Ushi No Tane - Harvest Moon

I have the Japanese version of this game too, and I know a bit of Japanese. Most of the daily conversations are quite simple. Although reading the instructions at the start of the game nearly killed me, most of the things they explain are quite straightforward, so I don't think it's a big deal if you can't read it.

And... In addition to what everyone said, on the computer, I recommend using http://kanji.sljfaq.org/ for kanji. You can write the kanji in with your mouse. But you'll need to know the direction of the strokes or it might be inaccurate. Sometimes the kanji in the game can be pretty small and hard to see too... So I don't know if it'll be useful for you. I use it quite often though, since I find it much faster than searching through the radicals. (Also because I know some Chinese)

I hope it'll be useful to you too.

I'll second nurse fin. I am at about her recommended low level with a few hundred kanji and the game is playable for the most part when I read it and don't just give up out of laziness. But going into this game expecting to translate the whole thing piece by piece is a big job. Don't take it lightly because unless you are very dedicated (or have an incredible memory) you will be doing a lot of translation.

For the most part you can skip daily conversation and it is only events that need any sort of effort. Also, the game has a nifty little summary sentence in the bottom screen that tends to describe the nature of the event and that might be of some help to you too.

Either way, best of luck. I've learnt many things from this game and can now speak with japanese friends about fertilizer and cow « Cow Poopoo » and various farm implements.... ( I lie, this is a guilty pleasure and I Tell NO-ONE!)

When I find a kanji I can't read or understand through context (rare now hurrah), usually it's faster to use one of the programs that lets you [i]write it in[/i] to search, instead of searching with radicals. I have a very nice Japanese dictionary for my DS that lets you do that, and actually has word/compound definitions and example sentences. C: Helps to have 2 DSes.

But if I have my computer on, usually I'd just do a radical search through WWWJDIC, and then search the compound I'm looking for. My old computer used to let me write in Japanese with my tablet, but for some reason, this one doesn't...

It's a pain in the butt to check every word you read, though, so really get a grip on kanji first then play the game. The language in Harvest Moon is not very advanced-- you can get by without too much trouble if you can only read up to 2nd or 3rd grade level kanji (about 300-400). To understand everything you read, though, it'd be better to be more like 4th grade level or even better, know all the kyouiku kanji.

The best one I've used is one I have for ipod touch. Its called [b]Kotoba![/b] but I don't remember if its free or not.

You can search for Kanji by choosing one (or more) of the radicals that the Kanji contains. It breaks down the matching Kanji by stroke count as well. You can also create 'favourites' lists and save Kanji for future reference. The app also shows animations of the stroke order and translations into other languages as well.

It also has a great dictionary that you can search using english or japanese. It's one of my most-used apps. :)

[quote="Anonymous Fish"]@OP:
If you have a smart phone, try searching "Kanji recognition" - I can't remember the publisher of the free app I use, but it's really helpful for when the game uses compounds I haven't learned yet. You just write a character into the program and select the kanji from a listing that best fits the character you're trying to write... Then the app provides useful compounds, pronunciations, etc.

And if you don't have a smart phone but do have computer access...
Denshi Jisho has a similar look-up function but you have to search by radical to find kanji and find the meaning.

So yeah, hope one of those two methods helps you decode the scarier kanji and compounds.

If this is heavily off topic, I apologize~ ^__^;[/quote]Do you know one for iPad/touch?

[quote="Anonymous Fish"]@OP:
If you have a smart phone, try searching "Kanji recognition" - I can't remember the publisher of the free app I use, but it's really helpful for when the game uses compounds I haven't learned yet. You just write a character into the program and select the kanji from a listing that best fits the character you're trying to write... Then the app provides useful compounds, pronunciations, etc.

And if you don't have a smart phone but do have computer access...
Denshi Jisho has a similar look-up function but you have to search by radical to find kanji and find the meaning.

So yeah, hope one of those two methods helps you decode the scarier kanji and compounds.

If this is heavily off topic, I apologize~ ^__^;[/quote]

No it's not off topic. I want this game for my birthday so it will help my Japanese. Thank you very much for the app names!

@OP:
If you have a smart phone, try searching "Kanji recognition" - I can't remember the publisher of the free app I use, but it's really helpful for when the game uses compounds I haven't learned yet. You just write a character into the program and select the kanji from a listing that best fits the character you're trying to write... Then the app provides useful compounds, pronunciations, etc.

And if you don't have a smart phone but do have computer access...
Denshi Jisho has a similar look-up function but you have to search by radical to find kanji and find the meaning.

So yeah, hope one of those two methods helps you decode the scarier kanji and compounds.

If this is heavily off topic, I apologize~ ^__^;

[quote="Cherubae"]No, you can't disable the game's language system.[/quote]

=)

No, you can't disable the game's language system.

I see there is a few Kanji' in the text in the game Is there a way to disable that. I can read hirigana and katakana but not that much Kanji.[*]