I’m just working on some home work for my Japanese class and I’ve been asked to write about my daily routine as part of that (Genki Chapter 3!). I started well enough, then I got to the end of the it and thought instead of saying I watch TV as in the example, I thought I’d put ‘at 7 I play video games’.
I looked over my verb tables so far and couldn’t see the word play, despite being introduced to sports like 'テニス’, there wasn’t any examples using it. I guess, based on what verbs I have I could say ‘7時にビデオゲームをします*’ but it just feels wrong to my English speaking brain.
Is there any alternative way to say this? Or do I just have to get used to the concept that ‘doing’ is equal to ‘playing’?
*する is an irregular verb that means ‘to do’ for any other newbies eventually searching for this same thing! It becomes 'します’ in present/affirmative and 'しません’ as you might expect in negative!
Yes, what he said. Also, playing a musical instrument:
Instruments you strum (and pianos) = 弾く
Instruments you blow = 吹く
Instruments you hit = 叩く
It’s not really that “doing” is equal to “playing” as it is that Japanese uses verbs in different ways. They don’t directly correlate with their English equivalents.
Poor phrasing on my part Belthazar, that’s pretty much what I mean. Accepting that the verb works differently in Japanese than it does in English and remembering that change. The ‘equals’ is just for my own understanding that when I want to say playing, I should use 'する’
I’m also working on chapter 3 at this moment and was wondering the same thing, so thank you! From all examples sentences i’ve looked up, it looks that する is used a lot. it’s definitely something to get used to because it’s very different from English/my native language!
If you ask me I would say that in English there is no verb for ‘play’ or, if you prefer, you use the word ‘play’ for a lot of very different activities that have little in common. For example in Italian:
Play (with toys) = giocare
Play (an instrument) = suonare
Play (For films, music stored) = riprodurre
So I would say that in this respect Japanese is actually not that different from English
Thanks @d-hermit and @Belthazar I asked my husband about it a few days ago and he was being silly and I forgot about it until just now. I guess I thought it must be more complex than dictionary so I figured some of the folks would know it here. I learned my lesson though!! Check the dictionary first <3
ゲームを遊ぶ is fine. You can say it. Just keep in mind that it puts an emphasis on the act of doing something for enjoyment. So it might be odd to use if you were talking about e-sports or something.
And I’ve been playing Animal Crossing recently, and 遊ぶ is used in the quit menu to ask if you really want to quit or まだ遊ぶ
