Sea Otters Are Considered Apex Predators - Blog Posts

hello!! sorry to chime in suddenly, but i saw a lot of cool nickname analysis and wanted to add my own two cents! it's fascinating to me that floyd doesn't actually use "apex predators" as nicknames for any of the characters so far (other than sebek, but like if you DON'T look at sebek and think 'croccodile' then you're doing it wrong). (1/?)

[Referring to this original post!]

As far as I know, no official reason for this has been stated in the game or shared by other characters. If I had to make an educated guess on why Floyd generally doesn’t give apex predator nicknames, I would say it’s because of his own selfish need to surpass others in strength.

In his Beans Day Camo personal stories, Floyd reveals to Epel that he wants to take on strong opponents (like Riddle), because he finds it to be exciting. In the Lyreless Brawl event itself, we see that Floyd refuses to follow Vil until Vil demonstrates his own strength and executes a flipping technique that catches Floyd’s attention. From these points, we can see that Floyd very much has an interest in overtaking powerful foes and learning new things to improve his own combat capabilities.

If Floyd were to nickname others after apex predators, I feel like that would come across to him as “I’m confessing that this person surpasses me in strength” every time he speaks their nickname, which hurts Floyd’s own pride. As we can see in his Beans Day Camo personal stories and in the Lyreless Brawl story, he’s willing and able to learn new things if it means enhancing his own abilities--but in calling others apex predators, it implies that they are naturally “above” him (because it is “in their nature” as the top of the oceanic food chain) and that, no matter how hard he tries to catch up, he won’t be able to. In this sense, granting an apex predator nickname to someone else would be relinquishing one’s own strength and confessing to their inferiority.

I think Floyd likes to leave the possibility of surpassing others “open” by not giving names that acknowledge another’s power. That way, there’s always a glimmer of hope that he can train and overtake them. It’s a matter of pride.