I wouldn't say that's true at all. I don't really think there are any more grammar points to learn in Japanese than in, say, German, but it is still a much harder language to learn for a native English speaker, and 99% of that is due to the writing system.
It's probably good advice, but writing kanji by hand is something I enjoy. Writing the characters also helps you recognize patterns that make memorizing kanji easier IMO. However it's true that if you're not consistently writing that knowledge will fade very quickly (it's even the case for native speakers).
Ultimately it's up to each individual, but I don't think the desire to play Japan-only games is enough motivation. I think that's quite limited in scope, similar to only wanting to learn how to order food. The difference being that ordering food takes a few hours to learn, whereas the entire written language is hundreds if not thousands of hours of hardcore studying. In neither case there's the actual desire to truly understand the language, and to be able to use it to converse with people.
www.viki.com
MiyazakiHatesKojima
listed in the OP.That depends. For example, the author of the Japanese From Zero books which someone recommended a bit further up has admitted to not knowing enough kanji to read novels in Japanese, despite learning the language for 30+ years and teaching it for a living. It's very much possible to spends years "studying" without making much progress.
That's kind of my point. When it comes to language learning, it's easy to fall into a habit where instead of learning the language, you're learning about the language. You're studying, but not really. That's how you get people who passed JLPT N1 but can't hold a conversation, or people who can talk just fine but can't read books aimed at middle schoolers. There isn't necessarily anything wrong with that if it's in line with your goals, but it always seemed to me like learners of Japanese in particular seem awfully quick to refer to themselves as fluent, even if they are sorely lacking in certain areas. I've certainly never seen anyone who couldn't read a book in English refer to themselves as fluent in English, but in Japanese there seems to be no shortage of these people.
Sounds like you need some language lessons, baka.
Thank you, I do and yes I will admit I am a idiot.
I'll say. You edited your post and it's still wrong. Shameful display.
I ain't touching your crimes against punctuation though.
It's a new immigration policy they introduced last year. It's actually there to make it easier for grunt workers to get a work visa in Japan and that new immigration policy requires you to do the JFT-Basic test.
This is such a well-told story,This is what I did about 25 years ago, for the same reasons that
I had a PC with a 200Mhz Intel CPU, that had 16MB of memory. I found that it could emulate NES / SNES games pretty well although the emulation software was not nearly as refined as it is now. This is also when the internet was moving off of BBS systems and "web pages" were a new concept. (Anyway - I'm dating myself here!) Through searching for Final Fantasy info online after playing the original NES game and the most recently released Final Fantasy II, I discovered the II was actually IV and that there were two games that never made it to America. I also found out that Final Fantasy V had just been released in Japan. After some digging around, I was able to acquire ROMs of these games, but young me was stupid and didn't realize they were going to be in Japanese.
I spent that entire summer with scant resources - like physical resources, like books checked out from the library as even Google Translate wouldn't come around for another decade - pouring over the game and using context clues along with language clues to advance through the game. At first, I had to look up absolutely everything, but as time went on a lot of the language started falling into place. I played through all of the Final Fantasy games that America never saw until much later. I kept digging and found great games like Dragon Quest 5 and eventually 6. I kept at it for years and actually got pretty good with what I can only assume was a highly specialized subset of the language. A lot of the language skills I developed were pretty primitive because I never had to write it, never spoke it, or never heard it spoken aloud. My friends thought it was awesome as I would regale them with stories about these "hidden" video games.
However, after I moved off to college and real life hit it became something that I spent less and less time on, until I eventually stopped playing Japanese games all together (as later systems were more difficult to emulate or expensive to import). By the time I had the time and resources that I could devote to it again, globalization had happened and we have things like region-free game consoles and the overwhelming majority of Japan-only games I'm interested in playing getting western releases anyway. That being said, even after 25 years I can recognize enough to kinda/sorta get me by. I've been playing Dragon Quest Walk (like a Dragon Quest themed Pokemon Go) on my phone for a few months and my brain surprises me with stuff like "oh here is the item menu" even though a lot of stuff in that game has icons and such that make it easy enough to understand. There are still a lot of things I don't get and occasionally have to look up online though, like when they do game update announcements. My kids think it's cool now that I can just pick up something like that and know the language enough to just play it. So I've got that going for me, which is nice.
jshackles
! You really have a knack at storytelling, makes sense since you are an avid fan of Valve
Would it make a difference if I told you I never attended a English speaking school.
MiyazakiHatesKojima
learning a new language for any reason is good and enlighten but I suggest you get some help, like a tutor or classes. I’d even say maybe the Rosetta Stone program might help.
So des nee
