序言

As a coordinator for the player based translation group, I have been talking with many vn developers over the past few years. And I am quite impressive about ebi since she's never been a procrastinator! Personally speaking, she could definitely write a book about Effective VN Game Development.  

这几年和不少视觉小说的开发打过交道，ebi 真的特别与众不同，经常开坑不说，还很擅长填坑。行事干净利落，完全可以出一本《高效游戏开发指南》。

The music from Blackberry is really amazing, so I asked the composer yuzuki if TA would accept my interview. Surprisingly TA is an easy going person and finished the interview questions within a day. 

《黑莓蜜糖》的配乐特别出色，所以我也去试着去联系了游戏的作曲 yuzuki。没想到 TA 是个意外健谈的人，几乎半天时间就交上了答卷。 

So, in this article, I would interview both the author ebi and the composer yuzuki. Besides general questions like "Who are you? Where are you from? What's next?", I invited two translators to talk about their feedback. Somehow, they want to know the same question—Is Constance gonna be happy someday?

本次采访对象有《黑莓蜜糖》的作者 ebi 和作曲者 yuzuki。除了“你在哪里，你从哪里来，你要哪里去”的常规问题，还另外邀请了两位小伙伴谈谈自己的感想。结果大家铺垫了那么久，最后都归结到一个问题——那位傲娇的大小姐会幸福吗？

人气超高的康斯坦丝大小姐

Well, I am more curious about how the game is developed, how the music is created, and more about the creators behind those work~ Overall thanks ebi and yuzuki for taking time to do this interview, and thank you for taking time to read this long article. Anyway hope you might enjoy it XD

相比之下，我更好奇关于游戏开发和音乐创作的话题，想拼凑出游戏背后的作者形象。总之，谢谢两位作者抽时间回答了这个超长的采访问卷，也谢谢大家抽时间阅读。希望这篇采访稿能给大家带来一些快乐吧~

Btw you can follow them on twitter!

ebi，游戏的作者：https://twitter.com/ebihimes

ebi的推特！

yuzuki，游戏的编曲：https://twitter.com/yuzukimasu

yuzuki的推特！

注意

• 头图是 ebi 推特里的一张图哈哈哈哈
• 容我慢慢翻译采访正文~

采访正文

Hi ebi and yuzuki, I am Alwaysmadowl XD, glad to have an interview with you guys! Thanks for making such a wonderful story together for us. Here I list some questions below.

哈喽 ebi 和 yuzuki！我又来啦~ 很感谢你们抽空参与采访。谢谢你们协力做出了《黑莓蜜糖》这款游戏，以下为具体的采访内容~

#1 作者专访：集作者和开发为一体的 @ebi

Q1 Can you introduce a bit about yourself?

简单介绍一下自己吧！

Hi, my name is ebi, and I write visual novels! I’ve been writing visual novels for about 6 years now, though my first stories were pretty bad… Back then, I didn’t have much of a budget, so I used creative commons (i.e. free) art, music, and backgrounds, and my writing wasn’t very polished either. I hope my stories have gotten a little better over time!

大家好，我是 ebi！我是一位视觉小说游戏的开发者！目前我已经开发了六年视觉小说游戏，不过我做的第一款游戏特别糟糕……当时我的预算有限，所以我只能利用免费的美术、音乐、背景素材，而且故事也没好好打磨。希望我这几年的游戏质量有所提升吧！

I’ve wanted to be a writer ever since I was young, and I’m really happy my stories have managed to reach a wider audience - and that a few of them have been translated into other languages! I think that’s really amazing, and I’m thankful to everybody who took the time to read my stories (even some of the very bad early ones... ;;).

从小我就想成为一名作家，所以我很开心看到自己的作品吸引到了很多的玩家，有的作品甚至被翻译成了其他的语言！这真的太棒了！此外，我也衷心地感谢每一位玩家花时间去体验我的游戏（虽然早期的几部作品的确很糟糕……;;）

译者注：ebi 超喜欢用各种颜文字~ 比如说  o'A'o  >_<  o:  u_u  XD  :/

无比配合本地化工作的ebi！

Q2 What’s your favourite game and anime?

你最喜欢的游戏和动漫是什么？

My favourite anime is probably Princess Tutu (the ending made me cry lol). I also like Rose of Versailles,  Magical Stage Fancy Lala, Welcome to the NHK, Kaiji, and The Tatami Galaxy! (That's a lot of anime haha). I’m particularly fond of magical girl series and melodrama.

我最喜欢的动漫是《萩萩公主》，结局把我看哭了lol。我也很喜欢《凡尔赛玫瑰》，《魔法小美穗》，《欢迎加入 NHK》，《赌博默示录》和《四叠半神话大系》！（真是好长的一个清单哈哈哈！）我尤其喜欢魔法少女系列和情景剧。

I’ve watched a lot of anime, but I don’t play many games. I also don’t have any modern consoles, other than a PS Vita (which I think is a bit outdated now anyway). I’ve played a few JRPGS like FFX, Kingdom Hearts, and Persona 3-5, but that’s about it.

虽然我是个动漫迷，但是实际上我没玩过多少游戏。我也没有太多主流的游戏机，只有一台有点过时的 PSV。大概玩过几款日本的 RPG 游戏，比如说《最终幻想Ⅹ》，《王国之心》和《女神异闻录 3~5》系列。但除此之外，我几乎不玩游戏。

Q3 What inspired you to become a Yuri VN author?

你为什么会选择成为百合视觉小说游戏的作者呢？

I like writing visual novels, I like writing romance stories, and I find female characters easier to write than male ones (maybe because I’m a woman haha ;;) I also like designing cute girls more than boys, so it seemed kind of natural.

我喜欢创作浪漫故事，也喜欢开发视觉小说游戏。可能因为我自己是个女生，所以感觉女性角色比男性角色更好写吧~比起可爱的男孩子，我更喜欢设计萌妹，所以我就自然而然地开始创作百合题材游戏了。

I would probably get bored if I only wrote one sort of story, though, so I don’t write yuri exclusively. I’ve written pretty much every type of romance story (though I haven’t published my BxB story yet, and I’m not sure if I will), and some of my stories don’t have any romance at all. Experimenting with the things I write keeps things interesting!

不过，题材过于单一的话，我很可能就会丧失兴趣，所以我不光创作百合题材的游戏。虽然我还没发行过 BL 游戏，不确定以后会不会开发这类游戏，但是我基本上写过各种类型的恋爱故事。我也写过一些不涉及恋爱的故事，总之，我会进行各类试验性的创作，这样会让写作变得更有趣！

大小姐和洛里纳

Q4 You have been posting tweets on your new project The Language of Love, could you mind to introduce a bit about it?

最近，我们看到你在推特上公布的新项目《The Language of Love》，能和我们介绍一下嘛？

The Language of Love is a cute BxG VN featuring a single mother as the main (and only) ******e. It’s a light and fluffy story set in Japan, so it’s pretty different from Blackberry Honey. I guess it’s more similar to traditional Japanese eroge like Navel’s Shuffle!, except it’s not set in a school, and the main characters are both *****s (well, in their early twenties) who have more responsibilities than teenagers would.

《The Language of Love》是一款很萌的 BG 游戏，这作只有一位女主角，是位单亲妈妈。这个故事背景发生在日本，算是剧情轻快的小黄油吧（译者注：诶？？？），所以这款游戏和《黑莓蜜糖》有很大的区别。我感觉它更接近传统的日式黄油，比如说 Navel 推出的 18 X 恋爱冒险游戏《SHUFFLE!》吧，只不过《The Language of Love》没有采用校园设定，而且主角都是成年人（大概二十出头嗯），比青少年要肩负更多的责任。

It’s not a yuri story, and it’s not very similar to Blackberry Honey. I hope you’re not disappointed, haha.

而且这也不是一款百合游戏，与《黑莓蜜糖》不太一样。希望你不会感到太失望哈哈。（译者注：不会！也很期待的 XD）

ebi的诸多作品，你玩过哪几款呢？

Q5 You have released so many games on steam! How could you be so productive?

ebi 大佬，你已经在 Steam 上发布了很多游戏！你怎么会这么高产？！

I write a lot of stories because I really like writing! I’ve written stories from a really young age (I still own some stories I wrote in notebooks when I was about seven), and when I was a teenager I wrote a lot of fanfiction. I got into the habit of writing at least a few thousand words every day when I was about 15-16, and I still try to write a few thousand words a day now. Otherwise, I don’t feel fulfilled, and then I feel depressed... 

我之所以写了这么多故事，完全是因为我真的很喜欢写作！我从很小的时候就开始写东西了（我至今还保留了 7 岁时写的东西呢），而且我十几岁的时候就已经写了很多同人文。在十五、六岁的时候，我养成了一个习惯，大概每天至少都要写上几千字。现在，我仍然保持着这个习惯。要不然我就觉得少了点什么，然后整个人会变得特别丧……

I also have a long list of story ideas, and I add to it whenever I get new ideas, so hopefully I won’t run out of things to write any time soon!

我还有一个超长的脑洞清单，每次一有新想法，我就会把脑洞加到上面，所以希望短时间内我都有东西可写吧！

Q6 What games are you playing these days?

最近在玩什么游戏呢？

I don’t play games at all these days, I’m sorry u_u I don’t have the consoles, my laptop isn’t high-spec enough to handle most games, and games tend to be so long I don’t have the patience for them. I spend more time reading books and watching anime.

其实近来我都不怎么玩游戏，很抱歉啊 u_u 我没有主机，笔记本的性能也不怎么样，大部分游戏都跑不了。而且游戏都好长啊，我真没耐心去玩它们。我更习惯看书籍还有动漫！

#2 作者专访：作曲大佬 @yuzuki

Q1 Can you introduce a bit about yourself? 

大佬好，麻烦介绍一下自己吧~

Sure, I go by yuzuki (lowercase please) and I write music for games. Most of it is for visual novels but I’ve also done music for action games, RPGs, and other things here and there. I started writing music when I was in high school and am mostly self-taught.

没问题，叫我 yuzuki 就好（请注意是小写），我是游戏的作曲。我的大部分作品都是视觉小说，但我也给动作游戏，RPG 和其他东西作过曲。高中的时候我就开始编曲了，而且基本上我都是靠自学的。

图源：https://twitter.com/yuzukimasu/status/1145841279160344576

Q2 What inspired you to start creating music?

出于什么契机开始投身编曲呢？

Well, I played a lot of video games in high school and I was really into JRPGs, so I put a lot of time into games like Final Fantasy IV - VI, Lufia, Chrono Trigger, and Xenogears. Those games had a very strong influence on me and I knew I wanted to be able to write pieces like that some day. I used to spend a lot of time transcribing the tracks onto sheet music as practice to see what Nobuo Uematsu and Yasunori Mitsuda were doing.

高中的时候，我玩了很多游戏，而且我真的特别喜欢日式 RPG，所以花了很多时间去玩这类游戏，比如说《最终幻想》系列的 4 到 6，还有《四狂神战记（Lufia）》，《时空之轮（Chrono Trigger）》和《异度装甲（Xenogears）》。这些游戏都对我产生了很大的影响，我梦想着有朝一日能创作出类似的音乐。以前的时候，我经常花很多时间去听谱，把这些配乐抄在谱子上作为练习，看看植松伸夫（Nobuo Uematsu，《最终幻想》系列的核心音乐制作人）和光田康典（Yasunori Mitsuda，当代日本优秀作曲家之一）是怎么创作音乐的。

Q3 What’s your favourite game and anime?

你最喜欢的游戏和动漫有哪些呢？

I don’t really have a single favorite game or anime, but I like playing Melty Blood, the fighting game based on the Tsukihime visual novel, and I play a lot of Fate/Grand Order. As far as anime, I think I would say Psycho Pass Season 1 is probably one of my all-time favorites.

很难选出特定的游戏或动漫啊，不过我挺喜欢玩《月姬格斗（Melty Blood）》，这是一款基于《月姬（Tsukihime）》的格斗游戏。而且我也经常玩《Fate/Grand Order》。至于动漫嘛，《心理测量者（Psycho-Pass）》的第一季大概是我最喜欢的动漫之一！

Q4 What games are you playing these days?

最近在玩什么游戏呢？

Mostly FGO and Melty Blood, haha. I don’t really have a lot of time to play games so anything that’s longform isn’t really an option, and both of those games can be played in short bursts.

我大部分时间都在玩《Fate/Grand Order》和《月姬格斗》。其实我真的没多少时间去玩游戏，所以太长的游戏真的玩不动，刚才说的两款游戏都很适合碎片化时间去体验。

#3 游戏专访

Q1 You mentioned Umineko a lot in Music Box, and it seems that you are quite familiar with traditional Chinese instruments. What’s your favourite?

yuzuki 大佬，经常看到你在八音盒中提到《海猫鸣泣之时》，而且你似乎对中国传统乐器挺熟悉的，那么哪个是你的最爱呢？

yuzuki: I’m actually not suuuuuper well-versed with Chinese instruments despite actually being Asian… though my favorite would have to be the erhu, predictably enough. The erhu’s sound is very iconic and distinct and has a rich, mysterious quality to it that I really like.

yuzuki：实际上，虽然我是亚洲人，但我并不精通中国乐器……不过我最喜欢的应该是二胡吧。二胡的音色很独特，特别有特色，音域很广，而且听起来神秘，所以我真的很喜欢这种乐器。

字体和游戏风格特别搭！

Q2 All the music in game is pretty amazing! Personally speaking, Waltz is the best! Thanks for sharing your thoughts in Music Box, it definitely helps players to understand the story behind each character. How could you come up with so many ideas, like creating a theme music for each character and scene?

游戏中的音乐都太棒了！我自己最喜欢的就是华尔兹！十分感谢 yuzuki 大佬在八音盒中与玩家分享了自己的感想，它们都有助于玩家更好地了解每个角色背后的故事。话说，你是怎么想到这些曲子的呢？比如说为每个角色和场景创造出不同的主题曲？

yuzuki: Ah, by Waltz you mean English Rose… that one’s actually my favorite as well! When I was working on the soundtrack, I did the opening theme first to establish the leitmotifs for the game and wrote a couple “easy” tracks before getting into the themes. English Rose was when the general tone of the game started coming together and most of the character themes came after it, since from that point I started getting a better understanding of what I wanted the soundtrack to be like as a whole.

yuzuki：啊，华尔兹嘛，你是说《英国玫瑰吗》？实际上，我也最喜欢那首曲子了！配乐的时候，我先创作了游戏的开场曲，奠定了游戏的基调，然后在创作主题曲之前再写了几首比较“简单”的曲子。总体基调完成差不多之后，我才创作了《英国玫瑰》，随后完成了大部分角色的主题曲。因为总体基调完成之后，我大概知道自己想要的整体感觉了。

As for coming up with ideas, it really depends. One very crucial element for me is to experience the story I’m writing music for so I can see how dialogue is framed and presented, and what the mood of each scene is supposed to be like. Another element is how catchy a melody is… since this is music meant to be looped and listened to for long periods of time as a reader is going through the game, it must be enjoyable to listen to over and over again. My basic criteria is: if the song doesn’t make you hum along or gets stuck in your head, it’s probably not good enough to be a character theme.

至于创作的脑洞吗，那就视情况而定了。对于我来说，故事的体验是一个很重要的创作元素，这样一来，我就能够了解作者如何构建和表现游戏的对话，并知晓每个场景的氛围基调。另一个元素则是旋律的调式了……鉴于这是段循环播放的音乐，大家肯定要听好多遍，所以曲子一定要特别耐听。听到曲子之后，如果你会跟着哼唱，或者它在你脑海中挥之不去，那么它就达到了我个人的基本标准。否则的话，它还不够出色，无法作为角色的主题曲。

yuzuki在八音盒中留下了自己的许多感言

Q3 Since you mentioned Blackberry Honey is one of your favourite, what’s your game review for it?

你说到《黑莓蜜糖》是你最喜欢的游戏之一，那对此有什么玩家感想呢？

yuzuki: 9/10! Needed more Constance.

yuzuki：满分 10 分的话，我给 9 分！强烈要求多出点大小姐的剧情！

Q4 I know ranking them could be difficult, but I would like to know your favourite characters in Blackberry Honey! (TOP 5!)

我知道排名很不厚道，但还是想知道两位心目中的前五角色排名！

 yuzuki:

1. Constance
2. Constance
3. Constance
4. Emilie
5. Constance did nothing wrong

yuzuki：

1 康斯坦丝小姐

2 康斯坦丝小姐

3 康斯坦丝小姐

4 埃米莉

5 康斯坦丝小姐什么都没做错丫

让人怜爱的大小姐

ebi: I don’t think there are that many fleshed-out characters in Blackberry Honey, other than Taohua, Lorina, and Constance… Theodora and Emilie are pretty much reskins of characters from one of my older stories (The Way We All Go) so I’m not sure if they really count! There’s a few side characters, but they don’t get much screen time or character development, so it’s hard to class them as proper characters... 

ebi：除了桃花，洛里纳和康斯坦丝以外，其他角色估计也没什么好选选了……西奥多拉和埃米莉是以前故事的角色（《The Way We All Go》），所以我不确定这两个算不算数！游戏中还有几个龙套角色，不过他们没太多出场机会，角色也没什么发展，所以很难把他们归类为合适的备选角色……（译者注：ebi 你太严谨了！感觉这大概是 ebi 的脑内活动吧哈哈哈）

My favourite character is probably Constance, followed by Taohua and Lorina. Constance is pretty horrible, but there’s something tragic about her, too! I’m also fond of unpleasant female characters who have sad backstories. As for the side characters, I like Lieselotte a lot. She’s very cute!

我最喜欢的大概是康斯坦丝，然后是桃花和洛里纳吧。康斯坦丝是个很糟糕的角色，但她也是个悲剧人物！我很喜欢这种有着惨痛经历的反面女性角色。配角嘛，我比较喜欢莉泽洛特。她超可爱！

Q5 How did you know yuzuki and decide to work with him for Blackberry Honey?

你如何认识yuzuki，最终与对方一起合作创作《黑莓蜜糖》呢？

ebi: I’ve known yuzuki for a while, and he’d already done the music for one of my past VNs, Strawberry Vinegar. I knew he was pretty good at composing classical music, so I approached him with the idea for this story and he was very enthusiastic! It helped that he read through the story before making the soundtrack (some composers don’t read the story - especially longer stories, like BH), and he liked the characters.

ebi：我认识 yuzuki 有一段时间了，他曾经帮我以前的作品《Strawberry Vinegar》作过曲。我知道他很擅长创作古典音乐，所以我把剧情内容告诉他之后，他对此十分感兴趣！作曲之前，他看完了整个故事内容，这起到了很大的帮助（有的作曲家不读剧情故事，尤其是像《黑莓蜜糖》这种比较长的故事），而且他喜欢故事中的角色。

Yuzuki worked very hard on the soundtrack (and turned the tracks over in a really short amount of time), and I’m very happy with how things turned out! I especially like the opening song! BH is the first of my VNs to have an opening with vocals, so that’s pretty special o'A'o

yuzuki 非常努力地为游戏作曲（而且在很短的时间内就完成了！），我真的很高兴听到他创作的这些曲目！尤其是开场曲！（译者注：我们也为开场曲配了中文字幕，大家感兴趣可以在 Steam 商店页面看看~）我写了好几部视觉小说，《黑莓蜜糖》是第一部有人声演唱开场曲的作品，所以它真的有着很特殊的地位 o'A'o

我们也为OP做了字幕！

Q6 How did you get inspiration for character design, stories for your games? The interpersonal relationship seems really complicated among all the characters.  Could you spoiler a bit about what could happen in future?

角色和故事的设计灵感从何而来呢？每个角色之间的关系真的好复杂啊，你可以剧透一下剧情以后的发展嘛？

ebi: The inspiration for BH mostly came from reading historical novels set in the 1800s, a few discussions with one of my friends, and my fondness for cute maids! I like maids a lot, so I’d wanted to write a story with Victorian maids for a while~

ebi：《黑莓蜜糖》的故事大部分源于 19 世纪的历史小说，还加入了我和朋友的一些讨论，当然了，里面还有我的最爱——女仆元素！我特别喜欢女仆，所以一直都很想写点关于维多利亚时期女仆的故事~

After I had the setting in mind, and some of the characters, their personalities and relationships developed somewhat naturally... 

设定好这个大背景之后，角色，性格和关系也就自然而然写出来了……

As for the ‘future’ of the characters, I don’t usually think about things like that. My stories exist because I want to write them, and they stop when I feel the most interesting events have already occurred. Sometimes I get the urge to write sequels or short ‘what-if’ scenarios based on some of my characters, but that’s quite rare. It’s hard to find the time when I have so many other things I want to write haha ;;

关于角色的“未来问题”嘛，我一般都不会考虑这些事情。因为我想写故事，所以这些故事就出现了，一般最有趣的事件发生之后，故事也就随之结束了。有时候我会产生冲动，想给角色写一些“what-if（万一……如何如何）”的小剧场，但这种情形还是比较少的。毕竟我还有好多故事要写，很难抽时间来做这些事情啊哈哈 ;;

Q7 As a Chinese player, I am very curious about Taohua. How did you come up with idea, like her name and the background story?

作为一名中国玩家，我对桃花这个角色充满了好奇。你是如何设计这样一个角色的呢？比如说她的姓名和故事背景之类的？

ebi: Part of BH’s story is based on the feeling of being an ‘outsider’ in a xenophobic culture/country that doesn’t really accept you. I got the idea after talking to one of my good friends, who was born in China, and went to live in America at an early age. They told me a bit about the discrimination they faced, and how they were bullied/teased because they looked ‘different’ to everybody else. Then, there’s also the feeling that you ‘belong’ to another culture, but you no longer live in that country, so over time you can forget your own traditions, or forget the language you grew up speaking...  I used some of my friend’s experiences (with permission!) to form the basis of Taohua’s character, and I asked them for some feedback while working on the story.

ebi：《黑莓蜜糖》的部分故事是基于这么一种感觉，那就是在一个排外文化或者国家中身为“局外人”的感受，实际上你真的很难被这样的文化或者国家所接纳。我有一个好朋友，对方在中国出生，但很小就来到了美国。聊完之后，我就产生了这样的想法。他们告诉我了自己所面临的歧视，还有由于外表的差异，他们如何被其他人欺凌和取笑。另外，还有一种感觉就是你“属于”另一种文化，但你却不在那个国家生活，所以随着时间的推移，你会渐渐忘了自己的传统，忘了从小使用的语言……我借用了朋友的某些经历（有得到他们的授权哦！）来构建了桃花这个角色。写作的时候，我也向他们寻求了建议和反馈。

Naturally, Taohua’s experiences are a little different to that because BH is set in Victorian England. Back in the 19th century, Chinese porcelain was highly valued, and a lot of rich people collected Chinese art. Lots of old British homes that are open to the public have Chinese-styled rooms filled with tapestries and pottery that was originally made in China. Chinese art was highly prized, but the British viewed Chinese people themselves as ‘inferior’. Taohua is half-Chinese, and a maid - and maids were already considered ‘inferior’ in British high society, regardless of race. Taohua is treated more like a piece of porcelain than a person, and is valued as being an ‘exotic’ curio. This gives her a slightly higher status than the other maids, in some respect, because she’s perceived as being more ‘unique’ than they are, and therefore more ‘valuable’... but this distances Taohua from everybody else. She doesn’t have any real friends, and most people perceive her negatively because of their own racial biases... 

当然，桃花这个角色还是有点不一样的，毕竟故事是设定在维多利亚时期的英格兰。19 世纪的时候，中国的瓷器备受关注，很多富人都有收藏中国艺术品的习惯。如今，许多对外开放的英国家庭中都有中式的房间，里面挂满了中国制造的挂毯，摆满了中国制造的瓷器。那时候，中国艺术品很受欢迎，但英国人却将中国人视为“下等人”。桃花就有中国人的血统，她还是一个女仆。在英国社会中，无论你是什么种族，女仆本来就是“下等人”。桃花与其说是一个人，她其实更像是一个瓷器，被周围人视为“异域”的古玩。从某种程度来说，她确实比其他女仆地位高一些，因为她比其他人更特别，也因此更有价值……但是这也让桃花与其他人产生了距离。她没有真正的朋友，大多人都因为自己的偏见而对桃花持有负面的看法……

Naturally, Taohua isn’t very happy with being treated like an object, or being looked down on by her peers, so she has quite a cynical outlook on life. She bullies Lori a little, and has a bit of a sadistic streak, mostly because she’s been treated poorly by other people, and this is the only way she can think of evening out the status quo.

桃花当然也不愿意被别人当成一件物品，更不愿意被同龄人看不起，所以她其实是个愤世嫉俗的人。她有时候会欺负洛里纳，有点 S 倾向（译者注：没错哈哈哈哈！）主要是因为她总被别人欺负，而这是唯一能够让她缓解情绪的方式。

Taohua’s backstory was more or less influenced by the historical period the story is set in. Since Britain and China were trading at the time, there were Chinese sailors in Britain, and some of them settled in Britain, or had children with British women. As for Taohua’s name, I asked one of my friends who had lived in China for a while for Chinese girls’ names that wouldn’t be out-of-place in the 19th century, and they came up with Taohua. I thought it was cute, so I kept it!

桃花的背景故事或多或少受到了历史的影响。由于当时英国和中国有贸易往来，所以英国当时也有一些中国水手，有的人就留在了英国，或者与英国女性生了孩子。至于桃花的名字嘛，我有个朋友在中国生活过一段时间，我问对方哪些名字适合 19 世纪的背景设定，他们就想到了“桃花”这个名字。我觉得这名字很可爱，所以就决定采用它了！

Q8 Do you plan to make any DLCs for Blackberry Honey? 

《黑莓蜜糖》会推出 DLC 吗？

ebi: I have no plans to release any DLC for BH. Sorry!

ebi：不好意思！不会的！

#4 汉化组成员提问 @龙TOKI

I think Constance is really well portrayed among all characters. From the beginning she's just a typical mean girl from an old money family, somehow her personality was revealed when Lorina walked into her life. Gradually players could see her true self and their relationship was getting better, so I was expecting there might be an end for Lorina/Constance.

Later Constance nearly drove me crazy with her kiss scene, I think it's really sad that Lorina could not sense the hidden struggle behind her.

The way Constance behaved is not totally her own fault, and every player could agree that she deserves a better future.

I was also sad when Taohua and Lorina ran away, Constance did not occur in the game any more, kind of left into some unknown place, losing her only silver lining Lorina. How could she deal with  such big change?

Q What could possibly happen next? I really wonder your thoughts on Constance's future.

关于康丝坦斯大小姐，个人认为她是角色刻画得最为饱满的一人。最初期开始是典型的刻薄富家子弟印象，然而随着洛里与她的接触变多，康丝坦斯的面纱就像是一点点被揭掉一样，玩家逐渐能窥得她真心的一角。到了中期两人关系有所缓和，更是心中期待了一下会不会有洛里×康丝坦斯线。

康丝坦斯的一吻令我彻底疯狂，她的矛盾都纠缠在了这一吻里，然而洛里并不能发现这一点，令人感到无比悲哀。
这样一个因为家庭背景被教育走偏了的孩子，每个人都希望她能worth a better future
所以当私奔的结局突如其来，我发现再也没有康丝坦斯的戏份时，内心感到了一丝失落与担忧，被遗留在那样黑暗的环境中，甚至失去了唯一有可能成为她的silver lining的洛里，她该如何处置？

所以我非常想知道在您的心中康丝坦斯的未来会是怎么样的呢？

ebi: Constance is very cute! She also ended up being one of my favourite characters, too, though it didn’t start that way. She was intended to be more one-dimensional and villainous, but the more I wrote, the more I got attached to her, so I ended up giving her a bit more of a backstory. In the end, maybe I fleshed her out too much, since she might overshadow the two lead characters haha ;;

ebi：康丝坦斯很可爱！她也是我最喜欢的角色之一，不过刚开始我并不这么觉得啦。本来我只想把她刻画成一个性格单一的邪恶反派，不过写得越多，我就越喜欢这个角色了，所以最后给她增加了一些背景故事。最后，可能我给她加了太多戏，完全盖过了两个主角的风头哈哈 ;;

I wouldn’t have written a Constance route though, because BH is an 18+ game and Constance is still a child. I wouldn’t want people to expect any 18+ scenes with Constance, because 18+ scenes with young characters makes me feel uncomfortable.

尽管如此，我还是不会写康丝坦斯的剧情线，因为《黑莓蜜糖》是款 18X 的游戏，康丝坦斯还只是个孩子。我不希望康丝坦斯出现任何少儿不宜的场景，这么幼龄的角色出现 18X 场景会让我感到特别不适。

 I didn’t think very much about what would happen to Constance next. I don’t think about the fates of my characters after their stories have finished haha ;;; Feel free to imagine what happens for yourself!

我没有想过康丝坦斯的未来。一旦故事完结之后，我就不会再管角色的未来了（译者注：嗯，不管生死了）哈哈哈 ;;; 所以，请尽情发挥你们自己的想象力吧~

#5 汉化组成员提问 @阿橘倒地不起‍ ‍ 

After participating the proofreading and editing for both Sweetest Monster and Blackberry Honey, I find that both games got really amazing characterization. Can you share something about the way to portray their personalities via dialogues? Besides, music seems to be an essential element for both games, e.g. Robin is a music teach and Taohua is a violinist! So do you play any instruments or have you ever taught music before?Blackberry Honey did roughly talk about Taohua’s life when she was a kid, but it rarely mentioned what happened on Lorina’s childhood. I am curious about Lorina’s life before she went to Bly. 

Q What happened before to make her so lonely? Would you mind to spoiler a bit about her background settings? Besides I really would like to know your thoughts on Constance's future.

我参与过《怪物甜心（sweetest monster）》和《黑莓蜜糖》的校润，我注意到两个游戏中的人物性格都特别鲜明，很想向您请教一下在写对话时是如何突出角色不同的特性的？此外这两个游戏都与音乐有一些关系（Robin是音乐教师，而Taohua是个小提琴家），我也挺好奇您是不是也从事或者曾经从事过音乐这一行呢？

BH这个游戏中，只大略讲到Taohua幼年时的经历，但是Lorina之前的经历却鲜少提及。

我很好奇Lorina前往布莱工作之前这段时间是不是经历过什么，是什么让她变得如此孤独呢？不知道您在这方面有做过设定吗？还有，我也很好奇Lady Constance的结局！

ebi: I like writing dialogue a lot, and I find it very fun! It VNs, it’s one of the main ways to communicate characters’ personalities. VNs tend to be more dialogue-heavy than normal novels, since the art assets eliminate the need to describe settings/character appearances (and, to a lesser extent, their expressions and body language). Dialogue is the main way to construct unique characters in VNs.

ebi：我很喜欢写对话，而且我觉得写对话特别有趣！它是视觉小说中传达角色性格的主要方式之一。视觉小说往往比普通小说有更多的对话，因为立绘和场景替代了场景和角色外观的文字描述（以及某些特定的表情和肢体语言）。因此，对话是视觉小说比较独特的构建主元素吧。

I usually create my character personalities based on what I think would play off well with each other and what would result in the most entertaining back-and-forth dialogue sequences. For example, in Sweetest Monster, Robin is kind of dour and has a sarcastic sense of humour, so Bell is very energetic and enjoys teasing people, to offset this. Sometimes, I also write down notes for interesting dialogue exchanges I’d like to write, and sometimes I construct whole scenes based around random dialogue exchange ideas I have.

我经常会基于双方的互动和娱乐性来构建角色的性格，比如说在《怪物甜心（Sweetest Monster）》当中，Robin 性格有点阴沉，总带着点讽刺的幽默感，所以 Bell 就充满了活力，喜欢调戏别人，我用两者的性格作为一个互补。有时候，想到有趣的对话，我也会把它们记录下来。而有时候，我则会根据一些随机对话来构建整个场景。

I can’t play any instruments myself (I wish I could!), but I used to sing in a choir for 11 years. Music was a very big part of my childhood, so maybe that’s why it crops up frequently in my stories.

我自己并不会弹奏乐器（我也想会啊！），不过我曾在合唱团待了 11 年，音乐是我童年很重要的回忆，所以这也许就是为什么音乐会频繁地出现我的故事当中吧。

Lori was born in Liverpool to a poor family, she has three sisters, and she had to work from an early age to help support her family. In her previous job, she caught the eye of one of her employers, who tried to seduce her. She turned him down, he was annoyed, and she got fired. The other maids at Bly find out about this, and they make fun of Lori and keep their distance because they think she tried to seduce her past employer on purpose. I think most of this is mentioned in BH in passing, but it’s not gone into too much detail.

洛里纳出生在利物浦一户贫穷的家庭，她有三个姐妹。很小的时候，她就肩负着养家糊口的责任。在以前的工作中，她被某个雇主看上了，对方试图引诱她。洛里纳回绝了他，对方十分气愤，把洛里纳开除了。布莱的女仆发现这件事之后都纷纷取笑洛里纳，而且大家都以为洛里纳试图勾引雇主，所以大家都与洛里纳保持距离。《黑莓蜜糖》提到了这些内容，但并没有太深入具体的细节。

As for Constance’s future, I didn’t think about it. Sorry ;-;

关于康丝坦斯的未来嘛，抱歉，我真的没有想过这些 ;-;

#6 汉化组成员提问 @Alwaysmadowl‍  

ebi 大佬我有疑问！

Q1 Hi, ebi! Well I do have many questions lol. First, any suggestions for procrastinators? Like how to release games continuously without losing any inspiration or passion？

ebi 大佬！我有超级多问题咳咳。首先呢，大佬对于拖延症晚期有什么建议吗？比如说怎么做到高频发行游戏，又不会丧失灵感或者激情呢？

ebi: I write a lot because I enjoy it, and it makes me happy… But sometimes, I don’t feel too inspired. Even so, I just keep going, and try to write a certain number of words a day, so I can meet my goals! If I really don’t like the direction a story is going, sometimes I just abandon it, but I’ll usually try to make things work.

ebi：因为我喜欢写作，所以我写了很多东西，而且写作真的让我特别开心……不过有时候，我也找不到灵感。即便如此，我还是会继续写作，每天都写一定量的东西，这样才能达到每日的目标！如果我真的不喜欢某个故事的走向，有时候我就直接弃文了，不过一般来说，我会尽力让故事走向正轨。

Q2 How long does it take to complete one single game? Have you spent lots of time on doing some research? Really wonder your planning and time management for the project.

一般一个游戏要多长时间完成呢？你会花很多时间去收集资料吗？我真的很好奇你怎么安排和管理项目的时间！

ebi: I do research by reading books, watching documentaries, and the like. I do a lot of these things for fun anyway, so it doesn’t really feel like work. When I’m writing, if there’s a specific historical detail I need to know, I’ll look it up online. Historical stories can take longer to write than modern ones, since I need to stop and look things up more often.

ebi：一般我会通过阅读书籍，观看纪录片等方式来收集材料。反正为了好玩，我经常会这么干的，所以不会觉得这是工作。写作的时候，如果遇到了与历史相关的细节，我就会上网搜信息。历史向的故事一般比现代故事要花更长的时间，毕竟我是不是就要停下来找资料。

In terms of writing, I can write a full script (about 80,000 words) in 2 months or less… Proofreading takes a bit longer. The coding is easy, but time-consuming. Each story takes a different amount of time to finish, and it’s largely dependent on how fast the artists are able to finish all the assets.

说到写作速度嘛，我可以在两个月之内写完一个剧本（大约 8 万英文）……校对则要花更长的时间。写代码很容易，但也很费时。每个故事最终完成的时间都不太一样，很大程度取决于美术和编曲完成素材的速度吧。

Q3 Since you have been working with so many people, any memorable experience?

鉴于你已经和许多人合作过，有没有特别难忘的经历呢？

ebi: Most people I commission treat their work as a normal job. I don’t often discuss personal things or make friends with my collaborators - I just give them a list of what I want, I pay them, and then they do it. It’s just like a business, really.

I get along pretty well with yuzuki, though.

ebi：大部分接受委托的人都把我的项目作为日常工作，通常我不会和合作人谈论私事，或者和他们交朋友。我只是给他们一个清单，为此付费，然后他们按要求作业。真的就像纯粹的生意啦。

不过，我和 yuzuki 相处得还不错。

Q4 Any suggestions for game writers who just step into visual novel creation?

对于新入门的游戏剧作家有什么建议吗？

ebi: And if anybody wants to work on their own VN, it’s probably better to start out with something small at first, that doesn’t cost much money. Most of my first VNs were short, and cheap to make (or free), and not very good. When you get more confident, then you can start thinking about more ambitious projects. I also don’t like commissioning artwork until I’ve finished about 90% of a script’s first draft, because I don’t want to commission art for a project that I then drop, and never finish.

ebi：如果大家想创作视觉小说的话，最好从小型作品开始入手，这样就不会花费太多钱。我刚开始的大部分作品都很短，而且项目花费很便宜（有的甚至用的是免费素材），一般质量都不太好。等你更有自信了，就可以考虑更有野心的项目。因为我不希望在废弃或者完不成的项目上浪费美术资源，所以一般剧本第一稿完成 90%的时候，我才会考虑委托别人作画。

作曲大佬我有疑问！

Q1 Hi, yuzuki! Well I do have many questions lol. First, how long does it take to complete all the music for the game? Have you spent lots of time on doing some experiments? Really wonder your planning, time management for the project, and the process on music creation. Would you mind to share a bit with us?

Hi，yuzuki 大佬，我已经准备好了很多问题哈哈哈。首先，一般花多久为游戏配乐呢？会花时间做一些试验和测试吗？我真的特别好奇你如何安排和管理时间，也十分好奇整个音乐创作的过程。能够分享一下你的个人经验吗？

yuzuki: Sure thing, though I’d like to preface this by saying that my workflow is mine and may not work for everyone.

yuzuki：当然没问题，不过我要先声明一下，我自己的工作方式只是个人习惯，并不适合所有人。

When it comes to writing music for a game, I like to experience the game first before all else. This usually means a complete blind playthrough of a working build minus the music. During the playthrough, I take notes for how various scenes come up and the mood that comes to mind while reading or playing. I also check to see where tracks can be reused, and about how long each scene takes to read so as to get an estimate of how long a BGM should be. Once I finish my notes, I go over them with the developer and decide on a finalized tracklist.

关于为游戏配乐的流程，我喜欢先体验一下游戏内容。所以，通常我会体验游戏 build，内容不含任何音乐。体验游戏的过程中，我会记录每个场景的切入方式，以及阅读或体验游戏中的情绪变化。我还会检查一下看看哪些曲目可以重复利用，每个场景大概要多长时间去阅读，这样才能估算出大概的背景音乐时长。一旦整理好了笔记，我就可以和开发者讨论每一条内容，然后决定最终的曲目。

yuzuki的推特有超多美食po！

From there on out, the process may diverge depending on the project. For ebihime, since we’ve worked together frequently, I tend to compose all of the music first as very basic sketches with a rough idea of melody, harmony, rhythm/chords, and bassline using just a piano. While the sketches may not sound like how the final product should be, the general idea should be sufficient from these sketches to confirm whether a track fits a mood or character. If something doesn’t quite work, I go back and scrap the idea and try again. Sometimes this takes a while; for example, Taohua’s theme was the most difficult for me and took four or five iterations before I finally managed to come up with the right tone. Other tracks may be easier: a lot of Blackberry’s location music (e.g. the music not for characters) are variations on the opening theme with leitmotifs repeated, so it’s a simple matter of arranging the melody in different ways. Sometimes, a track almost writes itself… Emilie’s theme in particular was done in a single attempt.

随后的过程可以视项目情况不同会有些变化。比如说 ebihime 的项目，因为我们经常一起合作，所以我更倾向于先做出所有曲目的小样，包括大概的旋律、和声、节奏/和弦，以及用钢琴所作的编曲小样。虽然这些小样可以与最终成品有区别，但应该可以听出大致的调子，并据此确定曲目是否符合某种情绪或者角色。如果有的地方不太合适，我就会重头再来。有时候这会花费一段时间，比如说对我而言，桃花的主题曲就最有挑战性，我大概试了四、五次才确定了最终的成品。相比之下，其他曲目会更容易一些。《黑莓蜜糖》的许多场景音乐（比如说不是专为角色所作的曲目）都是开场主题曲的变奏，所以用不同方式去编排旋律其实相当简单。有时候，有的曲目自然而然就完成了……埃米莉的主题曲就特别轻松，一次就过。

Once all the tracks are composed, this usually means my need to check in and confirm with the developer is done and I can spend time working on arranging the music without having to wait for feeedback. Unlike composition, which can be either very simple or very difficult, the arrangement tends to be straightforward. Since the melody and chords are usually locked in at this point, arrangement tends to come down to picking the right instrument and presenting the melody in a way that fits the tone of the story. Blackberry’s Victorian setting made this relatively easy, since it fits in with the classical style that I find comfortable.

一旦曲目完成了，我就需要仔细检查，然后和开发者确实是否合适。合适的话，我就可以正式编曲，而不用再等对方的反馈。编曲和写作不太一样，写作要么非常容易，要么十分困难，而编曲则十分简单明了。一旦确定了旋律和和弦，那么接下来就要选择合适的乐器，以符合故事基调的方式来呈现出整个旋律。《黑莓蜜糖》采用了维多利亚时期的设定，这让编曲相对比较简单，因为它比较符合我拿手的古典音乐风格。

Blackberry’s soundtrack took me about six weeks to compose from start to finish, but this was exceptionally fast for me. I did it during a time when I was working very hard and afterwards I had a bit of creative burnout, especially since I also work a dayjob at 40 hours a week. I wouldn’t recommend anyone try and compose this fast if they value work/life balance, and since Blackberry I’ve been taking steps towards getting a better balance of leisure time, exercise, and creative time. I would say nowadays, out of a 24 hour day, I spend 8 hours sleeping, 9 hours on dayjob-related things, 3 hours on exercise/self-care, and 4 hours on music during the weekdays. On the weekends, I tend to spend much more time on self-care and sleep and not as much on music.

《黑莓蜜糖》的曲目大概花了我六周的时间，不过这其实算很快了。当时我工作压力特别大，正处于创作力枯竭的阶段，因为每周我都要工作 40 个小时。因此，如果大家十分重视工作和生活之间的平衡，我并不推荐你去贸然尝试作曲。而且为《黑莓蜜糖》编完曲之后，我就一直调整自己的节奏，更好地平衡休闲、锻炼和创作的时间。一天 24 个小时，我大概花 8 个小时睡觉，9 个小时处理工作事宜，3 个小时锻炼/自我调整，然后周末花 4 个小时创作音乐。一到周末，我更倾向于把时间用在自我调整和睡眠上，而不会花在音乐创作上了。

yuzuki的香蕉猫（bananacat）

Self-care is really important, by the way! Even though it may seem like you’re not as productive if you spend less time daily, being consistent and working without burning out more than makes up for any time lost if you experience artistic block or creative burnout. For all creatives out there, please remember to take care of yourself and that it’s okay to relax.

顺便一提，自我调整真的很重要！虽然听上去好像没那么高产了，但坚持下来，你会发现自己不容易进入创作力枯竭期，工作更有效率，不会花费额外的时间来弥补过度创作所浪费的大好时光。对于所有从事创作方面的人来说，请务必记住好好关爱自己，切记放松一下也没什么大碍。

Q2 Since you have been working with so many people, any memorable experience?

鉴于你已经和许多人合作过，有没有特别难忘的经历呢？

I met ebihime by working on music for her, so I’d say that’s a pretty memorable experience!

因为编曲，我认识了 ebihime，所以我觉得这就算特别难忘的经历了！

Q3 Any suggestions for musicians who just step into game music creation?

对于新入门的编曲家有什么建议吗？

Don’t do revenue share. 

别选择收入分成的模式。

I was going to leave the answer as that but others suggested that I go into more detail… if you’re working purely for your own benefit or to pad out your portfolio, my personal recommendation would be to collaborate on a free project. NaNoReNo and Ludum Dare are great events for getting experience with working on a project as a team member and creating under deadlines, without any of the baggage associated with compensation. If you are working on a commercial project, please research a bit and check for rates in your region and ask for a similar rate. Working purely for free devalues your own work and the work of others, and while getting your foot in the door may be necessary in the beginning, there are better ways to do it than by trusting projects blindly when they may not pay enough to be fair afterward.

本来我就打算留这么一句话的，但是其他人建议我说得详细一些……（译者注：感谢其他人！）如果你纯粹是为了自己的利益参与项目，或者只是为了让作品集更好看的话，我建议你可以参与一些免费的项目。NaNoReNo（http://www.sky-artdesigns.com/category/nanoreno/）或者 Ludum Dare（http://ldjam.com/）都是些很不错的活动，你可以在有限的时间内与其他人合作完成项目。这样你就不用有做不完或者其他问题的担忧了。如果你正在做一些商业项目，请多做功课，看看你所在地区的报价情况，选择一个类似的价格。完全免费配乐只会降低你和其他人工作成果的价值。虽然一开始你可能需要想办法迈出第一步，但完全可以找到更好的办法，由于有的项目支付的价格也许不够公道，因此大家最好不要盲目地相信或者加入某些过于廉价的项目。