On occasion, a game that was originally written/released in Japanese will have a passage like “you found <>” or they’ll have a mark around the top left and bottom right edges of the phrase (e.g. “let’s go to the ⌈Hot Spring⌋”). I’ve never been able to figure out what they mean. I’ve always assumed it meant the phrase was used as a proper noun or name, but that doesn’t always make sense.
Guillemets « » ‹ › 《 》 〈 〉are quotation marks used in, well, a lot of languages.
brackets 「…」『…』you see a lot in Japanese, Chinese
In all cases, they are quotation marks.
Now, why would someone suggest going to the “Hot Spring” instead of the Hot Spring? Not sure, but this could be a use of quotation marks for “emphasis,” which is not always considered correct in English. OTOH normal Japanese text does not have italic fonts so they might be legitimately there for some reason and remained after the rest of the text got translated.
Wikipedia lists a bunch of rules for Japanese, like using double brackets for the titles of books and albums, single brackets for individual works in the collection. For emphasis it says to use “ ” or〝 〟, 「 」may be used but you want to avoid mixing it up with its other uses.
I’m fairly sure that if you want to emphasize something in Japanese, you write it in katakana. Or at least, it’s a way, as it’s visually distinct. It’s basically like italics, especially when considering it’s how you also write words borrowed from other languages; this is done in English for foreign words that aren’t completely considered borrowed yet (at least by major publishers), while Japanese does it for any word borrowed from somewhere other than Chinese hundreds of years ago.
You may be right: the Japanese examples using from Wikipedia using different types of quotation marks for emphasis seem to be more like irony quotes and setting off technical terms.
OK but note also stuff like this:
Anyway, I guess I was wrong and am still not sure exactly why someone would write「Hot Springs」; then again after translation any Katakana is lost unless the translator really does specify the use of a variant font like italic or boldface. Or maybe in the OP’s example “Hot Spring” was actually the name of a club or something?
In my understanding of written English, writing Let’s go to “Hot Springs” implies that Hot Springs is some kind of euphemism or it’s a place that is not spoken about in respectable company.
Using quotes for emphasis is bad because it can actually reverse the meaning. I saw a sign over a store that said - “Best” Bargains in town". This implies that the “bargains” are not really the best.
I don’t think it’s exactly the same as quote marks. In my Chinese language textbook, guillemets are often used around the first instance of a proper noun, something we do not use quote marks for in English. It’s something equivalent to italics e.g. A Christmas Carol is written << 圣诞颂 >>
This would make more sense for << hot spring >> btw; in the original Japanese it could have been referring to a specific place or establishment, and the best translation was just to change it to a common noun.
+1
I was composing an answer guessing the same thing. Some place or something known to the general national population, but unknown to Westerners.
It may also not be something related to the Japanese language but something specific to the game mechanic. For example there may be a map location labeled “Hot Springs” that the player is supposed to go to. and the game wants the player to know that this conversation refers to that specific place.
Yes, this is the reason. The emphasized words are proper names of game items or locations or otherwise denote to the player there is game significance to the phrase. The brackets are the equivalent of quotes or bold text in an English version.
To use the example in the OP, there is difference between an NPC saying “I took a dip in the hot springs and felt refreshed!” and “I took a dip in the Hot Springs and felt refreshed!” The first is just some flavor text to give the NPC and surroundings some personality. The second is a hint to the player there is/are some specific named place(s) called the Hot Springs and if the player visits one they will recover health and mana.
Or, if the player is at a certain part of the game and a lot of characters are talking about the Hot Springs it is a hint the player should go there to progress in the game.