how do you read untranslated vn?

[Sandstorm]

just a bit curious how do you people read raw vn?one day i randomly decided to learn japanese a bit,in around several month i already learned all kana and around 100 kanji,with that its enough for me to read the easy one like カルマルカ＊サークル with help of atlas and dictionary,the result is recently i became no-lifer who lock myself in the room playing eroge   

 

how long it takes for you to read vn without any tool/frequently looking at dictionary and how do you learn japanese?

 

your replies is much appreciated 

[Tenkuru]

http://visualnovelaer.fuwanovel.net/2013/02/how-to-read-visual-novels-in-japanese-in-2-years-time-or-1-year-if-you-are-fast-%E2%80%95-learn-to-read-through-vn-or-anime/

[Vokoca]

I'd say this just really depends on how fast you're able to learn and how you do so, therefore trying to compare would be quite a stretch. That said, once you learn grammar decently well, it's easy enough to read VNs with the help of JParser or the like. Just don't use translators, that does nothing but hurt both the experience and your language learning.

 

I've seriously studied Japanese just over half a year (if I don't count just lazily poking it the past year or two), I know only something over 400 kanji so far, and I don't really have a problem with reading VNs unless they're ridiculously hard. I do have to rely on JParser though, obviously.

[Mephisto]

study grammar -> play VN -> learn vocabulary from VN -> study more grammar -> play VN -> profit!?!? 

[Nyanko]

study grammar -> play VN -> learn vocabulary from VN -> study more grammar -> play VN -> profit!?!? 

I say yes to this, because I think its the most fun way to learn it. 

[Clephas]

Depends on the game, really...with the average moege, my speed doesn't fall that much (.85 of normal), but with chuuni it falls to half or less, because chuuni writers habitually use kanji that are never used in everyday life.  I can finish the average moege in eight to ten hours with translation aggregator and twelve without it.  Chuuni games generally take me twenty hours with (because they are much longer than the average moege), forty without. 

[Sethodin]

i'm quite gratefull for the link there, I wanted to learn some japanese in order to read VN's, trough anime i also gained a lot of interest in japanese culture. i allready started a japanese course, but its only speaking, and there aren't a lot of courses or books available where I live in order to learn japanese. tough I refuse to be stopped ^^

[Bolverk]

I learn with the method Mephisto said, It works really great. Tools I use is ITH and JParser + JGlossator. Read/check words with JParser and learn/check individual kanji with JGlossator. JParser is great, but you mostly just learn compounds in the long run. As it doesn't show up the individual kanji's meanings and readings.

 

I use JGlossator to auto check the kanji from the clipboard and makes a table of them. Similar to TA I suppose in that regard.

 

Also I agree with Vokoca. Using Atlas is a waste of time in the long run. You use time to analyse the engrish, instead of analysing the japanese. That being said.. It is practical as a crutch in start when reading. Maybe mostly to be sure you are acutally understanding what is being talked about. But, that will bite you in the ass. Because Machine tl's ain't reliable.

[zoom909]

I spent about 2 years studying Japanese, in the nerdiest way possible, though a bunch of books.  See, for me, it wasn't like one day I was just thinking "OK, I'm determined to read VNs, and I want to find the quickest possible way to start reading."  I'm the type of person who spends a lot of time in libraries and bookstores.  Once I got interested in Japanese, I automatically started looking for all kinds of textbooks, reference books, dictionaries.  I even got a couple of books on linguistics and translation.

 

Then I spent another year getting accustomed to reading and building up speed.  At first it was annoyingly slow and like solving some kind of coded message.  Every sentence I had to think of what it meant in English before I could move on.  But I was OK with that.  I just thought it was fun to be able to read some Japanese.  So I kept on reading.  I didn't have to do anything special to speed up my reading.  It just happened over time.

 

I can read Pretty Darn Fast when the text dialogue, especially if it's voiced.  When the text is unvoiced narrative, I have to drop down to Reasonable Speed.  That's in everyday conversation types of things.  I was recently faced with a scene in a game where one girl decides to give everyone an organic chemistry lesson.  When I come up against something like that, it's like getting stuck in the mud.  I have to pull out the dictionary and just slog through it until I'm on level ground again :-)

[shcboomer]

Depends on difficulty of the VN. Usually a VN with less infodumping and more commonly used terms won't take too long or too much effort to read. Anything with long infodumps or hard/rarely used terms take a lot longer.

[Nyanko]

I spent about 2 years studying Japanese, in the nerdiest way possible, though a bunch of books.  See, for me, it wasn't like one day I was just thinking "OK, I'm determined to read VNs, and I want to find the quickest possible way to start reading."  I'm the type of person who spends a lot of time in libraries and bookstores.  Once I got interested in Japanese, I automatically started looking for all kinds of textbooks, reference books, dictionaries.  I even got a couple of books on linguistics and translation.

 

Then I spent another year getting accustomed to reading and building up speed.  At first it was annoyingly slow and like solving some kind of coded message.  Every sentence I had to think of what it meant in English before I could move on.  But I was OK with that.  I just thought it was fun to be able to read some Japanese.  So I kept on reading.  I didn't have to do anything special to speed up my reading.  It just happened over time.

 

I can read Pretty Darn Fast when the text dialogue, especially if it's voiced.  When the text is unvoiced narrative, I have to drop down to Reasonable Speed.  That's in everyday conversation types of things.  I was recently faced with a scene in a game where one girl decides to give everyone an organic chemistry lesson.  When I come up against something like that, it's like getting stuck in the mud.  I have to pull out the dictionary and just slog through it until I'm on level ground again :-)

I have to say this way to learn is most impressive. You must have some great motivation and discipline. I don't think I'll be able to learn it like that in my current situation where free time is very limited. Not because I lack discipline, but just because it would probably take me longer than 2 years to be able to read what I want without the help of some tools. So learning through reading media I like to begin with by using the tools is more effective for me. Maybe also because I am only interested in learning the language to be able to play untranslated VNs and rpgs, which doesn't seem to be the case for you.

[Sandstorm]

I'd say this just really depends on how fast you're able to learn and how you do so, therefore trying to compare would be quite a stretch. That said, once you learn grammar decently well, it's easy enough to read VNs with the help of JParser or the like. Just don't use translators, that does nothing but hurt both the experience and your language learning.

 

I've seriously studied Japanese just over half a year (if I don't count just lazily poking it the past year or two), I know only something over 400 kanji so far, and I don't really have a problem with reading VNs unless they're ridiculously hard. I do have to rely on JParser though, obviously.

you're right,i have to agree that using atlas is not good in the long run due time is mostly spent on analyzing the engrish.i will look at jprser progam that you mention once i got home.

I spent about 2 years studying Japanese, in the nerdiest way possible, though a bunch of books.  See, for me, it wasn't like one day I was just thinking "OK, I'm determined to read VNs, and I want to find the quickest possible way to start reading."  I'm the type of person who spends a lot of time in libraries and bookstores.  Once I got interested in Japanese, I automatically started looking for all kinds of textbooks, reference books, dictionaries.  I even got a couple of books on linguistics and translation.

 

Then I spent another year getting accustomed to reading and building up speed.  At first it was annoyingly slow and like solving some kind of coded message.  Every sentence I had to think of what it meant in English before I could move on.  But I was OK with that.  I just thought it was fun to be able to read some Japanese.  So I kept on reading.  I didn't have to do anything special to speed up my reading.  It just happened over time.

 

I can read Pretty Darn Fast when the text dialogue, especially if it's voiced.  When the text is unvoiced narrative, I have to drop down to Reasonable Speed.  That's in everyday conversation types of things.  I was recently faced with a scene in a game where one girl decides to give everyone an organic chemistry lesson.  When I come up against something like that, it's like getting stuck in the mud.  I have to pull out the dictionary and just slog through it until I'm on level ground again :-)

do you also takes jp major on college or you just learned it by yourself?

its true my motivation mostly come from desire to read vn/ln,i actually bought few books about learning japanese and kanji around 5month ago but i olny touched it and started to learn it around february due my weak motivation.but right now i find it fun and kanji is actally q

uite interesting once you start to learn it so i have good motivation now to improve it.in addition being able to speak 3 languange certainly is a good asset for job hunting.

[zoom909]

do you also takes jp major on college or you just learned it by yourself?

its true my motivation mostly come from desire to read vn/ln,i actually bought few books about learning japanese and kanji around 5month ago but i olny touched it and started to learn it around february due my weak motivation.but right now i find it fun and kanji is actally q

uite interesting once you start to learn it so i have good motivation now to improve it.in addition being able to speak 3 languange certainly is a good asset for job hunting.

 

No I took German in school, actually.  But that experience taught me many things about how you can learn a foreign language.

Because I did not take Japanese in school, I have had almost no practice in speaking or writing...but the way my life is right now I probably cannot live in Japan anyway :-/

 

I did meet a friend where I live who is a professional translator and he gave me some tips in the past.  He works for a Japanese car company...

[Chronopolis]

study grammar -> play VN -> learn vocabulary from VN -> study more grammar -> play VN -> profit!?!? 

This is the general structure.

I recommend you study vocab from a list for the first 500-800 words. (Like do this list http://www.tanos.co.uk/jlpt/jlpt5/vocab/).

My first attempt at japanese VN reading was Clannad at 800 words.  I honestly could not make any head way on VN's (even using Jparser) until I hit about 1500 words of vocabulary (http://www.tanos.co.uk/jlpt/jlpt4/vocab/). Even though I say that, the grammar is probably more important. I think most people underestimate the amount of grammar involved in any kind of VN.

[Clephas]

I've already repeated how I learned Japanese on this forum several times, so I won't go back over it... but I'll leave you with a few suggestions... First, 'slice-of-life' anime is best for understanding modern Japanese culture and will help you gain a contextual understanding of much of what ends up being said in moege-type VNs.  For non-moege... tbh, there aren't any good examples of anime that would help you expand a contextual understanding of vocabulary made in recent years.  I'd suggest watching Legend of the Galactic Heroes, simply because the sheer amount of literary power in that anime.  The subs aren't all that good, from a translator's point of view, but the writing for the lines is excellent, so it is something that is good to listen to for understanding linguistic context for less 'everyday' vocabulary.

[Vokoca]

I'm personally studying Japanese on college, but even with our breakneck pace, I probably wouldn't be anywhere this far in such a short time if I didn't read a lot of VNs and didn't watch plenty of anime. Learning theory is good and all, but seeing the language actually used helps the most in actually understanding it, or that's what it feels like to me, anyway. It's definitely a great way to learn the vocabulary - but you should do some serious studying on the side for the grammar (and preferably kanji) to be able to actively use the language instead of just passively understanding it.

[Yeah Way]

work it harder. make it better. do it faster.

 

Keep playing like you are until you can play w/o assistance like a man.

[Chronopolis]

For those of you wondering, I think the ballpark is about 400 hours of real decently-directed study to go from zero to being able to start to read vn's with ITH without being overwhelmed, and another 400 hours (including time spent playing VN's) to get good enough to read basically all levels of vns with good understanding (with dictionary help).

 

The time is there for most of us, the motivation and knowing what to prioritize is another question.

[Sandstorm]

thanks for the one mentioned Jparser,damn it! should use this thing from the start instead of atlas 

 

study grammar -> play VN -> learn vocabulary from VN -> study more grammar -> play VN -> profit!?!? 

 

this is very true,i am at the point that i could understand voiced  daily conversation without looking at the text and i can read hiragana quite fast now.just from playing.

[Chocolat]

When I was playing Gakuen Hetalia, which is not translated, I used a website to find kanjis and google translation to traduce (or at least to understand the meaning of some sentences) while playing. But I think it all depends of your patience and of your motivation, because it can be annoying to search for a kanji during 10-20 minutes or not understanding a sentence even with the kanjis and kanas in google translation.

[astro]

In Japanese.

[Cyrillej1]

To achieve the level where I'm able to even try reading/translating japanese to a decent degree (at least the easy ones), this is what I did.

 

Reading through Elementary level grammar books.. then totally focused on learning by grade, the jouyou kanji from a kanji book using Anki to review almost every single day for almost a year (like learning 5-10 a day, sometimes more). I also used Anki to review vocabulary I learned in the grammar books and from the new kanji. I tried to reach 1000 kanji, before wanting to tackle the Intermediate grammar books. After reviewing old stuff and finishing the intermediate grammar books, I went back to learning a couple hundred more kanji... and just reviewing, reviewing...  before I actually tried reading any japanese novel games.  

 

I think some people learn better by just diving in from the beginning.. but I got annoyed constantly having to stop while reading things, so I just focused on building kanji & grammar before trying to tackle anything.

 

Oh and I think watching anime, and listening to it helped quite a bit in remembering certain vocabulary, and casual speech (which wasn't focused as much in the grammar books I read).

 

I'm not gonna lie, I was quite discouraged a couple times going crazy with all the kanji and how different it is from english.. still do xD.. For me, I learned the hardest part about learning japanese is just finding the motivation and diligence to study and learn it every day. You really have to stick to it... 

 

I've been guilty of slacking off on my japanese, and I can see how fast it's easy to forget... so yes, review, review.

 

oh.. and as you see from my method.. Since I mostly focused on reviewing kanji/grammar for reading, my speaking probably isn't very good though.

 

-since I kept hearing about Jparser/ITH on here... thought I'd try checking it out... holy crap! It's awessomeee. tttyyy-