I have a few games started, actually! Mario & Luigi RPG, but also ドラクエ３２D-HD. The latter has ふりがな for dialogue, so it’s very good for learning kanji while also just being able to read as long as you know the words by sound. ファイナルファンタジー5も初まった, but I’m probably only gonna finish that one later. Before this, I finished Mother 1 – let me tell you, the Famicom version is the worst possible one to start with, especially for language learning.
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Oh that reminds me, I was watching a streamer play that once… I wonder if I can figure out who that was (or just find a new one).
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Splurged and bought Ace Attorney Apollo Justice trilogy on a whim because it was on sale.
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Recently, I got Cooking Mama on my 3DS. The first one and the second one. I’m not reading as much on those ones though. I finished BoxBoy but it will take me longer to finish the sequel.
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Just finished Puyo Puyo Box, the only (non-spinoff) game in the series that doesn’t have a translation patch. The story mode is a mini JRPG, Chronicle before Chronicle. Considerably simpler in terms of mechanics, you start with Puyo 1 rules and equipment lets you individually unlock each rule change introduced in Tsu (offset, double rotate, 2 piece preview, All Clear bonus). Beyond that, it’s just that your attack/defense goes up but so do theirs so it evens out. So you’re pretty much playing Tsu, but with some dungeon crawling instead of the usual VN-style cutscenes.
At my level I’m only skimming, picking out the parts I can understand and skipping over whatever I don’t. But I was able to follow along with a good chunk of it, enough to get the gist. Simple vocab, simple grammar, plenty of repetition. And since I’ve played every other game in the series, recognizing the running gags helps with context. Only catch is that the font makes some kanji hard to read, but that’s what OCR is for.
Definitely recommend this if you’re looking for something short and sweet that’s easy to get into. Good candidate for My First JRPG. The modern games are good too (except the crossovers those are terrible do not play them and do not @ me), those have full voice acting, but if you’re a fan of the series Box is notable for being untranslated.
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I picked up Fate/Stay Night again for a few hours, after realizing that the Prologue has actually less unique vocab than most novels I’d read… only to then realize that I’m already on the Saber Route (which has substantially more vocab than most novels I’d read) 
Anyway, it didn’t feel so bad - but there were some parts that are a bit tedious to read (either b/c info-dumping, or b/c I don’t care about Shirou being a slightly horny teenager), and a number of places I’ve skipped (I’ve already read this in English, and also read part in JP last year). Only up to Day 2 in-game. Not sure whether I’ll continue rn. and not sure whether I’ll actually continue right now - though it will be much more interesting when I get to the actual route part, b/c I really don’t remember Saber’s route very well at all.
Probably better if I don’t, cuz I’m kinda behind on books rn 
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I got a physical copy of the Simoun game, and am currently SRS’ing the 解説書 (instruction manual). Wonder if anyone else has done this sorta thing… I know modern games don’t generally come with them (sadly - I loved reading them as a kid, and hate in-game tutorial screens). It also came with 2 bonus manga!
Playing Memories Off (Home Thread for メモリーズオフ - Visual Novel Reading Club) - slightly into the first day. Not sure how I feel about it just yet. On the easier side, and I can usually read just ahead of the slow auto-speed. Looked up 22 words so far
Depending on if there’s anything really beneficial in the Simoun 解説書, I might play that a bit more… I’ve still been playing every now and then
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Did 1.5 hrs of Home Thread for メモリーズオフ - Visual Novel Reading Club earlier, and so far I’m really unimpressed. Hoping it’s just an “it starts off really slow” thing or something
So I decided to play a bit of 月姫 -A piece of blue glass moon- (2021 remake), and wow I’m impressed. The beginning of the game was pretty identical to the OG, but starting with Shiki’s commute to school, they’ve changed things up so that he meets Ciel on the train, and it feels very organic (in the OG you meet her during lunch - and there’s a kind of “something is weird/mysterious about this, but can’t place my finger on it” vibe, and she feels a bit more lax & goofier). The modern version of the scene was a bit fanservice-y, but it makes sense for the character/story, and the whole scene was well-written, so I’ll forgive it. That aside - the voice acting adds so much, and the backgrounds and models are really beautiful. I can still get the gyst of stuff, even being lazy about lookups - so I’m excited to play more!
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I just starting playing Transiruby in Japanese. Figured it wouldn’t have much dialogue, though it’s actually quite a bit more than expected. It’s fine though. So far the most interesting bit was just them using ひし形 to describe a square sign where the corners are top/bottom. Like I know it’s technically correct and that saying “square” when it’s turned like that would be confusing. But I realized I would never describe something as a rhombus in English, which got my wondering how I would describe that kind of sign in English. Maybe “diamond” would be best, which I guess is also a valid translation for ひし形. In English most people wouldn’t know what a rhombus is even though they would know what a diamond is. I wonder if the average Japanese person knows what a ひし形 is or if there’s a better layman word for it.
Also, it’s just this robot(?) girl and her talking cat-bot. This is what I’m playing for.
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I finished 13 Sentinels. I could start reading SeaBed, which I bought recently. Or finishing some of the English games I started (including Hollow Knigh). Or start one of the “latest” two Zelda games (probably in English).
But I think what I’ll actually do is take a short break from video games.
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If 13 Sentinels was in full Japanese, how did you find it? Anything you can compare it to level wise?
The most recent Zelda game (echoes of wisdom) I found easy enough to understand from prior series knowledge and the language used. Link’s awakening is on par (though I know it’s a bit older). Not sure about Tears of the Kingdom though.
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Currently playing ラブ★コン ～パンチDEコント～
Which so far (I just finished all of Stage 1, I think) is basically a slightly less exciting version of the anime, but you control the ツッコミ… I don’t 100% get the mechanic (or how it affects the larger story), but I seem to be doing well enough? I’m in it for the 関西弁 anyway, but it’s an interesting way to interact with it. There is a playthrough video of Stages 1-3 on YouTube
A month ago, I was playing:
It’s been years since I played the original, so unlike Fate/Stay Night & Tsukihime I don’t have as clear memories of it - plus it’s a choice-based time loop, and not linear in the first place. A lot of parts of it are used in Carnival Phantasm (Fate & Tsukihime-verse parody show) as well. Which is to say it’s a bit more exciting (but apparently not enough that I decided to keep playing)
I skipped the intro section bc it’s a horror/murder story that I really can’t stand. So now I’m up to the ghost stories at the temple, where they introduce you to all the characters. Lookups are about 1 word per every few sentences, some of which I could get from context… And promptly forgot about the game like 3 days after I started playing 
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13 sentinels was fully Japanese. On the it’s-easy-side, it’s fully push to proceed and with backlog. On the it’s-hard-side, there is some sci-fi vocab, the plot is complicated enough that you might get confused even when reading in your native language, and on the strategy game side (battle mode) the font was impossible for me to read and the texts are highly technical.
I basically played the battles without reading the descriptions of the attacks and skills, which I think removes a bit of depth (it basically means I was ignoring some attacks or aspects of how they work).
For the story (“adventure mode”). I think I did pretty well. As typical, I got lazy and looked up less and less towards the end. I think it wasn’t that difficult language wise except for a few sci-fi vocabs. I think it was way easier than the Flowers game. Maybe somewhere in the L31 to L36 range?
I also bought the English version as I want to replay it for the story and I’d rather play it without a language barrier next do that I can hopefully understand everything this time (as I said, it’s a complicated plot).
As for Zelda, I actually chose to play Breath of the Wild in English, since there are parts where… There is just language without backlog or push to proceed. I assume it’s going to be the same for Echoes but wisdom?
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Np, I have 13 Sentinels PS5 version with only English text (you need the Japanese disk or download version for the Japanese text) but the Switch version with Japanese for text and audio. I did try it but found the language a bit too overwhelming at the time (that was earlier this year iirc). I have been trying to figure out if I should play through it first in English then re-play it in Japanese though it’ll probably be next year at this rate before I get the courage to do so
For Echoes of wisdom, I would say I found the text quite a bit easier than a lot of the stuff from Tears of the Kingdom or Breath of the wild so if you managed Breath of the wild, echoes of wisdom is likely to be an easier play through both in terms of gameplay and understanding. iirc, I found it on par with Link’s awakening in terms of difficulty and I think it is aimed at a younger audience than Breath of the wild and Tears of the kingdom.
I can’t remember if there is voice acting in echoes 
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Speaking of Zelda, I’m watching a playthrough of Majora’s Mask
The VTuber is from Kansai region, doesn’t use a synthesized voice, and makes really great character voices when she’s reading the on-screen dialogue or narration. I don’t usually watch playthroughs of games like this, but it’s been super fun
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Thanks, she seems to have a lot of the games I’ve played in English so this could be good listening for me 
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Cool. I don’t see a lot I’m familiar with, but I get the sense it will be fun too watch either way - and Majora’s Mask still has another 30 hrs left So I won’t have to think about it for a while 
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Started the
It’s pretty great so far, but I seriously hate all the onboarding for starting off with JRPGs, and it keeps trying to make me do turn based combat, which I just don’t want to do, if I don’t have to. I paused right before the big battle, bc that seems like a “yeah, you should use turn-based for this” moment… And like I just don’t have the energy rn. Maybe I should just switch the difficulty to the super easy mode, but I feel like I should at least give it a try first.
I am Estelle 笑
Will probably end up making a jpdb or Anki deck out of all the tutorial screens, monster stats, interface stuff, etc. Took pics of everything, so I can read it later, when I’m in the mood
Edit: I played a bit more after a break, and actually I kinda like the turn-based mode too
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Finished the game last night. It was fine, which is what I was expecting. Just wanted a short game with not too much dialogue and it achieved that. Took about 7.5 hours which is perfect. Any longer and I would have gotten bored.
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This game gengo video might be helpful for people that are considering playing trails in the sky in Japanese.
I played a little of the demo in English (really just until they leave town). Unfortunately the European switch version doesn’t have Japanese. I’m a little tempted, except that I’m not currently intending to buy new games and the last Japanese games I played I felt the language to be a bit of a barrier.
I think giving Joshua a female voice was a bizarre choice. I jokingly wondered if you were tricked into believing it’s Yuri again, since both main characters have female voices. Estelle grew on me (she is a fun boke character. I kinda imagine her and Joshua as Kyoko and Yui from yuru yuri). But Joshua is really bland so far.
Some of the aesthetics remind me of Chrono Cross, which I really like the aesthetics of. Though story and game play were a huge disappointment for me on my replay recently.
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