For anyone wondering, I just downloaded the demo from the eShop in the UK and both Japanese audio and subtitles are available from the options menu, no need to set your console language or use a VPN or whatever. This is also the case for the Ace Attorney trilogy, which I've really liked so far.
I bought the game and made it to a big reveal at 5 hours in, there are a lot of letters to read that I guess are optional but will require N2 I think to properly follow (or a fair bit of look up in the dictionary). Enjoying it so far though!
i will say as an english language teacher, the unpausable cutscenes are actually good for practical language learning. its good practice for on the fly conversation listening practice - you dont have to know every word, but it forces you to use quick thinking, context, and whatever words you know to grasp the overall meaning. don't worry about looking up the definition of every word when doing listening practice - you're eventually going to come across words in a conversation that are unfamiliar, even in your native tongue, and you won't be able to stop and look it up without disrupting the flow of conversation. it's an important skill to be able to understand the point they're making on the fly without having memorized the dictionary definition of every word being said. using a dictionary is best for when you're doing reading practice, but even then it's important to practice without one.
I played through the original on a Japanese DS a little while before the remake was announced and it was genuinely the first time a game in Japanese took me the same amount of time as it's expected to take in English according to HLTB. I was genuinely shocked at how accessible it was for a mid level learner.
I'm so happy I found this channel as a resource for Japanese learning and games. Your style of review is very clear and helpful! I've been a huge fan of this series and the original company CiNG for so many years now, and I wasn't sure about the language options. I'm glad it led me to finding your review. Thank you! I'll be watching more 😊
i find the font kinda hard to read in portable mode on the switch so definitely playing it on an actual monitor or tv for now. all in all, i quite enjoy it as a beginner, though it's still a bit tough at times for my level. the visuals are really nice, as is the music and such great voice acting. (out of all the characters so far, the old man is the hardest to follow/understand for me, but i take it as something i'll get used to as i progress, hopefully!) frankly, the only thing missing at this point would be an in-game vocab/grammar dictionary.
Hey Game Gengo! I've been wanting to learn Japanese since I was stationed in Okinawa. I took a few classes in like 2016 or 2017 and im restarting now because I am much more interested in Japanese than the classical singing languages (the basic European ones) even though I am a singer. I also wanted to play the Disgaea games before they release in the west. I think it would be really cool and on brand for your channel to have a list of games (switch or otherwise) that you can buy on the American or European eshop (of physical) that can change their text to Japanese without needing to go through the hassle of translating the eshop when you're new to learning and buying a Japanese eshop card online. I went through the games I own and noticed that the more recent square enix games do it like Star Ocean 2R and Triangle Strategies. I started playing Granblue Fantasy Relink also which can just make all the text Japanese. I think this list is vital for when the eshop eventually closes like the 3DS one did. It's hard to find a definitive source for American Switch games that can make the text Japanese since most people want it the other way around. My other thought was that with how easy it is to jailbreak a 3DS and download Japanese games on any 3DS console with the H-Shop, a tier list of 3DS games for learning Japanese would be amazing. I personally downloaded the bravely default games, DragonQuest 8 and Monhun Stories 1 along with two of those Kanken games from your video (the one with the rabbit and most recent 3DS version of the long series. I am going to keep up with all your videos and use you for my self-study outside of my classes!
You should check out 'STAR OCEAN: The Second Story R' remake, it has a lot of the features you typically look for in your videos, and can switch the text in-game between Japanese and English. There's a demo available also! I've just purchased Another Code based on your gengo review here, a well put together summary for sure.
I tried the demo and what I found helpful that you didn't mention was the fact you can change the language easily on the fly in the + menu. It takes a couple of clicks and there's no loading screens. (In the EU version not sure about the others) Of course its not one to one translation but good way to check if you understood the context
That's really convenient. There are games I want to play in Japanese and others in English or German. It's annoying to constantly change the console settings.
I’ve been playing Ocarina of Time in Japanese, and I’ve picked up more than a few verbs just by paying attention to what the Action Button says, as Navi advised. Hey, turns out it’s good to listen to her!
I used to hate that font for it being kind of hard to read but it's grown on me because it actually looks really nice and it's not actually that hard to read. It takes like maybe an hour at most to get used to how all the characters look. Seriously though, why is that font so common? I see it in so many completely unrelated games. I thought it was "fantasy-styled" but then I saw it used in Street Fighter 6. I mean, It looks nice but it's just weird how it's literally everywhere.
So glad you made this. I saw the typical marketing email from Nintendo pop up in my recommendations and it sounded interesting. My first thought was wondering if it would be good for Japanese learning, and here we are! Very glad to hear how good it is for learning. And good luck with the new spreadsheet.
Please do a series on Mother 3! It just released on the Japanese eshop and I'm sure there are lots of folks who would enjoy/appreciate following along with you.
I'm glad I found this channel. Really helps me find games I can use to learn a language. Another Code could be useful for learning other languages as well. Good to know I can use the game to learn Japanese if I wanted to. I really like the tier list for games to learn a language. It's useful to know which games are easy for beginners and which games are for more native speakers.
I've tried some of the demo and I see what you mean about the font, some of the characters are so confusing! Also the chair puzzle, the motion controls are dire. I'd love to keep playing as the language is fairly understandable, but my biggest peeve is the off-centre camera. I know this has been common in games for many years but I can't stand it, it just doesn't... feel right lol
And again an absolute awesome video. Started with Shin Chan few weeks ago, but I guess I need something else to switch things and genres a little bit up. This could be perfect. Learning for N4 right now.^^
I started playing this the other day in jp and happened to see your vid recommended to me today. Another downside I would say are the long journal entries which for some reason are not furigana'd, but because you can re-view any of them at any time, and it's pretty easy to switch between japanese and english, I don't think it's too big a deal. Unfortunately you can't switch mid-page of a journal entry for easy comparison or anything, but it's fun to kind of go through once, see how much you get, then read in english, then try again in japanese.
Having a lot of fun with the demo, but I'd like to mention already that quite a few menus and HUD elements don't include furigana so far (unlike all dialogue which does). Hasn't been too important yet but worth mentioning.
Whoa, this game is really accessible. I am still fairly early in learning. I can read some kids stories, so, this level felt accessible and a little above where I am. Which is perfect to stretch the brain without feeling over whelming. And if I don’t know the words, I can usually guess via context. Really great demo so far.
I played the demo of this and it was great!!! Will be buying it next month. A game that everyone might have missed that I feel might be almost as good as this for learning Japanese - Life is Strange 2. It doesn't have a log like this, but unlike this *all dialogue* (including thinking to oneself) is voice acted. You can examine an item and he will think out loud and there will be subtitles, and if you miss it you can simply examine the item again. It's also a choose your own adventure game so a lot of replayability there.
Once again Matt, another great video showcasing more content to learn from! Like you said 2024 is going to be a great year, and I'm excited to see what's in store! I'm doing well, Tokyo being cold as usual lol. My suggestions for learning Japanese: Destiny 2, Guild Wars 2, Elder Scrolls Online. These are likely more on the difficult end but they're mostly full voiced, and because they're MMOs there's plenty of time sink to go back and relearn, since the language will always be repeated in quests, etc.
I played Another Code back on the DS but never finished the sequel. I'm currently learning Japanese (which I... have started on multiple times already, lmao, but this time I'll keep going!) and, though I've only recently started, my current goal is to be able to play this game! I've been thinking about playing it and this is more encouragement. But I'm currently only three weeks into my current attempt, so it'll be a while... :P
This game is also just a good game!! I was so excited that this game was getting a remake treatment and being brought to modern consoles. I’m even more thrilled to hear this is a great game for learning and practicing Japanese.
Highly considering using my free time between quitting my job and going on holiday to Japan to play this game and try to study Japanese from it. 動画を公開してありがとうございます
I played this with English text with Japanese audio. I could understand some the language before reading it, hard to explain but once you hear it there is like a 3-4sec gap you know what was said before reading it. And I could tell if the audio was different to the English text. I may have to replay this totally in Japanese, but maybe it would be tedious as I know the story. Great video!
I remember playing this game on DS. Didn't know they did a remake version for the switch, I'll take a look. It's has double use: entertaining and learning Japanese at the same time 😂
I have been playing this in French to help me practice French reading and nearly all the same points apply to French with the exception that there is no French audio, quelle domage !
Any chance of you updating the Switch game list with this? I am VERY curious to hear your take on "Unicorn Overlord" too. Also how about Mamida no Bakeru(might have misspelled this, it is the new game that is suppose to feel like a Goemon homage since it is from the same team)? Your take on this last one would especially be fantastic. If this was Trace Memory I was a fan too. edit: Ummm Matt the list is loading up weird for me in terms of display.
7 месяцев назад
I just play this game yesterday (Wii Rom) looking for a game that has furigana, and now this video :D Also with furigana (Wii, Gamecube emulation): Super Paper Mario, Zelda Wind Waker, Detective Conan.
It's possible to pause the cutscenes on the emulator. The Agent scripts don't yet exist so you will need to use Yomininja but with Agent it is going to be even easier to look things up.
I downloaded the game recently to check it out, but my biggest gripe is with the furigana, surprisingly. The resolution of the switch along with the stylised lettering makes it hard to make out what the furigana is supposed to be (for example, i just came across 屋敷 (やしき) but because of the low resolution, the furigana looked like やしさ The stylised lettering isn't much of a problem (if at all), especially since it's the most readable stylised kana I've seen yet, and it's good for recognition in other environments, but it's a shame it's so hard to make out in low resolutions
I highly recommend this game for early learners. The language is very understandable and the puzzles are very easy, so you can focus on the language. This game boosted my self esteem after struggling with some other games. The art and music are cute too.
if I were fluent in Japanese I may consider translating games from English to Japanese, basically the opposite of what you do with the vocab series. I would find listening to a translation of the first cut scene of modern warfare 2 quite interesting even if it were just an off the cuff video.
I first encountered this font in Octopath Traveller 2. It took a while to get used to, and the screen reader app I use didn't like it, but it's really not that bad after a while.
I've never been able to finish a game in Japanese before. I tried many times but each time I kept having to look in the dictionary over and over again and playing became a pain and I gave up. I wonder if this game would engage me enough to play it in Japanese. Maybe I'll try.
Well if I had a switch I'd get it, also on ps5 there is 2 short games simply called hiragana and the other called ...you guessed is katakana so easy to brush up on those or just to learn them in general
Question: I Just purchased Nintendo Switch and my Japanese is at intermediate level. I learned that buying physical games for Switch is quite ok since some of them hold their value in time. So now I want to purchase Fire Emblem Engage from EU, physical, however I need to know if it will: 1) have Japanese text option 2) will be any different than the Japanese physical game Is there a way to check this for sure? Thanks
@@GameGengo I tried the demo for YsX Nordics and I think it has the same font, even though it's a totally different game. BTW, that would also be a cool game to review + it's not available in English yet, so it might even be kind of "worth" it. Cutscenes can't be paused, but everything is in a log with audio replay.
There is a demo so you should be able to check for yourself. But from what I can see it looks like full Japanese is available outside of the Japanese store.
I just downloaded the demo from the UK eShop, Japanese audio and subtitles are available from the options menu without having to change any system settings, nice and easy!
I agree with your mentioned negative aspects, also I don't know why but I kind of hate and like the artstyle of this game. Still it seems very nice for learning japanese.
Hey I like to follow your vids and learn. But as a complete beginner to japanese, I dont know where to start. Can you give me your video roadmap for a beginner?
Is it too easy for someone that has played famicon detective (although struggled a bit?) Also, I noticed the tier list was missing sumire but you reviewed in the switch tier list. Should I do a community submission for this game? Although it misses most of the features you want for learning I have been enjoying it so far.
@@relik7 there's no such thing as "too easy". If you understand everything ideally, you can pay attention to finer details of the language, like the accents and way of speaking. Plus, the more you understand, the easier it will be to acquire words and grammar in occasional phrases with the unknown elements.
This seems to be accessible for both N5 to N4 level learners to really cement those verbs, nouns, etc.. I’m N5 close to N4 myself so I’m definitely gonna try this game out!
If you want to work in Japan most companies only look at N2-N1 unless you can take the test for free. Otherwise passing doesn't really help you. I think you be better off just playing this game and Shin chan Me and the Professor on Summer Vacation The Endless Seven-Day Journey also try to shadow the words.
Can you provide? Japanese Language Version Furigana over Kanji if you want Pleasurable font to communicate and voice acting JLPT of N5, N4, & N3 Plus real life Japanese conversational communication Start August 12, 2025 and Beyond At least 200 + or more video games in development With 3 years of Development timing Nintendo Video Games for Japanese version Sony Video Games for Japanese version Microsoft Video Games for Japanese version Smartphone Android Video Games for Japanese version iPhone Smartphone Video Games for Japanese version
