By: enigmaopoeia.

Still confused whether or not Jennifer's redheaded friend Lotte is a boy or a girl? I will try to put a rest to Lotte's gender once and for all!

When people found the ROM of Clock Tower for the Super FamiCom, before the translation patch by Aeon Genesis was released, about everyone was confused about the gender of Lotte. To the point in which debates were brought up proving Lotte is a male or female. Some believed that Lotte is a male such as Mr. Mason W2DS stated in his walkthrough, "In my opinion, Lott is a male, though I'll tell you up front that I've never gotten any solid proof to this. Different people have different opinions about Lott's gender." Some like Eric Larson wrote in his FAQ, "Lotte is the most heroic friend as she/he saves Jennifer from the jail cell, thus being shot by Mary Barrows. Lotte can also die in the caves. Lotte wears a red shirt on screen and her sex is questionable." While others state that Lotte is a female such as Gideon Zhi, who works for Aeon Genesis and did translated Clock Tower, wrote in his walkthrough, "This will make it so that Lotte doesn't have to save you... But you still need to find her in the Caves, or you'll get ending F. There doesn't appear to be a way to save her :| ".

While there are debates, some would try to conclude as to what Lotte's gender is. Eric Larson did in his FAQ under his question and answer section, "Q: And what, exactly, is the sex of this 'Lotte' thing? ... A: Let's put this to rest once and for all PLEASE! Lotte is a girl. She has curves and boobs and the whole bit! Just because she is the only chick not wearing a dress and with short hair, she is not automatically a guy! In the manuals, she is obviously female. Really, it dosen't matter because she dies in every ending anyway." This answer really doesn't help prove anything because we still have inconsistencies about Lotte's gender. If you are going to claim something, at least support it with solid proof. Now I will show you the evidence which proves that Lotte is once and for all is 100% Female!

First of all, we have to get rid of any stereotype based upon Lotte's appearance. Because Anne and Jennifer have long hair, and because all three friends wore dresses. It must mean that Lotte is male because she chooses to have short hair and wear jeans, that makes her a male? If we're going by that theory that long hair means they are a woman, how come we don't call Sephiroth from Final Fantasy VII a woman? And if wearing pants means you're are a male, Cybil Bennett from Silent Hill must be a man. Then there is Emi from Sweet Home, who has a short haircut like Lotte's, yet no one confuses her as a boy. Really, people, please break out of this stupid stereotype.

The first evidence that we see is her name, Lotte. Lotte is a diminutive form of the name Charlotte, and Charlotte is a female's name. According to BehindTheName, Charlotte's name means "manly" which explains Lotte's tomboyish appearance.

The second evidence would be her voice. Though this game doesn't have voice acting, which would've stopped these debates a long time ago if we had heard a female's voice coming out of Lotte's lips, we do hear Lotte scream. After Lotte rescues Jennifer from the jail cell in the Courtyard Shed, she ran outside and we then heard her screaming. This scream we hear is the exact same high-pitched scream used for Anne and Jennifer. Some may argue that it was Mary who screamed, not Lotte. But let me bring your attention to Ending A where Mary fell off the railing of the Clock Tower, her scream was a deep wail. Not the same scream we heard in the Courtyard. We know that Anne and Jennifer are not males; so if Lotte shares their same scream, Lotte has to be female as well.

Now let's focus on Lotte's dialogue. Since English is an ambiguous language, we cannot decipher Lotte's gender based upon her dialogue. The Japanese language however actually uses gender specific dialogue. So when we look at Lotte's dialogue, she refers to herself as "Watashi". I have marked the Kanji of 私 （わたし） [Watashi] below in red:

"Watashi" is a Japanese gender-neutral form meaning "I; Myself" and is mainly used by men and women in formal speech, but women also use it for informal speech. When "Watashi" is used by men in informal speech, it sounds effeminate. Jennifer also uses "Watashi" to refer to herself:

Since we have to put into thought that these girls are teenagers, there would be no use for them to use formal speech. If Lotte was male and uses "Watashi" to refer to himself as informal, it would make him look feminine. Which would make more sense if Lotte dress more like a woman with masculine features. And since Jennifer uses "Watashi" and we know she is not a male, so neither is Lotte.

To continue on with dialogue, the introduction of the game states in the English version, "Jennifer and her friends were wanted as adopted daughters.":

If Lotte was one of the orphans adopted by Mr. Burroughs, why would they have excluded her from the introduction? It clearly states that she is indeed one of the adopted daughters! If she was male, they would've used a gender-neutral wording such as "were wanted as adopted children." Even the Japanese version states that Jennifer and her friends were indeed female orphans:

The red words marked are 少女 （しょうじょ） [Shjo] meaning "daughter; young lady; virgin; maiden; little girl" and 養女 （ようじょ） [Yjo] meaning "adopted daughter; foster daughter".

This dialogue is only exclusive to the English translation. When Jennifer ran back to the Entrance Hall to find out that all three of her friends are missing and she calls out, "Girls... ?":

If Lotte was a boy, wouldn't Jennifer cry out something more gender-neutral such as, "Guys...?" The Japanese version has Jennifer calling out, 「みんな…？」 ["Min'na...?"]. Though "min'na" means "all; everyone; everybody" which is gender-neutral and can be translated as, "Guys...?". Because we already know that Jennifer and her friends were girls, as shown in the Japanese introduction, "Girls...?" would be an acceptible translation to "Min'na...?"

Now it could be argued that Jennifer was only concerned about Anne's and Rolla's well-being, not Lotte's. We know that Lotte can very much handle herself, so Jennifer would naturally be more concerned about the two other girls who can't defend themselves. But that argument is just absurd! Out of her relationship with her three friends, Lotte is considered as Jennifer's best friend as shown on the back cover of the box to Clock Tower for the Super FamiCom:

The three unindented words to the left are the names of Jennifer's friends which reads ロッテ [Lotte], ローラ [Rolla], and アン [Anne]. Notice how Rolla and Anne both have similar sentences underneath their names? The sentence reads "ジェニファーの友人" [Jenif no yjin] with 友人 （ゆうじん） [Yjin] meaning "friend". So Rolla and Anne are considered as Jennifer's friends. However Lotte has two different Kanji characters at the end of her sentence. Her sentence reads "ジェニファーの親友" [Jenif no shin'y] with 親友 （しんゆう） [Shin'y] meaning "close friend; bosom (old, intimate) friend; buddy; crony; chum". Now we know that Lotte is Jennifer's close friend. So why would Jennifer care more about Anne and Rolla, two girls who she is not close to, over Lotte who is her best friend? That doesn't make sense! So let's dismiss that claim.

Now let's look at Lotte's appearance in the game. What would you call those two lumps on her chest, certainly they are not tumors! They are breasts. Also if you compared her sprites to the other three friends, you would notice that she shares the same bust size as Rolla's and Jennifer's. If she was male, she would've have a flat chest and her buttocks would be not as pronounced. I have done an edit to show what would've happened if she was male:

Also let bring our attention to the infamous scene of Lotte at the Underground Caves. If you focus on her arm resting on her waist, you would see that above that she has breasts:

If Lotte was supposed to be a male, you think that HUMAN Entertainment would've not included that?

The most solid piece of evidence lies in Lotte's profile! This profile was taken from page 12 of the Clock Tower ~The First Fear~ instruction manual:

The first red circle I've marked reads 養女 （ようじょ） [Yjo] which translates to "adopted daughter; foster daughter". The second red circle reads 少女 （しょうじょ） [Shjo] meaning "daughter; young lady; virgin; maiden; little girl". And the third red circle reads 彼女 （かのじょ） [Kanojo] which translates into "she; girl friend; sweetheart". All three point to her gender being female!

How much more proof do you need to finalize that Lotte is 100% female? I think I already proven enough with solid, concrete facts and evidence.

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