I’ve recently been trying to play more of my favorite games in Japanese to switch up where the input comes from and keep it interesting. But switching the language of the Sims from EN to JP had me encountering so many complicated kanji characters in succession that I almost thought I was looking at traditional Chinese. No furigana in sight, just me relying on the hundreds of hours I’ve played in English to somehow muscle-memory my way back to the main screen lol. In hindsight, even the English is quite advanced, so I probably should have seen that coming.
I’m in the awkward intermediate plateau between N4 and N3 and I was wondering what games you guys play in Japanese – do you switch English games to Japanese, or do you play Japanese-only games?
I play Stardew Valley in Japanese and it’s very doable. Just a tad difficult sometimes but that’s the kind of challenge I like.
I also play Pokemon Midori, which is a bit easy but taught me quite a few nature/animal related terms. I really recommend this to N5-N4 if you’re looking to use games as well.
What games do you guys recommend?
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Nintendo titles are usually my faves. However if you only have a PC Ni No Kuni get manageable around N3.
All Pokémon games would be my biggest recommendation. Biased because that’s what taught me a large chunk of my Japanese, but besides attack names it’s all very easy to read. I especially love talking to every NPC in towns when I get there as a ready challenge.
桃太郎電鉄 is a good one. You get to learn Japanese geography while getting your ass kicked by the rigged さくま AI at a Monopoly-like board game.
I try to play Japanese games in Japanese like the 戦国無双 series, 戦国BASARA series, 龍が如く series, Monster Hunter Rise, and Final Fantasy. Struggled at first with a lot of seldomly used Kanji but started getting used to it. Definitely helped me get from N3 ish to N2/1 ish.
I’ve been playing harvestella recently & was pleasantly surprised at how approachable it felt (I’m ~n3). It doesn’t slam you with big blocks of text at the start which I find intimidating in other games I’ve tried, and characters speak simply enough.
The SIMs 4 looks easier than what others are suggesting. Just checked a let’s play. A lot of those words are common and show up in a bunch of role playing games…. Are simply common words
Unless I checked an easier part or something. What’s some really hard Japanese you encountered?
The hardest game I’ve ever played is 魔界村. Kicks my ass every time.
Jokes aside, when I was a beginner I played Pokemon red in Japanese. I got far because I’ve played it a million times in English anyway but I certainly didn’t understand much at all.
I just started playing Pokémon Leafgreen on GBA and it’s the first Pokémon game I’ve ever played. Good fun and the Japanese is explained in a YouTube by Game Grammar so that helps when I don’t understand.