In this image, the girl is trying to wake up a boy sleeping inside a coffin (It’s a game). But the verb todomeru (留める) is written in Katakana.
[https://imgur.com/a/Y1Va5XR](https://imgur.com/a/Y1Va5XR)
From what I learned, Katakana is used for foreign words, which I don’t believe would be the case for this verb. But I may be missing something basic as I am learning on my own for now and I know very little so far.
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Katakana has a near infinite amount of uses.
It can be used for emphasis, robotic talking, animal names, representing stilted Japanese coming from someone not fluent in the language, sing songyness…etc.
In this case without being able to currently look at the link I would imagine it was for emphasis, possibly for shock effect?
Edit: Having been able to look at the picture I’m pretty sure it’s 止め. Something like a finishing blow or something that settles a matter/fight/argument.
In which case the katakana gives emphasis and finality.
Disgaea is a beloved classic. Always happy to see people playing it.
Might be the noun
“finishing blow”
I saw とどめ to mean that in final fantasy, might be same here in disgaea
There’s a phrase 止め (とどめ) を刺す(さす) and it means like : When killing a person or animal, to ensure death, the throat, chest, or other vital organs are stabbed to choke out the person’s life.
Yeah, the kanji for とどめ is not 留 but 止.
The reason why it was written in Katakana is that Japanese people tend to use Katakana when they want to emphasize a word or when they want to give a word more strength or breadth to its meaning than it has.
Sorry if my English is off lol (I’ve been learning English but my English is still poor… )
Hope it helps ☺️