Learn Japanese with homebrew DS app
by John Bardinelli 
{ Mar 31st 2007 at 6:57AM }
Japanese gamers can learn English with their DS. There's even a Japanese-English dictionary for the system. Now it's time for us poor monoglot anglophones to expand our linguistic horizons. A coder known as Zoelen has just released an early version of Project JDS. The app teaches you to recognize and write both hiragana and katakana characters, even listen to their pronunciation. And if you're really nice, you can use the touch screen to draw characters and get berated for using the wrong stroke order!It isn't much to look at, but it gets the job done and is surprisingly feature-rich for a homemade app. Now if only it had a catchy name. Something like ... Touch Dic.
[Via DrunkenCoders]
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Hikiki @ Mar 31st 2007 10:12AM
Given the amount of quality Japanese only games and the popularity of importing, I'm quite surprised that this has not happened on a commercial level. If some nice dev company would put forth a well put together app with decent features I would certainly drop some for it. It's nice that the homebrew community are doing it though. But not everyone has homebrew or nows how to get it working on their ds.
Rob Accomando @ Mar 31st 2007 9:00AM
FINALLY! Imports Japanese RPGs here I come!!!
Tadashi @ Mar 31st 2007 9:27AM
Kana? Sorry, but this is really no problem.
I hope he integrates the same function for Kanji. Especially for WaPro baka ;)
Alex @ Mar 31st 2007 9:57AM
The website is down ...
@2 Tadashi
黙れ。
Squeek @ Mar 31st 2007 9:59AM
It's a shame that hiragana and katakana are really basic and easy to learn.
We need one for Kanji. I'd pay for that one.
Kritz @ Mar 31st 2007 10:26AM
4chan has taught me all the Japanese I need to know.
desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu desu, etc.
Oh, for all those Japanese nuts, I have a very handy Kanji tool. It's called "JE Dict". Basically, you select one or two radicals (Such as the Female radical and say, the sun radical), and it'll show you all the Kanji that have those radicals in it. This program's very useful for anyone doing Japanese at school, or just want to know what those Kanji mean in anime.
An example of the use was when I was watching the South Park episode, Good Times With Weapons. I didn't know what the Kanji was on Eric's left arm. I put in a radical, and I choose the one that matched it from a list of maybe, 20 Kanji.
Apparently, it means "Taste".
If JEDict could get onto the DS, I'd be impressed. As for learning how to write / pronounce Hiragana / Katakana, well, heh. Won't take long for even a novice to pick up over half of them.
haha @ Mar 31st 2007 10:29AM
"Won't take long for even a novice to pick up over half of them."
Says the guy who needs a program to tell him what a character means.
Rubang B @ Mar 31st 2007 11:03AM
Dammit! I was so excited when I read the headline that I almost exploded. But without kanji or even vocabulary, this won't help.
Kritz @ Mar 31st 2007 11:20AM
@ 7,
I ask, do you even know the basics of Japanese? There are three different character "styles", I suppose you could call them.
Hiragana's the basic alphabet. You put a bunch of these together? You've got a word. Much in the same was as English, you can look at them and read them no problem.
Katakana's mostly used for foreign words (To the Japanese), such as "Hamburger" or Western names such as "Mark". They follow the same sound structure as Hiragana, but generally have less curves in appearance.
Kanji? This is the bitch of all characters. As said before, these consist of radicals. Some only have one or two, and can fairly easily be used to find out what they mean. Others have anywhere between 5+ radicals. There are bloody thousands of these Kanji, and just by looking at them, you'd have no idea of how to actually pronounce them. Which is why Hiragana's so important.
Kanji are really just pictures. They're drawings that try to show what's going on. You can't look at an English drawing of say, a flower, and be able to name that exact flower without already knowing it before hand. It's basically the same concept.
So, I ask of you, not to insult other people when you've got no fucking idea what you're talking about. Or hell, not to insult people at all. I mean, the Joystiq community's pretty shitty as it is. I'm sure the guys here don't need more crap in their comment pages over all the stupid console wars arguments.
Oh, and not that it matters, but I learned both the Katakana and Hiragana "alphabet" in two months (Yes, I confused the Hiragana characters "Re", "Wa" and "Ne" my fare share of times, too).
Rubang B @ Mar 31st 2007 11:37AM
The point is, there's about 46 hiragana and 46 katakana, and they're all syllables. There's about 2,000 kanji in modern Japanese and 3,000 in modern Chinese. Without kanji, we're all screwed. This is off to a good start though.
Tamago @ Mar 31st 2007 2:37PM
Well this is pretty useless. Pick up a book and learn hiragana and katakana in a weeks time. Do it for kanji and you have another story altogether.
Pal @ Mar 31st 2007 1:46PM
Get off your high horses, eesh. Someone has to start learning somewhere, don't they? I'm a fluent half-Japanese guy who has taught Japanese as a second language to many students, and they do struggle with the kanas.
There are two large sets to learn that exceed the number of characters in the alphabet to begin with (104 for each set, 208 in all; don't forget Gya, Kyu, Cho, Mya, etc.), and many that (prematurely) get into kanji can't even read the kanas at a decent speed, which makes looking kanji up in the kanji dictionary a chore.
It's impressive that they've learned so many kanji, but not so much when they read everything in kana at a snail's pace, or can't use the kanji in a sentence. Kanji is, after all, used to abbreviate and clarify something that could be written entirely in kana, so there's no rush to get into kanji so fast to be "cool".
If anything, this is good exercise for those that have already covered the basics (and actually listened to what the characters sound like through another person talking, or via CD, TV, etc.), and want to review what you've learned on the go. The program teaches proper stroke order as well, which is great.
For those who have a good grasp of the kanas with room for improvement, I suggest reading manga that have furiganas (kanas beside kanji characters) with an easy-to-follow story. I recommend Doraemon, Japan's most beloved character. It's hard to avoid this robot cat's charm!
Thanks Zoelen for this wonderful application, my girlfriend loves it :)
djmg82 @ Mar 31st 2007 2:06PM
Is there a PC version of this? :P
Hiroaki Masahiko @ Mar 31st 2007 2:07PM
Uhm, learning Kanas, or even Kanji, isn't the same as learning Japanese... And if you're willing to learn Japanese just for the sake of playing import games, there's got to be something wrong with you. For those who don't already know, Japan isn't as idealized as you think it is. We have a strong sense of nationalism and xenophobia is very common. With that upbringing, I can't help but get annoyed at people who idealize us or desire to learn the language for the sake of reading anime, etc. I'd understand if you guys were learning for business purposes or if you're moving there, but please, we are more than just our anime or video games.
-An anonymous Japanese Male
Rubang B @ Mar 31st 2007 2:21PM
@Hiroaki Masahiko, in one of my Japanese classes there was a man in his 40's who said he was taking the class just so he could understand your soap operas. So watch out, it's not just the anime that's sucking up all the whiteys.
@Pal, Furiganas are my crutch and my savior.
Tamago @ Mar 31st 2007 3:05PM
Besides if you take up japanese for the sake of anime or imports, you likely wont get far at all. I guess that's the beauty at least the difficulty weeds out all the anime nerds pretty early
*cue a handfull of anime nerds claiming they made it*
Pal @ Mar 31st 2007 5:43PM
@ Hiroaki: It is kind of strange that Japan has received this strange curiosity in the past few decades, but I don't mind. It weirds me out when I meet anime fans that can sing Japanese songs without knowing the language, but it doesn't affect me too much. I also believe that only a few are serious enough to master the language, and those few usually learn Japanese not just for anime and games, but for genuine love for the country.
That being said, games and manga alone probably aren't enough to merit learning any language, so those interested should save up and visit Japan and see if you genuinely like the country, or just the games :) Who knows, you could be the next Ted Woolsey!
Megaqwerty @ Mar 31st 2007 5:50PM
There's an Anpanman DS game that already does this, but then again, that costs money.
But, yeah, most of my motivation to learn Japanese comes from the several gigs of hentai I have.
Ihar `Philips` Filipau @ Mar 31st 2007 7:19PM
Hiroaki Masahiko: "With that upbringing, I can't help but get annoyed at people who idealize us or desire to learn the language for the sake of reading anime, etc."
I learn Japanese because I like anime/manga. I haven't reached games though.
I do not "idealize" - it just Asian culture fits me better. And Japanese one at that most accessible in Western world. And anime/manga/games - they are all contemporary expression of the culture. What's wrong with liking/studying somebody's else culture and history?
P.S. I'm also huge fan of Japanese cuisine. Probably there is really "something wrong" with me ;-)
Rowd149 @ Mar 31st 2007 9:00PM
If you're so xenophobic, why are so concerned about people in other countries learning your language? :\ Personally, I've found that people who really like the language transition from learning it for video games and anime to learning it for Japanese culture. Maybe by going to Japan, maybe by meeting Japanese people, but people serious about the language are in it for more than perks, they're in it for the spirit. Just, you know, be happy to have such a strong, concrete, long-standing culture you can fall back on :\ A lot of displaced peoples around the world don't have that, even hundreds of years after the fact.
Ryan D. @ Mar 31st 2007 9:17PM
@All this other static.. hey! Zip it!
I'm just learning it to better myself by taking on a challenging project, anyway.
Okay - so something relevant to this article - has anyone been able to get this working yet? Doesn't start unpatched, doesn't patch successfully for me.
Ryan D. @ Mar 31st 2007 9:53PM
Erm. Nevermind - works fine.
Aberu @ Apr 2nd 2007 9:15AM
You don't really need to get this on DS, you can buy a training calculator shaped device for like 50 bucks. Go looking around for it, forgot what it is called, but 50 bucks and you have the device that has training for not only all kana, but vocabulary and grammar training as well.
Aberu @ Apr 2nd 2007 9:18AM
@Ihar: Asian culture is not manga/anime, I think that's what he is offended by. You made it clear in your post exactly what he is saying. You are learning the language not to make any real use of it other than to read manga and maybe keep up with anime. I could see how it is offensive to him. Sure no one in America would be offended by that, but if you truly are learning the culture you would understand that.
Abscissa @ Apr 4th 2007 9:13PM
"You are learning the language not to make any real use of it other than to read manga and maybe keep up with anime." -#24 Aberu
I see nothing wrong him wanting to learn the language for that reason. Granted, it's not a form of sucking-up to them (which it sounds like this is what they're expecting). But it's hardly an insult either.
Abscissa @ Apr 4th 2007 9:48PM
"For those who don't already know, Japan isn't as idealized as you think it is. We have a strong sense of nationalism and xenophobia is very common. ... but please, we are more than just our anime or video games." - #13 Hiroaki Masahiko
First of all, I realize you're mainly talking about certain westerners and not all of us as a group. So please don't take my message here as anything against you personally, or against all of Japan. I'm only talking about *some* Japanese just as you are only talking about *some* of us...
I respect a lot of things about Japan very much, but one thing that consistently annoys me is people who believe the "gaijin" stereotype so strongly that they actually believe the average westerner is stupid enough to think Japan is all anime, manga, video games and sushi. Of *course* we realize there's more to it than that.
As an example of what I'm talking about, I once took a "Japanese Pop Culture" class in college (and yes, it did focus very heavily on items of historical and traditional significance - it barely touched on anime or video games). One day we watched a film about Japanese subcultures. In fact, the film and the class instructors made it very clear, right at the beginning, that it was about subcultures, not mainstream Japanese culture. Some of the subcultures just happened to be people who liked American-developed themes, such as The Wild West. But the exchange student from Japan was horrified and thought that this film on *subcultures* was an indication that we Americans thought Japan was a nation of people who did nothing but sit around all day worshiping America.
My point is, give us some credit: we're not as stupid as you may think we are. *Sigh*, ok, ok, I guess maybe *some* of us are, but that's true of any culture.
And for the record, nationalism and xenophobia DO exist over here just like in Japan, and in larger numbers than we normally like to admit.
Julio @ Apr 9th 2007 3:25PM
I'm developing a similar app, called Kana DS. I keep a blog here:
http://kanads.blogspot.com
I'm sorry it's in spanish though, I will switch to English soon.