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Good games for learning Japanese?
- Thread starter Juice
- Start date
Gameboy415
Member
Agreed - I learned a lot of new words/Kanji thanks to the furigana in first-party DS games.
The biggest challenge I ran into back when I was actively studying Japanese was encountering a Kanji I didn't know and having no way to look it up so I really grew to appreciate furigana in games (and manga!).
Seraphis Cain
bad gameplay lol
If the game itself isn't terribly objectionable to you, Akiba's Trip has options for both Japanese/English voices and Japanese/English text. I could see that being really helpful for learning.
kitschbeam
Member
I'm curious about this as well
The Spoony Hou
Member
OccamsBlender
Member
Animal Crossing. There's so much basic, every day chit chat in that game.
Prof Layton games have Furigana(phonetic hiragana for kanji so you can easily look it up.) Furigana is your friend.
Prof Layton games have Furigana(phonetic hiragana for kanji so you can easily look it up.) Furigana is your friend.
Ooooh, might have to check this if it's not like normal Japanese TV, which is supercrappy food or celebrity guests rotating constantly, but with the best bits and useful for learning.
Thanks for the recommendations so far folks:
I think when my n3DS comes I'm going to start with one of:
* Story of Seasons
* animal crossing
* a Professor Layton title
* Youkai Watch
And maybe a couple cheap eshop titles.
As for language ability, I had several years of college Japanese instruction so I'm pretty solid on the grammar and structure side. My biggest gap is reading and listening comprehension, as well as vocab (I have probably only mastered 200-300 kanji, with a total vocabulary of probably about 800-1200 words)
I think when my n3DS comes I'm going to start with one of:
* Story of Seasons
* animal crossing
* a Professor Layton title
* Youkai Watch
And maybe a couple cheap eshop titles.
As for language ability, I had several years of college Japanese instruction so I'm pretty solid on the grammar and structure side. My biggest gap is reading and listening comprehension, as well as vocab (I have probably only mastered 200-300 kanji, with a total vocabulary of probably about 800-1200 words)
Woot! My 3DS came and I came up with an effective way to translate what I see on screen efficiently as I play / study
Check out my guide here:
https://medium.com/@searls/studying-japanese-with-a-nintendo-3ds-google-translate-b5c6d3206562
Check out my guide here:
https://medium.com/@searls/studying-japanese-with-a-nintendo-3ds-google-translate-b5c6d3206562
I found EX Troopers was a wonderful help to me when I was learning. Scenes have a comic-book style to them so you'll get in plenty of hiragana and kanji reading. Helped me so much along the way, shame I kind of had to drop it when I went back to university but if I was to pick a few games to play when I return to Japanese that would definitely be near the top from the ones I've tried.
Ni no kuni is not bad at all in that regard. A lot of quest-text/dialogue that repeats pretty often.
Useful for getting used to some typical grammatical forms !
I think it's suited for beginner/intermediate learners.
Edit : plus, you can pause during cutscenes! (at least on PS3)
Useful for getting used to some typical grammatical forms !
I think it's suited for beginner/intermediate learners.
Edit : plus, you can pause during cutscenes! (at least on PS3)
Lostconfused
Member
It depends on the game and really most if not all can be played without knowing the language at all. Except maybe something like Nobunaga's Amibtion/Gihren's Greed.
Really it's better to just start with those games now so you have some motivation to learn the language.
Woot! My 3DS came and I came up with an effective way to translate what I see on screen efficiently as I play / study
Check out my guide here:
https://medium.com/@searls/studying-japanese-with-a-nintendo-3ds-google-translate-b5c6d3206562
That's a great solution! Sometimes machine translation can be a bit funky, but things are just gonna keep improving. I'd like to share your guide with my buddy if you don't mind - he's coming to Japan soon and I'm gonna try and persuade him to get a 3DS so we can get back to our MonHun roots.
I may be in the minority, but I studied the language for 4 years at uni (3rd year spent at a university in Nagoya). I was eager to play games in Japanese when I started the course, and I'd say I was comfortable/able to enjoy them by the time I was studying abroad. Even now, after using the language at every job I've had since uni, I don't profess to get absolutely everything, but you just keep learning every day and things get easier/quicker to pick apart.
If you're even semi-interested, playing games in Japanese while learning can be great motivation as well as being fun, so just go for it and don't worry about not understanding all the kanji and every little nuance. You'll find that you surprise yourself with moments of genius - laughing at stuff you wouldn't necessarily laugh at in your mother tongue - and it's very rewarding. I'd dare say it can even make some games (not just games, mind) more fun than if you played in English, etc.
Don't forget the face plate
Also, dunno if you saw this in my edit; my friend (university professor) teaches English and Japanese using Minecraft: http://www.kotobaminers.org/
wow ... that's cool. That's really REALLY cool !
It's nice and all, but I've got a question to the Japanese Speakers of GAF - how much of this 'game japanese' is actually common to use in normal conversation with a Japanese person?
What are the odds you'll sound rude and/or like a total otaku?
It is my understanding that in anime, the language used is not something people use in normal speech and it's considered somewhat of a slang, that would sound rude in most normal environments.
Correct me if I'm wrong.
What are the odds you'll sound rude and/or like a total otaku?
It is my understanding that in anime, the language used is not something people use in normal speech and it's considered somewhat of a slang, that would sound rude in most normal environments.
Correct me if I'm wrong.
SerTapTap
Member
Woot! My 3DS came and I came up with an effective way to translate what I see on screen efficiently as I play / study
Check out my guide here:
https://medium.com/@searls/studying-japanese-with-a-nintendo-3ds-google-translate-b5c6d3206562
I tried this with some 360 games, unfortunately it's more annoying than expected and some stuff doesn't translate well at all. You also need a game with a plain font, UI text and stylized things are often unreadable. I was hoping one of those augmented reality instant translate things would work but none support Japanese, so I'm stuck taking pictures and slowly waiting, Google Translate isn't really designed for this workflow, it assumes you're only going to take one image to translate.
BTW, anyone with an "old 3DS" can now do this without importing a console! Been playing SK2 on my NA 3DS recently
DeliciousDoc
Member
I learned English mostly from playing games as well but that was before I was an adult. I also watched TV in English, read books in English, had English classes at school and had people to ask for help (my parents). I switched my "internal talk" to English. Learning from one source limits your exposure.
I learned Japanese as an adult. I learned some Japanese from very basic study and daily interactions. That gets you to about N5. I needed a rival before I could get motivated enough to hit the books hard. I had a girlfriend tell me about a Korean girl who she was helping read the newspaper in Japanese and she had been in Japan for about 3 years. I had another girlfriend (now my wife) who would study English 7 hours a day. My Japanese was the best among my co workers but then a new guy came, younger than me and above my level (he was studying for N2) Again, I redoubled my efforts. You need a tangible goal. You are probably thinking you want to know Japanese perfectly. You need something you can measure and that is reachable in a reasonable amount of time. Knowing x number of Kanji isnt a good goal, in my opinion, because it doesn't connect to fluency. Think of a kid who says "I can count to 100". That does mean he understands basic arithmetic? No.
As for playing games in Japanese, just start. First few games you play you might not get everything that is going on. Maybe you need an English walkthrough to make sure you got everything important. You'll get better. Sometimes I get tired and stop wanting to look up words I don't know. Sometimes I permit myself to keep playing for a bit more. Sometimes I decide it's time to stop.
Kids are taught to read with the five finger rule. http://redbridgeserc.org/resources/entry/reading-5-finger-rule/ You can use that to determine if your dialog boxes are too hard. Unforutunately, there are no leveled readers for games but I think some exist for Japanese.
To use a lame analogy, it's like riding a bike. You can read about it all day, look at xtreme bikers but you'll never get there until you get on the bike, hit the curve because you couldn't find the brakes.
Here are some articles I wrote which help beginners.
https://gamekamiwaza.wordpress.com/2014/11/14/new-guide/ basic idea on how to study.
https://gamekamiwaza.wordpress.com/2014/11/14/politeness-in-language/ Why people say anime Japanese isn't real Japanese and similar topics.
I learned Japanese as an adult. I learned some Japanese from very basic study and daily interactions. That gets you to about N5. I needed a rival before I could get motivated enough to hit the books hard. I had a girlfriend tell me about a Korean girl who she was helping read the newspaper in Japanese and she had been in Japan for about 3 years. I had another girlfriend (now my wife) who would study English 7 hours a day. My Japanese was the best among my co workers but then a new guy came, younger than me and above my level (he was studying for N2) Again, I redoubled my efforts. You need a tangible goal. You are probably thinking you want to know Japanese perfectly. You need something you can measure and that is reachable in a reasonable amount of time. Knowing x number of Kanji isnt a good goal, in my opinion, because it doesn't connect to fluency. Think of a kid who says "I can count to 100". That does mean he understands basic arithmetic? No.
As for playing games in Japanese, just start. First few games you play you might not get everything that is going on. Maybe you need an English walkthrough to make sure you got everything important. You'll get better. Sometimes I get tired and stop wanting to look up words I don't know. Sometimes I permit myself to keep playing for a bit more. Sometimes I decide it's time to stop.
Kids are taught to read with the five finger rule. http://redbridgeserc.org/resources/entry/reading-5-finger-rule/ You can use that to determine if your dialog boxes are too hard. Unforutunately, there are no leveled readers for games but I think some exist for Japanese.
To use a lame analogy, it's like riding a bike. You can read about it all day, look at xtreme bikers but you'll never get there until you get on the bike, hit the curve because you couldn't find the brakes.
Here are some articles I wrote which help beginners.
https://gamekamiwaza.wordpress.com/2014/11/14/new-guide/ basic idea on how to study.
https://gamekamiwaza.wordpress.com/2014/11/14/politeness-in-language/ Why people say anime Japanese isn't real Japanese and similar topics.
Of course. More clicks, the merrier.
FWIW, in my experience with Animal Crossing DS so far, pictures of the dialog screen have worked well about 80% of the time. Ironically, the thing that trips it up most often is Furigana. I have to be careful not to incidentally select that as I'm swiping over sentence fragments.
Naturally, it's more reliable for translating smaller snippets if I'm trying to learn something, but when I just want to boulder through the dialog, "Select all" bulk translations are usually able to give an impression of what's being said (given that you understand some japanese grammar, such that a negative often implies an imperative or request)
I think it depends entirely on the genre (and to some extent, the developer). Games that take place in realistic-like environments tend to use realistic speech. High fantasy games with lots of magic and so forth tend to use a lot of old or made up language. All games tend to be written rather informally, so it's just important to keep all of that in mind (and to default to speaking more formally to Japanese people you're not close friends with).