Learning Japanese on DS

[Kaladron]

I've been meaning to learn Japanese for a while now, but there are no language schools located near enough to my home. The next best thing, I figure, is to teach myself. So I've ordered Ubisoft's My Japanese Coach for DS and will give that a shot. My thinking is that the repetitive nature of a videogame could actually make it a great learning tool. I've also ordered a text book too, before anyone says that I shouldn't rely on a videogame.

Does anyone have any experience of using a game and how did they get on with it?

Also, there seems to be another similar product available called Mind Your Language: Learn Japanese. Has anyone used this one? Is it worth getting in addition to My Japanese Coach?

[DeathAdder]

I have My Japanese, French, Chinese and Spanish coaches. The Japanese one I bought more out of interest - I was past its level before I got it. However, the Chinese one is quite good. Being able to record your voice and compare it to the native speaker is really good for a language with tones and such difficult pronunciation as Chinese. It suffered from too much reliance on Kanji from the start (I don't care about learning Chinese kanji) and I think, from my brief look at it, the Japanese one does too. That's not to say learning the kanji isn't worthwhile, but I was only interested in learning to speak and listen to Chinese.

I think those two products are good, but should be seen as a supplement to learning, not courses in their own right. And I always got the feeling that I would learn a lot more with a concentrated 15 minutes with a book than an hour on the DS, but maybe that's just my style of learning.

The French one (I know you didn't ask, but for the sake of completeness I'll post my impressions) is useless, as it pays no attention whatsoever to gender of nouns. I gave up after only a few lessons. According to Amazon reviews, the Spanish one is OK for the first few lessons, when it explains some grammar, but after 20 lessons or so, the remainder are just vocab tests. Hence my opinion that these are no substitute for real language courses.

If you have any specific questions, post them on here and I can whack it back into the DS and have a look for you.

I haven't use the Mind Your Language series, but I loved the TV programme of the same name.

[Kaladron]

Thanks for the impressions, tomato. It sounds like you're an avid linguist.

[Arctic Feather]

I gave the Japanese Coach DS a go, just out of interest but to be honest I really didn't like. It only has very short grammar explanations may be useful as a reminder, but but as proper explanations for the first time you come across a particular grammar point.

The mini-games are mostly useless and not worth the time but you still have to play through them to progress to the next lesson. As you progress you will also unlock hiragana (which really should have been there from the start) and you'll move on to learn some kanji, but the kanji mini-game is again useless - it actually displays the answer on the upper screen.

You're much better off just sticking to textbooks IMO. (Which one did you go for?)

You could also get this DS dictionary. It's a decent dictionary and let you write in kanji on the bottom is is very useful.

There's a few Japanese kanji learning games out in japan too that may help with learning kanji readings (though obviosuly not meanings), such as KanKen DS, but if you just starting out you wouldn't need to worry about that yet.

[nakamura]

Slightly odd but I learned to read Katakana translating the player names on Winning Eleven. The repetative nature worked very well for me as I am rubbish it study.

[Kaladron]

I gave the Japanese Coach DS a go, just out of interest but to be honest I really didn't like. It only has very short grammar explanations may be useful as a reminder, but but as proper explanations for the first time you come across a particular grammar point.

The mini-games are mostly useless and not worth the time but you still have to play through them to progress to the next lesson. As you progress you will also unlock hiragana (which really should have been there from the start) and you'll move on to learn some kanji, but the kanji mini-game is again useless - it actually displays the answer on the upper screen.

You're much better off just sticking to textbooks IMO. (Which one did you go for?)

You could also get this DS dictionary. It's a decent dictionary and let you write in kanji on the bottom is is very useful.

There's a few Japanese kanji learning games out in japan too that may help with learning kanji readings (though obviosuly not meanings), such as KanKen DS, but if you just starting out you wouldn't need to worry about that yet.

I ordered this book along with the accompanying audio CD.

I also downloaded a little Xbox Indie game that uses flashcards to teach you pronunciation and then follows with multiple choice quizzes to test you. I used the former by looking at the spines of my Dreamcast games as a learning aid and then went into the quizzes blind. It was remarkable how much I recognized, actually. And even more interesting that when I didn't know the answer I could work it out logically by recalling similar shapes I'd seen before. Those characters aren't quite as random as they first seem.

[Paddy]

No they're not. I think for you a game/software will be a good way to learn as you'll enjoy it and that's half the battle with continuing to do something new. If you need any help don't hesitate to ask. My writing of kanji's crap but my reading is quite alright (but can always improve). I may have to get that myself as 30 mins of that a day can't hurt. What's spurred the interest again then?

[Paddy]

Try watching something in Japanese language with subtitles as that's a good way of assisting your understanding of what different words/sentences will mean. Youtube is a good resource for this as well. When you get confident enough, try watching without the subs on and see what you can understand.

P.S shinhatsubai - 新発売 - means new release, for example

[kryss]

We have a whole thread dedicated to learning Japanese don't forget.

The "nazotte oboeru otona kanji renshuu" games are excellent for learning Kanji, there are also some games and tests in there too.

[Kaladron]

What's spurred the interest again then?

Thanks, Paddy. Nothing spurred the interest in particular. It's just that I've gotten to a place in my life where I need a new challenge to keep me motivated. This one should easily take care of the next decade, I reckon. And it can only make me better at my job too.

[Paddy]

Thanks, Paddy. Nothing spurred the interest in particular. It's just that I've gotten to a place in my life where I need a new challenge to keep me motivated. This one should easily take care of the next decade, I reckon. And it can only make me better at my job too.

Then you can ask Miyamoto when him and Yuji Naka are going to team up and make the best new platformer (or never).

It'll certainly be another string to your bow. I always wondered how Tim Rogers (the guy who writes a column in Games TM) got to work ouot there but I guess he just started to learn, did his research on the necessary things and then made the move. Might do that myself sometime.

Trying reading some of the mags/manuals of some of the games you own that are Japanese. For fighters/RPGs you should be able to easily work out what punch/attack/magic/move are and stuff but you can then easily become familiar with their Japanese characters as well. The cool thing is when you start to see characters overlap in words so even if you can't pronounce the kanji you can get the rough meaning by looking at the characters (sometimes). Works a treat when that happens.

[charlesr]

I note there's an Xbox Live Indie "learn Japanese" app in the recent arrivals at the mo.

[jamesy]

Trying reading some of the mags/manuals of some of the games you own that are Japanese. For fighters/RPGs you should be able to easily work out what punch/attack/magic/move are and stuff but you can then easily become familiar with their Japanese characters as well. The cool thing is when you start to see characters overlap in words so even if you can't pronounce the kanji you can get the rough meaning by looking at the characters (sometimes). Works a treat when that happens.

Yea definitely give this a try as well as menus within games. That's pretty much how I learned katakana and hiragana. By doing this i've become much quicker at recognizing characters and reading. Still have no idea what most of it means at this stage. Also some manga might help too just for learning kana.

[Kaladron]

I note there's an Xbox Live Indie "learn Japanese" app in the recent arrivals at the mo.

I noticed that too and downloaded it straight away. It's mostly a series of tests, so isn't too useful just yet. But could be a helpful aid later on.

[DeathAdder]

This may help you. I work part-time for this place, although not the Japanese part of it.

http://www.japanesepod101.com/search/lessons

I can use the languages I want for free, as a staff member - they do plenty of other ones as well as Japanese. It is a subscription site, but you can listen to the audio of the lessons for free. Feedback is very good if the forums are anything to go by, and you can post on the forum without paying to join.

I hope this doesn't sound like spam / a plug. I get no commission whatsoever, but mods, feel free to delete if it does.

About dictionaries - the My XXX Coach carts have an excellent talking dictionary in the back of them. Doesn't matter so much for easy to pronounce languages like Japanese, but it was invaluable for a tonal language like Chinese.