In the game Okami, the demon Yamata no Orochi is written here, and also in a separate game here as ヤマタノオロチ, not やまたのおろち. Even the particle の is in katakana. I'm curious as to why this is. I know that it derives from a Japanese legend of Yamata no Orochi, so why is it written in katakana?
Answer
You are actually thinking the other way around. It is written in katakana BECAUSE the term is 100% Japanese.
Japanese mythology existed way before we encountered the Chinese. It existed only in the oral tradition because we did not have a writing system back then. In other words, only the sounds "yamatanoorochi" existed, so even after we encountered the Chinese and learned Kanji and created kana, it just was not very natural to write "yamatanoorochi" in kanji. With ヤマタノオロチ, we are just using the katakana as the pronunciation symbols.
There are kanji versions （八岐大蛇、八俣遠呂智、八俣遠呂知） for this term but they are ALL [当て字]{あてじ}. You may use one of them if you love kanji but it will not necessarily make you look more intelligent or educated. Contrary to what some Japanese-learners seem to blindly believe, writing in kanji the words that have no Chinese roots is often regarded as not being in good taste.
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