumption they do or believe any argument that assumes as much.

This isn't about gender-neutral names. This is about gender specific names being given to the opposite gender. And no other Garlean male has a feminine name. Just like no Garlean female has a masculine name. They all fit the gender name "rules". Except for Regula.

Exceptions prove the rule.