What is the significance of the letter S in Japanese?

Question

It seems like the letter S is used to denote the highest rank or position in Japanese media I've encountered. For example, in the Armored Core videogame series, a player can rank A, B, C, etc. in missions but the highest ranking is S. Megaman X follows a similar scheme. In the anime Naruto, the difficulty of ninja missions is ranked with letters, with S being the highest. S seems to precede all other letters. Why is S so important in Japanese?

Answer 1

The grading system is likely taken from the west, considering that the Japanese don't really have a letter system with A, B, C, etc.

Most likely, games started using that sort of system before the S. I'm also guessing, and it's probably a good one too, that the S is used because it is the first letter for words like Special, Super, and other S words that can mean something great.

Answer 2

There are many "loan" words in the Japanese language, usually written in katakana. As opposed to hiragana which would be equivalent to writing in cursive in English, or kanji which is taken from Chinese. The English word "super" becomes "supaa" in Japanese. Instead of writing the "S" in katakana which would end up being the equivalent of "Su", oftentimes English letters are used so you are left with, you guessed it, "S".

Answer 3

As an American studying chinese language & going to China quickly, my humble suggestion would to be VERY VERY careful about your translation. Language is a very cultural element... words that translate straight away from chinese language as "iron fowl" or "horse, lion" can actual have extremely user-friendly meanings like "stingy man or woman" and "truly nicely." that's basically as an instance how uncomplicated chinese language is to the western translator - it extremely works any incorrect way, too. basically stringing words at the same time with out being attentive to way of existence and grammar is almost absolute to not make much of expertise - truly frankly, maximum chinese language personality tattoos on human beings do not. and likewise remember, font concerns - i imagine human beings have a tendency to ignore different languages have forms of handwriting, too :) Your popular chinese language personality stumbled on at random is the English equivalent of writing interior the equipment font in English - not inventive in any respect, and actually frankly relaxing to maximum chinese language human beings. So be careful and imagine it with the help of. there are quite some factors to think about!