Has gaming helped you in learning Japanese?

Rewording your question does not change it... nor the answer. Basically, no. You can learn a new vocab word here & there, but if you don't have a very solid base, it is somewhat useless.

To further illustrate the point, there are countless English programs for subconsciously teaching Japanese kids English. Go randomly talk to some kid in English on the street in Japan and you'll see the fruits of such programs.

 

ugh... the Rosseta Stone adverts.... like inch long nails running down the worlds longest blackboard....

"A curled up hedgehog...."
"A punk rocker..."

Picture of a curled up hedgehog, a punk rocker curled up, and a conker

I know it's for comedy effect, but having some Mongbert pick the curled up punk rocker from a selection of three THEN getting the correct answer? It's not a great advertisement for your company product is it?


Anyways, as per GP, mainly no. That said i know a couple of people who dived head first into Japanese FF11 and they did get much much better at Japanese. Though it's not a "traditional" game what with it being an MMO so it's absolutely necessary to communicate with others (though no doubt heavily 2ch'ed/Internet weeaboo'ed Japanese)

 

Lol @ that RS advert. The other day, the player had kinda malfuction and repeated exactly this advert over and over again. The whole way up from TYO down to YKH.

 

learning a new language is hard.
Good for you if you think games can help, but at the end of the day you would be far better in getting some books and lessons before shouting about it.
It would be much faster too.

 

Half the fucking US needs help w/ their English first.

 

I think these sort of things can be useful but only if you have a "high" (like, as a student)-level of Japanese already.
Video games are a lame attempt at immersion. Most games don't have that much dialogue... that's not the point of them about 95% of the time.
I did get some help by playing the Densetsu no Stafy games, as they aren't kanji-ridden and occasionally had puzzles that would suck if you didn't attempt to read a bit.
Immersion has never helped me, except recently when I put my Facebook account on 日本語　mode. Though all I've learned are a few new kanji combos like 近況。

 

AKA I want to play jap-hentai dating sims so I have to learn Japanese to get these anime chicks naked?

 

Most of those games are generally just clicky games that require no skill to play, even the ones that do, you can fumble your way through them to get at least one good ending...

Back to the main point, I hate the English companies that advertise on those video screens on the Yamanote line amongst others, most of the time I play a game with my girlfriend to see if 1 - The phrase they teach is useful and 2 - The phrase they teach is one I have personally used within the last 2 years and normally the answer is no for both cases...

 

Given the amount of time and effort needed to learn a language like Japanese you are better off doing something more productive (like digging ditches). Alot of the popular things can be found translated into english from one source or another. You don't really have anything to gain by learning Japanese and I recommend not wasting your time unless you actually plan to spend a significant amount of time actually in Japan. If you don't ever visit or live in Japan you are an idiot for wasting your time learning Japanese.

 

Getting there by trail and error for hours on end kinda kills the moment :thumbsup:
I even had a hard time getting it done with the in English translated Can Can Bunny DX PC-FX version :crying:

And staying ontopic, NO: like everyone else mentioned already.

 

What a backwards way of looking at education. I'm awful at languages and have no intention of learning Japanese, but if someone else wants to then more power to them. Learning just for the sake of learning is never a waste as long as you enjoy it, and I can totally understand why someone would want to understand another language, especially around these parts where the language in question is so often tied to our choice of entertainment.

Also, you mention translations, but they're never perfect and are frequently way off the mark. Whenever I play a foreign game, the chances are pretty high I'm missing something, whether it's simply a word that has no real analogue in English or because I'm lacking broader cultural knowledge. Some people want to fix that, and that's their prerogative.

 

How true! I'll never learn latin because I'm never going to a misa in the Vatican, so, why learn it...

 

B/c nobody speaks it? And no cartoons are in Latin?

 

I totally share your point GaijinPunch and you can't learn Japanese by only playing games, I'm totally with you on this. However, as for me, playing Japanese games has really helped me improve my reading. I also wanted to translate game manuals and the fact that a lot of the old Japanese games have furigana in them really helped me out - it was a good training exercise. But entirely relying on Japanese games and anime to learn the language won't get you very far indeed.

 

its hard to learn japaneses?

 

I seem to think anime and games have helped me. Then again, I do also regularly study from textbooks (Genki, Minna no Nihongo, and then those "xKyuu ni deru bunpou" when I had to study for 2kyuu).
But I did get to review the reading of many Kanji from the Galaxy Angel games on PS2, because every character speaks except yours.

So no, maybe you can't learn Japanese from games, but they and anime are a good tool to review your skills from textbooks.

That and, contrary to popular stereotypes, Anime and Games have several times helped me get laid. Weeaboo chicks are FUN.

Weird shit, huh?

 

All this said, my wife puts a lot of her Japanese language development in her youth down to hammering manga - she was playing games too but she never mentions those as something that helped her language skills.

(wife is half japanese/portuguese - fluent English/Japanese, but English is her native language despite being born and raised in Japan)

 

My new goal in life is to start a fansubbing group that subs popular anime into Latin.

 

haha, i actually thought about converting them into Geordie/Cumbria at one point with the express purpose of knowing that some asshat would get extremely upset because the translations would not be LITERALLY the same

I'd just need to include a Geordie -> English guide along side

"Howay pet, ya knaa itz gannan champin" --> "All according to keikaku*" --> "keikaku is japanese for plan"

 

Well, when I was studying abroad, I read a shit ton of my host brother's mangas, but it was more or less to actually get ideas of words to use. Couldn't read real books, and looking up random English words will get you laughed at. I basically just read through... made flash cards from the words I didn't know, and pounded them.

In short, it can probably be an aid, but it needs to be like 20% of your regime, tops... and probably shouldn't bother until you're somewhere between JLPT 3 & 2.