Hi, I want to ask about something but before that, let me tell you a bit about myself. I speak Pashto because I come from a rural village, and I also speak Urdu/Hindi and English because I enjoyed watching cartoons.
I started learning Japanese because I wanted to play a game by a specific author that wasn’t translated.
I found many resources to learn Japanese and started with Genki but didn’t find it helpful. I learned the kana in just under two days and started using Anki to learn vocabulary. I feel comfortable with immersion (listening and writing) for 2 hour each day.
I think my knowledge of two languages with similar structures to Japanese helped me get comfortable more easily, but I still struggle with new grammar and vocabulary.
I want to know how much Japanese I need to know to play visual novels, RPG games, and other things, including the required vocabulary amount and grammar level.
Let me know if you have any questions! Thank you!
1 comment
Hi it’s nice to meet you. I do play some games in Japanese.
The amount of Japanese you need for games varies, but I find that the vocabulary in games is very specialized. So that means, your first game will be pretty hard, but games will get easier over time.
Overall the level of Japanese you will need depends on which game it is, and how much you want to avoid using the dictionary.
**N5:** Impossible
**N4:** You will understand most grammar, but your vocab will be so small it will be nearly impossible to play without decoding each sentence by using the dictionary
**N3:** You can understand almost all the grammar, and the vocab for very “plain” sentences, but you will be glued to the dictionary
**N2:** You rarely find grammar you don’t know, and you know a lot of the words, but still have to use the dictionary quite often
**N1:** You probably can play most games, though you will still encounter kanji you haven’t seen from time to time, and might not get all the cultural references. You rarely will have a problem with grammar. Your vocab is still not big enough to avoid the dictionary entirely but you will have a good guess at words you haven’t seen before.
**Post-N1:** (at about 15,000 words) You can play games without a dictionary. A few words here and there will not be known to you but you have so much context from everything else the holes will be filled in easily.
**Post-N1:** (at about 25,000 words) You can play games without a dictionary. Congratulations.