My Japanese Coach
by UBI Soft
|
List Price: Our Price: $29.82 You Save: $0.17 (1%) Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours Category: Video Games See more product details |
|---|
Video Game Reviews of My Japanese Coach
Customer Review: Best and Most Affordable Resource
Summary: 5 Stars
I've been studying japanese for about 3-4 years and I picked this up just on a whim. I've tried many of the various programs out there including Rosetta, Pimsleur and BYKI. I must say that this is one of the best for the LEAST amount of money. I am so pleased with this program. It's entertaining and has extensive vocabulary, grammar and many different learning exercises/games. It does cover reading and writing of hiragana, katakana and Kanji. I especially like how it tracks your progress so you stay engaged and motivated by the whole process.
In short, I'm blown away by this software that is so under the radar in the Japanese study community.
Rob
Ps. I wanted to mention that I don't work for this company. I'm adding this because my review is so favorable.
Customer Review: Daijoubu!
Summary: 4 Stars
Got this for my 7 year old to start working on Japanese. Lots of great options. She can go at her own pace. She's not going to become fluent using this, but every little bit helps.Customer Review: A huge disappointment
Summary: 1 Stars
When I first heard that there was going to be a Japanese language Coach game for the Nintendo DS, I thought that by now the developers and publishers of this series would have learned from their previous mistakes.
Well, unfortunately I was was wrong. I got this game as a gift from my older brother during christmas. He knows that I love learning languages and that in high school I was teaching my self how to speak Japanese. Well, I came to an abrupt stop during my senior year because my parents didn't want me learning Japanese. As you can see some people can be racists and stereotype others without even realizing it. Also, just a little bit more background knowledge of me, I'm a major in video game development...
Anyways, 3rd year of college. My brother thought I would like this game and purchased it for me. We were both excited about this game, but were highly disappointed. I wasn't expecting too much due to what we heard on the reviews of the other games, but this is highly ridiculous. The point system is flawed and you don't really learn the vocabulary by the time you get to the next level. Most of the games are boring and half done by the developers, almost like they didn't care about the game and slacked off. The concept of the Rank, "baby, high schooler, adult," is even more flawed. Stroke orders are messed up and vocabulary choice is poor. The lesson map makes you go through a detailed area surrounding Tokyo and then completely zooms out after lesson thirty. What if I want to learn a lesson that features the Ainu people? Oh, I forgot. No one cares about native people.
Gamers should be learning from the JLPT just like students. They're not fools, they deserve to know. The rank system should have also been based on the JLPT to give people a more accurate understanding of their proficiency. Why waste time learning random words if it's not going to help you understand? The way that this game tries to teach grammar is also questionable. They try to stuff so much in just a paragraph of text and expect beginners to understand it. There is so much that the developers left out of this game, that it shouldn't have even been released.
Maybe one day, someone will release a better Japanese language game for the DS. I'm sure of one thing though: if it's good, it ain't a My Coach game.
Customer Review: Great Tool!!
Summary: 4 Stars
I would definitely recommend this for people who are serious about learning japanese. being able to compare your voice with the girl in the game really helps with the longer phrases. the writing games are my favorite, best way to remember your hiragana!Customer Review: Wonderfully Helpful Introduction to a New Language
Summary: 4 Stars
Since I'm seriously considering studying in Japan for college either next fall or the year after that, I knew I needed to start somewhere. Picking up a good-sized book is all well and good, but taking some of them (often slightly oversized from what I've seen) everywhere is a little overwhelming at times. So, in addition to the book I purchased (Japanese the Manga Way, which I strongly suggest if you're serious about learning the language) I picked this up to take with me wherever I go so I can practice on my breaks at work, while I'm eating lunch, etc.
So let's start with the basics.
Starting up is a snap. It's self-explanatory and is one of the easiest things of the entire game. However, regarding file management, I found it difficult to figure out how to delete files. This was mostly due in part to how far ahead the placement test put me. The instruction manual doesn't tell you how to do this and it's not from the main menu, but rather in the options section of the menu once you actually get into your file.
Speaking of the placement test, that's the next thing. If you know a little Japanese, that's all well and good, and even better if you feel that you just want to move on. But I personally feel it should give you the option for a placement test or not, because not only in the earlier lessons did I come to find that there were certain words I didn't know, I wanted to be able to practice writing them and speaking them. (on that note, the speaking and comparison feature is absolutely wonderful. Possibly one of the best features of the game, granted you have enough peace and quiet to do so)
The lessons themselves are rather short, but even when you would take a foreign language class in high school, the reality is you would only cover a maximum of about 3 pages in a single day out of your textbook on average. That said, I recommend taking your time and don't rush yourself. You'll just find yourself ending up worse and possibly confused later on. Their point is well explained, however, and the games only help pound the terms into your head (for the most part and depending on the game played).
Only being on lesson 8-9 so far, I don't have even half of the games unlocked, so I really can't comment on any of the later ones. However, just to mention the initial three, there's a word search, a whack-a-mole equivalent, and a multiple choice test. The word search is generally useless, listing the English word at the top and you have to search for the Japanese term in it's place. This might be effective, but you instead focus so intently on the words your looking for, chances are the intention of focusing on their meaning gets lost. The whack-a-mole game on easy and medium difficulties is pretty useless, but once you try hard, it's almost like playing fast-paced multiple choice. Watch what you're hitting! And the multiple choice test is just that, possibly the best of the first three games.
The next two unlocked are as useful both as the multiple choice, if not moreso. Fading characters is the absolute most effective way to really practice learning how to write Japanese at a fast speed, though beginners should start with the in-lesson training. While it may be true that some of the brush stroke sequences are supposedly off (so far I've yet to really notice anything) if you're going to learn the language and use it in the future, either you'll figure it out on your own through a different source or possibly through a native speaker. Being, from what I've read elsewhere, only about 30 or so stroke sequences are off, which isn't a big number at all and is, in my opinion, not something to really worry about. The next game after that tests your memory of how to write words, a true test to how well you've learned and been paying attention. Hard, but possibly one of the most useful tools on the cartridge in getting you extremely familiar with the language.
The best thing about all the games is you can set them to Open mode, which uses only words you haven't mastered yet, unless you've, say, only got 3 words left to master, in which case the other 7 words will be replaced with mastered words from any lesson; or you can set it to mastered, which will only give you words you mastered. Again, a great way to effectively test yourself in the later lessons.
The dictionary is wonderfully helpful as well, but I'd personally prefer a book-version dictionary instead. It would probably be more helpful, beneficiary and you can actually compare and contrast with this game to see where it got romaji spelling wrong or where it got kana/kanji wrong.
All in all, the game is a wonderful tool for learning, but it's just that. The unfortunate thing is that it really doesn't do too much to make it really all that interesting and fun, which is sad because it's a great tool for learning. It becomes boring after a short while, and I never find myself completing more than one lesson at a time.
The best thing of all is that hopefully this will be the start of a new trend of games. Think about it, it could be potentially possible to take an entire college course (at the very least homework-wise) on a DS game, thanks largely in part to the touch screen.
Bottom line: if you're serious about picking up Japanese, pick this up. It's more for starters, but even more intermediate learners may find something here or, if not, can keep up on their studies on the go and brush up on the basics. Practice makes perfect after all.