Something went wrong. Try again later

Pepsiman

英語圏のゲームサイトだからこそ、ここで自分がはるかの旗を掲げなければならないの。

2815 28072 98 588
Forum Posts Wiki Points Following Followers

Putting Yourself on a Pedastol: Pepsiman's List of "Educational" Japanese Games

It should be no revelation when I say that if all you're doing when you're learning a language is practicing textbook exercises and using formulaic sentences, you're not making the most of your time nor your potential. Most of the battle of becoming competent with a language and subsequently mastering it comes from actually utilizing it in your day-to-day life, constantly testing yourself and being tested by the world around you. One important way of getting up to snuff and staying up to snuff is to by consuming media in the target language, figuring out how a language is actually used and what that means for those who speak it. Without that effort, theoretical knowledge of how a language operates is nearly worthless, since you can be guaranteed that in even the simplest situations a native speaker won't inherently talk like a textbook.

This list therefore exists for people who understand that and are learning Japanese and want to expand their knowledge through playing video games specifically. Of course, it's always wise to make sure video games aren't your only crutch when it comes to reviewing and refining your Japanese skills in a non-classroom setting, but it probably goes without saying that those who pick video games as their first choice of entertainment in general will likely also find themselves able to better relax and concentrate on a Japanese game than, say, a novel or movie that they might not be as inherently interested in completing. You engage with the language in a game in ways that you can't with other mediums because of the interactivity and there's a certain gratification to be had as a learner when you're successfully able to grasp what the game says or wants you to do and then you complete it without a hitch. If you've come to this list in search of games that will give you that sort of fulfillment, then you've come to the right place. If you're here because you just learned kana and want to know what are good Japanese-only games to flaunt your superior knowledge, then this isn't going to be for you. But since you probably wouldn't have already made it as far as you have in your Japanese if that was your only motivation, that's probably not a huge worry.

As such, the general criteria for a game to make this list is that its writing and (when applicable) voice acting are of a respectable quality. As learning tools, if those things aren't good, then the games aren't going to be worth pursuing as educational tools. This means that a lot of Japanese games with otherwise great gameplay will be omitted since the point isn't to just enjoy yet another game, but to get something out of it as a Japanese learner. To get that across, each game on this list will have some at-a-glance information that will tell you in general terms about the overall merits and difficulty level of the game as a learning tool, with more specific notes afterwards. The difficulty itself will be broken down in terms of how much time you'll have probably need to have spent studying Japanese at a university level to competently handle it, as well as a corresponding JLPT level for those who are learning through self-study. Regardless of that, different games on this list will be good for different aspects of Japanese learning; even at advanced levels, no one game is going to fill in all of the gaps you might still have and that's what the additional details will hopefully cover sufficiently.

Beyond that, the only general disclaimer I have about this list is that there are no guarantees that anything included on this list will have English FAQs readily available online (not a problem if you know your Japanese search terms, though) and that some may also be available in officially localized versions whose "accuracy" as translations I can't guarantee. (Going with an undub version will not inherently solve that problem for a variety of reasons, for the record.) Beyond that, this is an organic list that I hope to continually expand as time goes on, so if a game that you think is good isn't on the list, it's very likely because I just have yet to play it myself. That being said, if you do have suggestions for other games or other such comments, you're free to do so either in the comments section or in a PM.

List items

  • Difficulty Level: Absolute beginner (0-6 months); JLPT N5/N4

    Specialty: Basic grammar and vocabulary applications, kana practice.

    Tomato Adventure is a charming RPG brought to you by the team who would later bring you the Mario & Luigi RPG series. As such, it features battle mechanics that do require special inputs from you as a player in order to succeed, creating a system that, while simple, is pretty engaging. All of the text in the game is written in kana, featuring spaces between concrete grammatical statements/clauses that should make it easy for beginners to isolate which part of a sentence is providing what sort of information. Furthermore, the vocabulary used in the game is also simple, with the bright graphics helping to provide situational context during any confusing stretches. This also happens to be one of the very few Japanese-only RPGs I'd recommend to those who don't speak the language, but that's not what you're here for, right?

  • Difficulty Level: Medium (1.5-2 years); JLPT N3/N2

    Specialty: Kanji review, environmental and location-related terms.

    The sheer pedigree that drove the development of this game has likely made it known to most anybody who has a serious interest in DS gaming, despite the fact that it was never released overseas. Developed by Level 5 of Professor Layton, Dark Cloud, and White Knight Chronicle fame with design and animation work provided by the world-renowned Studio Ghibli, Ni no Kuni is a straightforward turn-based RPG with some light SRPG and monster-gathering mechanics. It's main claim to fame is the fact that every copy comes with a hardcover book that is all but essential for playing it, as the game requires you to consult it in a variety of situations to progress. Sometimes the game will just tell you which page specifically to turn to, but often you'll need to divine a little bit of context from the dialog to figure out where to find the needed information, something that's used in puzzle solving segments with some regularity. Given that the book is organized not unlike a traditional printed walkthrough, though, the information is never in an obscure place as long as your fluency is up to snuff. The presence of the book nevertheless is what drives up the general learning difficulty, though, as sufficient reading comprehension when using it while playing the game is a must in order to progress. Beyond that, every single kanji character in both the book and game's dialog comes with furigana, meaning that even if you don't know the actual meaning at a glance, you'll never be at a loss for how to pronounce it.

  • Difficulty Level: Advanced (3+ years); JLPT N2/N1

    Specialty: Military terminology, conversational flow.

    The black sheep of the acclaimed third-person shooter/SRPG hybrid series from Sega in terms of localization (or lack thereof), Valkyria Chronicles 3 features a lot of gameplay mechanics that should be familiar to fans of the series, as well as new additions such as character-specific abilities that can be triggered in battle for a price. As with every other game in the series, Valkyria Chronicles 3 features tutorials that should get you up to speed if you're new to the series, although the game otherwise operates in a manner similar to previous entries. Linguistically speaking, however, the game is made to be played by a literate Japanese-speaking audience first and foremost and therefore does nothing in the way of hand-holding regarding how it handles its text, meaning no furigana readings or other such things. As features are introduced into the gameplay, the messages will usually be accompanied by screenshots that will provide some contextual elucidation, but in general, if you run into words that you don't know, it'll be up to you to either intuitively figure it out based on existing knowledge or to just use a dictionary. This is more important in terms of the narrative than the gameplay since missions generally revolve around only a few specific types of objectives, but it's a general thing to be careful of throughout the game, especially with menu interfaces. The game does feature subtitles that you can turn on or off in the options menu for animated cutscenes and the game does feature a pretty liberal amount of voice acting throughout the storyline, although not all of it is voiced. Beyond that, expect to learn new military terms galore, ranging from hierarchical titles to tactical terminology used for the battlefield.

  • Difficulty Level: Medium-High+ (2 years minimum); JLPT N3+

    Specialty: Schoolyard terminology, conversational flow, social titles/hierarchy, keigo/kenjougo.

    You can really put any version of Persona 3 in here and likely do okay, but Portable makes the list specifically because it's inherently region-free as a PSP game. Regular Giant Bomb users are already likely to be well-versed in the general premise and will as such not be rehashed here. Although it's a heavily story-driven game, its generally straightforward, realistic dialog means that you'll be reading and hearing natural-sounding Japanese that isn't littered with obtuse terminology; most everybody talks like a real Japanese person would, including the few characters that speak more formally. You're bound to miss some things if your Japanese isn't sufficiently solid, but nothing critical is worded in an overly complicated matter. It is, however, a game whose benefits as a learning tool are best reaped the more prepared you are as learner. Characters naturally have dialog quirks that might be mistaken as typical parts of Japanese sentences by lower-level learners and menus/dialog trees are bound to be hit-or-miss without that added literacy. If, however, you already know the general story and gameplay beats from having played a previous edition of Persona 3, this one isn't so different that you can't get a decent amount out of it if you choose to play a little sooner rather than later. But its realistic slant in its writing and voice acting means that those who do play the game with more experience behind them will likely come out of playing the game feeling their knowledge is better expanded overall having had a larger foundation to build upon in the first place.

  • Difficulty Level: Advanced (3+ years); JLPT N2/N1

    Specialty: Regional dialects, name readings.

    The second entry in Atlus' spin-off series of SMT-themed SRPGs, Devil Survivor 2 is once again about living to see the next day in the midst of a disaster-stricken Japan, which means more isometric battlefield navigation mixed with turn-based team battles in the vein of its parent franchise. New to this edition is the Enishi ("Bonds") system, which is basically a sped-up version of Persona's Social Links in which characters in your party unlock new abilities and demons the more you get to know them. With a large amount of text during story sections and other situations, it is absolutely critical to go into the game with a very liberal amount of both grammatical and vocabulary knowledge. Like with Valkyria Chorincles 3, Devil Survivor 2 is designed for a literate audience first and foremost and that reading comprehension is critical to make sure you're not making critical mistakes in everything from plot points to how you set up teams. Dialog choices that affect the plot in ways both big and small are in plentiful supply and considering that the game is all about dealing with conflicts on your own terms, you need to be equipped to understand the implications of what you're reading to a pretty proficient degree. If you do have all of that general knowledge ready, however, Devil Survivor 2 is a great game to supplement your existing studies, especially with regards to regional dialects. Since the playable cast of characters come from a variety of regions in Japan, many of them speak in very distinct manners that will vividly remind you that the Tokyo dialect you've likely been learning is hardly the only flavor of Japanese out there that natives speak. You probably won't come out of the game able to speak the other dialects, but you'll be a lot better equipped to recognize when someone is, say, talking in Osakan Japanese. (Your dialog choices are naturally in the neutral Tokyo dialect, though, for the record.) Furthermore, while the game doesn't provide readings for most of the advanced words in its text, it does provide name readings for characters when you initially meet them, which is incredibly helpful considering that names often rely on now obscure readings for otherwise common kanji in many instances.

  • Difficulty Level: Advanced (2.5-3 years); JLPT N2/N1

    Specialty: Conversational flow, adult vocabulary, social dynamics.

    As with most other Atlus games, Catherine is not designed for a young audience, by any means. As a story-driven game whose goal is to get you thinking about relationships in a more personal, retrospective manner, a healthy knowledge of the language is obviously necessary in order to grasp what's going on on a fundamental level. The actual gameplay itself can be largely navigated without such a high level of Japanese proficiency, but then at that point, you're better off just playing the English version. If you come in prepared, though, Catherine is prepared to reward you as a learner in ways few other Japanese games can really compete at thus far. With much of the story taking place in a bar, you'll gain some insight as to how Japanese conversations are formulated and flow at the adult level, as well as just general vocabulary geared to towards everyday adult matters. As with other games at the advanced level, by the time you're really ready to tackle Catherine in its native language, the learning process is going to be geared more towards specific vocabulary and Japanese-exclusive phrases and euphemisms rather than anything fundamentally revelatory, but that's also a good sign that your Japanese learning is about refinement rather than playing grammatical catch-up with natives.

  • Difficulty Level: Beginner (6-12 months); JLPT N5/N4

    Specialty: Basic grammar/vocabulary/conversational phrases

    You could probably put most any main Pokemon game in here and do fine, but the Gold/Silver remakes are on here specifically because I have some experience with the Japanese edition of those. Regardless of that, Pokemon games are solid choices for the beginner Japanese student looking to broaden their linguistic horizons. With the exception of Black/White, they're all written entirely in kana which means you're arguably spending less time trying to look up kanji readings and more time just learning new vocabulary and, by extension, how to pronounce them. In addition to that, the kid-friendly nature of the game results in words having spaces in sentences and the dialog/general interface text being simple, both of which naturally reduce the stress of trying to process information in a non-native language, something that's especially appreciated in an RPG. Like in the English version, attack names and the like are also written to be pretty literal and employ actual vocabulary words which, in addition to general bolstering one's general word bank, also acclimates learners to what sounds (and, by extension, kanji, if they look them up) tend to be associated with what sort of concepts in the language. It also obviously doesn't hurt that the interface and general gameplay is still going to be entirely familiar to anybody who's played a version of the games in any language, making progression a lot more straightforward than a lot of other Japanese-language RPGs.

  • Difficulty Level: Medium (2 years+); JLPT N3/N2

    Specialty: Kanji acquisition/review, formal/age-related conversational expressions, semi-archaic terms

    Spirit Tracks makes this list primarily due to a feature that, to my knowledge, is not at all widely advertised by Nintendo and that's toggled readings for the kanji that shows up in the game's dialog. Essentially, kanji that show up in the text won't be coupled with furigana readings by default, but if you tap a word with a stylus, then the reading for that word will appear on the screen. This is a feature that's more useful for advanced learners who might understand the meaning of a kanji compound just by looking at the characters yet are unsure of the actual pronunciation, but that's hardly to say that it doesn't have its uses for lower-level learners either. Beyond that, the dialog has a good mixture of conversation styles that correspond with the various characters and demonstrate in very broad strokes how people of that age, social status, etc. generally talk in Japanese. Beyond that, the game is a mostly straightforward experience in Japanese that shouldn't provide too much trouble for those who have studied long enough, although there is one portion of the game that requires speaking into the microphone in Japanese to progress, something that at least my DS didn't handle well no matter how clearly I spoke. It's doable, however, so your mileage might vary with that particular experience.

  • Difficult Level: Advanced+ (4+ years); JLPT N1

    Specialty: Literary Japanese, regional dialects, honorific/humble form

    If your Japanese is good enough that you feel confident in venturing into the world of visual novels and adventure games, you probably don't ultimately need my advice all that much about what's good since you can just do the research yourself. Easily one of the most diverse and well-populated genres out there in Japanese games, visual novels and adventure games have come to fill more or less every narrative genre and niche you can hope, meaning that there's definitely something for you out there. Still, if you're lost and don't know of a quality game to start with, Dangan Ronpa is a hell of a good way to kick things off. Easily one of the best written Japanese games in recent years, Dangan Ronpa's prose in its native language is top-notch, taking full advantage of both the language and its medium as a game to create an experience that somehow manages to be both haunting and humorous, with the two often just being moments apart. That makes the game a very good candidate for learning what passes as good prose in Japanese. Some characters speak in obscure dialects you probably never learned in the classroom, for instance, while others will have verbal tics that make them stand out and feel unique. And then the narration that's coming from the main character does a great job of evocatively setting up the various scenes, playing around with Japanese terminology and grammar to get the tone and characterizations just right. For the Japanese learner without much left to learn in terms of raw grammar and vocabulary, Dangan Ronpa is a great way to simply expand your understanding of how beautiful and flexible Japanese can be handled when composed by a master.