Lurker > Itachi157

I'm going through Ryu Ga Gotoku Ishin. It's pretty cool! Not getting everything, but probably a good 90+%.

Interchangeable as far as I know.

SpiritSephiroth posted...

What was the first novel you read when you were learning. I want to know the level I should be aiming for around about.

The first native material I ever tried reading were the manga I listed in my previous post, pretty much in that order. After that, I moved on to visual novels. I haven't actually read a straight novel in Japanese, only VNs (which are pretty much novels with music and artwork I guess).

The first VN I ever read was called Fureraba, I think it's since been translated to English, but wasn't back when I read it in JP. It was definitely a jump up in difficulty from the manga I had read up to that point (most VNs are due to having narration etc) but I was able to get through it without all that much difficulty.

If you need VN recommendations I can definitely suggest some, unfortunately won't be much help for traditional novels, though I do plan on reading some someday. The "pick which girl you would like to date" type of VNs (Fureraba is very much one of those) can get kinda boring but they are easy to start out with.

Yotsuba was great for me when I was just starting out. Very entertaining too. I think the next one I read after that was Ika Musume. Then I read all of what was currently published at the time of Nisekoi and To-Love-Ru/Darkness.

I would just plagiarize one of the ones I "composed" in Ghost of Tsushima.

For my own Japanese activity the VN I'm reading right now is pretty boring. Almost dropped it to pick up another one but I do that too much, so am powering through it.

SpiritSephiroth posted...

Doing a quiz on a character in Keigo that the class has to guess from the pieces of information I reveal about them. I chose Ayumi Hamasaki. I hope they know who that is, she's pretty damn big in Japan.

Although whenever I speaak about famous Idol groups, actors, actresses, singers ect, they never know who they are >_>

Edit: Maybe I should change it to Gackt. Hmm.

Change it to some anime character and I'm sure they'd know it

Overall, I highly recommend that method. Visual novels are pretty good for improving reading and building up basic vocab. If you're a beginner, there are tons of visual novels that have mostly slice of life scenes and therefore easier vocabulary and grammar than your typical actual novel. Of course, there are some really hard visual novels as well, but obviously you don't start with those. However, even those are probably easier than many traditional novels.

As that guy brings up in the video, like 99% of them have 18+ content, but if that's an issue you can just skip right through it and not lose anything in the vast majority of VNs.

Here's a useful guide for setting up visual novels to be a Japanese learning tool. It found it when I found the same guy's Anki setup guide earlier.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oAPr5S6h6yE

Very useful way to improve reading skill and vocabulary. I can't vouch for that Island game he recommends but I read Himawari by the same writer and it was excellent.

Reading manga is also good. A lot of people start with Yotsuba& and that is indeed the first thing I ever attempted to read in Japanese.

Demon Slayer movie is out on Funimation now (streaming). I started it and it seemed there was a really strangely long recap of the very beginning of the series (showing Tanjiro's family alive). I was thinking "wow, they really took up this much time of the movie with showing this again"?

It felt too weird, so I checked and realized I actually hit play on episode 1 of the series.

Did you run into her IRL somehow or was it online?

I kind of wanted to watch it in theaters but I didn't want to get delta covid, so I decided to just wait until it's available online. I was able to understand the series in Japanese pretty well so expecting the movie to not be much more difficult. I do need to do more listening practice in general, too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OJxndUGN8Cg

Handy video which should fully be able to set up Anki for you along with auto creating flashcards.

Found this when poking around reddit

https://learnjapanese.moe/

It has a section on Anki. Not sure who made it and I didn't in depth read the whole thing, but from skimming there's some good info on there.

There's no one way to learn but you can usually glean some useful stuff from guides like this.

SpiritSephiroth posted...

I checked Anki out and I really don't know how to use it. All I saw were blank cards. Am I supposed to fill them out myself?

It's been a while since I've set it up, but IIRC there are pre-made decks you can download and use.
Not sure if they are still out there. I think they set up all the formatting for you too.

But aside from that to my understanding, you do make the cards yourself manually. You can set the cards up however you want (what info to show on each side, etc) and there are also ways to change up the fonts/sizes.

There used to be a tool in Firefox I believe that synced up with Rikaichan (mouse over dictionary) where if you linked it up with Anki, you could add and create new cards to an Anki deck with the press of a button. Made it super fast to make and add new cards. It would make the whole card for you. However, some browser update broke it, and I didn't check if it ever got restored. It was kind of a double edged sword as the ease of using that tool made me add every unknown word I ran into, which led to inefficiencies.

I'm actually going to make a new deck for the first time in a while, so if I find anything useful, I'll post it here. I was planning on making the cards manually which would probably be a pain, but if there's a way to auto do it I'll try to find it. Like I said it's been years since I really messed with Anki.

Starting to get back into the groove. Back to finishing VNs for once and going to start a new Anki mined words deck. I'm going to abandon my old decks as I haven't used them in forever so the algorithms are probably way off.

One of them was the Core vocab deck and I've long mastered all that vocab. The other was an old mined words deck that was way bloated with unnecessary stuff.

I added a bunch of words that I doubt I really need to know and that I barely have a grasp of in English anyway (a bunch of scientific terms like chemical compounds etc that basically had no chance of sticking). I think there was a science infodump in some VN and I just added all the words from it to Anki without thinking.

My new deck is only going to contain stuff that I think I can remember and that seems like it'll be useful/repeated often.

Overall if someone goes the mining/Anki route (adding words that pop up in stuff you read to a deck), my advice would be to not add in everything blindly because your deck will end up bloated with difficult to remember stuff. I would advise asking yourself if the word is actually something you'd predict seeing more than a handful of times ever. I think with a more focused deck, practice will be more efficient.

Of course it depends on your goals with Japanese as well. If you're going for like a science degree at a Japanese university obviously priorities will change.

Some of the booru image sites have tons of images with untranslated text (mostly dialogue from characters). You can make an account on there and try to translate some of the images. You can then tag the image with a request for someone more experienced to vet the translation for you too.

It's kind of a fun no stakes way to practice translating.

I'm hoping with stuff opening up they hold the JLPT outside of Japan again this year so I can re-attempt N1. My state is dropping all or most covid restrictions on June 15th so there seems to be no reason why they can't hold the test this December.

I'm going to have to step it up for the last six months of the year and practice more though.

Rimmer_Dall posted...

I feel like I've reached some kind of important milestone in hearing comprehension. I can finally understand Dogen's videos without reading the subtitles.

Yeah listening comprehension is what got me last time I took the test. I feel I've improved now.

Koei Tecmo makes some good stuff. For example Nioh 2 was my GOTY last year.

I understand there are different studios etc though

Gurifisu posted...

So I've been watching Odd Taxi. Quirky little show that I've actually really come to enjoy, but I just barely learned that the MC is voiced by Natsuki Hanae who voices Tanjiro from Demon slayer. Holy shit this guy has some fucking range.

Yeah, I can sometimes pick him out when he starts yelling.

Watched Lupin the Third The First (the CG movie) earlier this evening. The CG was nice to look at but the movie was only alright actual content-wise. Pretty crazy over the top. Lupin disguising himself as literal Hitler was pretty unexpected.

The only Lupin I had really seen prior to this was the Castle of Cagliostro movie and the episodes that used to air on Adult Swim back in the early 2000s, so not sure how over the top the series typically gets. I watched the dub for this movie and I'm pretty sure they got the original dub cast back for this one, at least Lupin was for sure the same.

pogo_rabid posted...

Is it just me, or has anyone else's anime intake taken a drastic downturn ever since vtubers became a thing. Ever since I started following "interactive anime girls", I don't find myself watching nearly as much traditional anime as I did in the past.

I hadn't watched much anime in recent years due to mostly reading VNs which kind of filled the anime gap for me. Now though as of the past year or so I'm starting back up, and this is like the first season in a while that I'm watching newly airing anime.

Vtubers personally aren't really my thing, I've seen maybe 15 minutes total of content from all Vtubers, mostly from people linking me funny moments from them or something.

Juhanor posted...

Nothing major under the tags IIRC there'll be one more "important" villain in Part 3, then a handful of clip shows before the next starts.
Part 4 is largely about some new Nanto guys and Raoh of course. Keep an eye out for Juza.
If your episode count goes to 152 then just keep number 110 in mind, because that's when the "second" series started, and it's polarizing among Hokuto fans. Some people love it, others absolutely loathe it.

I had heard about the second series. I was probably going to take a break before starting it. Is it also based on the manga?

Also, up to about 70 in Fist of the North Star.

Souther didn't last as long in the story as I thought he would. Final battle came and went pretty fast it seems. Decent arc though, they did a good job in making him actually seem like a threatening villain since he beat Ken once.

I wonder what's left at this point. I'm guessing some filler/minor villains, then Raoh? It would be cool if Raoh, Kenshiro, and Toki just permanently teamed up but we can't just let Raoh slide for what he did to Rei.

I remember me and my friend watched Demon Slayer at around the same time, he was a few episodes ahead of me. I remember him telling me Zenitsu was the best character. When I got to Zenitsu's first scene I was like "dude, are you serious?"

Also yeah I'd agree Demon Slayer was mostly unremarkable in its content, however something about it drew me in. I think a large part of it was the overall style and atmosphere.

I need to buckle down and focus more. I have every intention of reading an hour of VNs a night and maybe watching an hour of anime but I always just end up watching YouTube videos or playing games (in English). Basically, I need to improve my willpower.

Calwings posted...

https://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2021-04-25/madoka-magica-gets-new-anime-film-as-sequel-to-2013-rebellion-film/.172103

It's finally happening. Gen Urobuchi finally decided to put away his Taiwanese puppets for a little while and make more Madoka.

Oh that's awesome. I would have hoped for a new series but this is way better than nothing.

Urobuchi has made tons of cool shit so I'm glad he maybe finally got tired of the puppets for now.

Only bad thing about the movie is that we're going to have to wait forever to be able to see it in the West.

Gurifisu posted...

Fuck. I wanna go see it, but I'm being quarantined since I flew recently. God damn.

Yeah I wish I would've watched it instead of Mortal Kombat

Spidey5 posted...

https://i.imgur.com/ScV8Hyx.png

I could use the extra source of smiles.

I'm sold.

Juhanor posted...

How was it?

Yeah, how was it to anyone who went? And how was the theater experience?

Caelthus posted...

Yep. Fortunately, I've never ran into such people at the screenings I've been to.

Only screening I ever went to was Madoka Rebellion in like 2013 or whenever that came out. Crowd was OK and wasn't obnoxious at all other than a couple of people yelling stuff at the screen during the credits.

Anyone buy a ticket to the Demon Slayer movie screenings? There were quite a few locations. I think the screenings are tonight or tomorrow. I briefly considered going but I'd probably end up sitting next to some dude wearing the ahegao hentai faces hoodie and catch covid from him.

Leanaunfurled posted...

I dropped Jouran, too. I like the music and the art style but plot-wise, it was kind of...so-so. Especially in terms of plot twist whiplash. I'll peek on it at the end of the season to see if people say it gets better, but otherwise I'll sit out.

Also dropped Tokyo Revengers, solely from the art style rubbing me the wrong way. TIL I can be a shallow ho.

Yeah I didn't really like the art of Revengers either but the first episode was interesting enough. I'll probably watch the second tonight.

I see. I must have forgotten that or missed it. Because all of a sudden there are tons floating around and I did not remember them being a thing during the earlier episodes.

I was liking it, I just stalled out and never watched the last two episodes or so. One thing I remember being confused about is that I totally did not remember them getting playing cards after completing games, but it comes up as a plot point later.

All of those things seem like a big improvement over MAL. You can import your list too, right?

I'm probably the only one who made a list on Anime Planet.

I have, One Outs is great. If you're into baseball (I kind of am now and definitely wasn't back when I watched it) then you'll probably appreciate it even more. Either that or call out more ridiculous moments from a baseball fan's perspective if/when they happen.

SpiritSephiroth posted...

Guess not. I really want to watch it again but Amazon Prime being crap as it is, lost its license to stream it here in the UK.

Yeah, haven't watched too many J-dramas myself. I think Switched was the only one I've watched all the way through. I stalled out at the last two episodes of Alice in Borderland.

I did look that one up when you posted it though.

Netflix seems to have a few, I kind of wanted to watch the Ju-On series.

Leanaunfurled posted...

That is pretty cool trivia lol. I've been enjoying Shigeo's character as well so it's cool to see the thought that went into the character.

The straight up best for me is Yang. I feel that might be a common answer though, so I'll name a few secondary favorites. Olivier, Julian, and Mittermeyer. I can't say I don't lean towards the Alliance cast.

Yeah Yang was my favorite as well. One of my favorite anime characters overall actually. I was just curious because I see a lot of Empire fans who think Reinhard was the coolest and also think Yang was lame and/or overpowered. It seems to be split 50/50.

Leanaunfurled posted...

Patlabor was pretty good I haven't really gotten into mecha anime, or anime that's this classic aside from Legend of the Galactic Heroes, so I wasn't sure how I'd feel about it. It has a great cast and I'm looking forward to the movies and the reboot series.

Who was the best LOGH character to you? Everyone always seems to take a clear side between the Empire characters or the FPA characters.

Watched the first episode of Tokyo Revengers. Didn't care for the art style but it was interesting enough for me to watch at least a couple more episodes. Didn't really expect him to go back at the end, I imagine he's going to be jumping back and forth in time.

I'm going to try to pick up at least three or so shows this season. I'll likely watch Nagatoro next. Kind of want to watch Blue Reflection but I want to play the game first, I have it on PS4 and it's been on my backlog forever.

Also @Juhanor I got to when Souther is first introduced in FOTNS. He seems pretty badass, probably the deepest voice I've ever heard in anime. Also have to pour one out for my boy Rei. Sucks he had to die but I like how the Raoh battle had real consequences. At least he went out accomplishing a goal.

FL81 posted...

I found this cool ass anime background once on the internet
https://i.imgur.com/qrTAN4Y.jpg

and to this day I have no idea what it is or who drew it

my google-fu skills have failed me

Looks like Suigintou with a scythe on the right

I kind of get the vibe that a Western artist drew that. Maybe they posted it somewhere on Twitter or Tumblr. Too bad the signature in the upper left isn't really legible.

If you know the character name you could probably go on one of those image archive sites that tag all the images, and search for the characters name as a tag. I find that's where a lot of people on 4chan find fanart to post. If it's on there, it will probably have the artist listed.

SpiritSephiroth posted...

Been using duolingo, a nice change of pace tbh.

I started doing that for Spanish, however I didn't really keep up with it and now the green owl sends me sad phone notifications.

I took two years of it in high school and two semesters or so in college but I barely remember anything.

Calwings posted...

https://i.imgur.com/XjfcEau.jpg

Also PART SIX ANIME CONFIRMED!!!

Nice thing to wake up to!

Jeff AKA Snoopy posted...

Also slowly going through Devil is a Part Timer. Just finished episode 5. This is pretty damn good.

It's been years since I watched that but I remember Mao's sidekick (Alsiel or something like that?) being my favorite character

Rimmer_Dall posted...

Think I'm gonna put Shiki on hold. It's shockingly hard compared to everything else I've tried reading before, and it's honestly frustrating to have to look up a bunch of words every chapter now that I'm used to not needing to do it anymore. I think I'm gonna focus on Bakemonogatari. It's pretty easy, but I really want to increase my reading speed and comprehension more than I want to increase my vocabulary right now.

I thought the Bakemonogatari author was supposed to be pretty hard? Used a lot of wordplay and such.

I tried Medaka Box (the manga) around the first year I was learning and it was a bit beyond me at the time, so I picked something else.

Juhanor posted...

Finished Souten no Ken, left with a lot of questions about what happened to Uncle Ken.
It was a pleasant read anyway, kind of the "Battle Tendency" to HnK's "Phantom Blood."

I've been watching more HnK in the past week. Got up to through the first Raoh fight (assuming there will definitely be more). I'm surprised everyone made it through that. Well maybe everyone, it looks like Rei is fucked. Sucks seeing him writhing in pain knowing he has three days left to live. Hopefully Ken, Toki or Mamiya find a way to save him but it doesn't look good.

This whole dog village place they are in screams "filler episode/arc" so I'm wondering if it was in the manga.

SpiritSephiroth posted...

Isnt that the remaster version that they decided to charge for? It has a different art style too.

Yeah I thought it was going to be an update. Might as well just play my PS4 version. I didn't hear about a different art style but they did cut out/replace one of the actors for smoking weed or doing cocaine or something.

Games can be good listening practice. There's a lot of Kansai-ben in general in the Yakuza series. I bought Judgment a long time ago for cheap but haven't gotten around to playing it. I heard there will be a PS5 update soon with 4K/60FPS so I'll probably just wait for that at this point. Not sure whether to play Yakuza 6 or Judgment first though.

SpiritSephiroth posted...

Im hearing they're going to remake it for the west now.

I saw that quote and I thought it was a little odd. You think they could just localize it and spend way less money. It's not like it's super dated or anything, it's on the same engine as 0 and 5.

I can definitely see the need to remake 1 and 2, MAYBE 3, but not Ishin.