Yeah, sure, pal, whereas nothing you’ve written in this thread (including this post) is insulting or demeaning in the slightest.
It’s funny how insulting and demeaning others is perfectly fine on this forum as long as you use outwardly polite language to do it.
This reminds me that there’s also cutscene “movies” for the Japanese dubs of Kingdom Hearts games on Youtube. There are undubs with English subtitles, but some of them include gameplay from what I’ve seen.
You can more easily find movies with Japanese subtitles, like this playlist: 【KH1】OP~デスティニーアイランド【キングダムハーツ】 - YouTube
(For acquisition I’d argue that JP with JP subtitles is the best choice)
I’ve just started to listen to Nihongo con Teppei. Very doable for my level and an educational style geared more towards immersion than a traditional lesson format like most learn-jp podcasts are
This is actually pretty smart. I’d figure there are more playthroughs like this with a Western player playing a game that has Japanese audio available. I don’t play games anymore but last year I played some Dragon Quest XI and found out aome JRPG games offer Japanese audio (Dragon Quest doesn’t, though). I can’t be bothered to grind through games anymore but I could skip ahead to some of the cutscenes
I think so too! For those who want Japanese subtitles, this is the one I’ve been watching:
It’s much shorter than the undub because it shows almost nothing but the cutscenes, which is nice, but I kind of like to see a little of the battle. A tradeoff.
Yeah, it’s much easier to just have this on while you cook or during the commute to work or something, rather than play through the game itself
Me too! I actually got stuck and never finished it as a kid, so I’m excited to see the ending
I’ve been watching a lot of Hololive/Vtuber streamers on YouTube. Can kind of just put them on in the background, and it’s usually someone talking casually so it works good.
There are a ton of anime that have nothing sexual at all if thats the issue you have with it. I’d recommend that and podcasts if theres no way to talk to native speakers which would be the best option.
Ah yes, most podcasts I’ve seen are a bit formal for me so if you want to learn more casual japanese I’d recommend watching vtubers because those are real people talking like they would among friends instead of actors
Any specific non-sexual anime suggestions? I always like seeing people’s personal preferences
I finished it when new, and have played it a few times over, but been so many years!
I even bought it again in the remaster version (Possibly twice…PS4 (or 3?) and Switch version I think… or was that FFXII? Maybe both XD ), but haven’t prioritised it since I have other games to finish, and other things to do =P
Terrace House.
I think I would recommend getting into YouTube more. I totally agree with how you feel about anime and Japanese dramas. It’s artificial and not the way people really communicate/feel!
In my opinion, the best thing to do would be to make a youtube account purely for japanese content. SNS is designed to show you more of what you find interesting, and if you have it focused on one language, you will only be shown content that you are interested in from that particular language.
Personally I watch a lot of gameplay channels (ゲーム実況）and comedy like 漫才 or コント etc, so if you’re interested in that let me know and I’ll give my recommendations!
I haven’t watched loads of anime but these are three of my favourites and can vouch for having 0 fan service:
I see what you imply with this flagging thing, and I agree with you. The"flagging" mechanism is a bit too much in my opinion.
“I don’t like the way a person has expressed himself? No problem! I flag his message so everyone can see what an offensive individual he/she is! Shame on him/her!”
If a person expresses himself in a direct or harsh way, well, this person has the same right to express himself as you have. Why should this person’s message be hidden? Now, name-calling is of course out of the question, because it does not provide any ground to opinion justification; it’s just gratuitous attack.
In real life, we are not going to have a flag mechanism at our disposal to put tape on someone’s mouth. We have to learn to take things without losing one’s composure.
Amazing! Yes, it would be very useful if you could give me some further recommendations. I fear a lot of the content will be too advanced for me, but ultimately realistic immersion is the way to go and thats how I learnt Argentine Spanish to fluency in the past. As an auditory learner I am obsessed with listening.
The Japanese used in anime (slice of life was my preference) seems to be OK at my level because I recognize a lot of words and expressions, but I definitely agree the characters are artificial and this probably influences the way they speak with each other constantly. I looked up an interview with the boss of Studio Ghibli who criticized the lion’s share of animators for not having a clue how real people interact, because as ultra-otakus they don’t like real people in the real world. Of course, this man enjoys saying controversial stuff but if I look at slice of life animes, which should be relatively close to real life, I started to see a pattern where all the characters are just tropes, one-dimensional cliches, as if the story was invented by algorithms. For instance, every story has an annoying tsundere who feels copy-pasted from the last anime you saw. The production value of many mangas and their animes are just really low. It’s sad that such an amazing drawing and animation culture (in essence, I absolutely love the drawing style/art form) is often so mediocre in many ways. Sure, there are some great animes around, but those too are often sabotaged by lazy tropes and fanservice. Anime is mostly a niche thing for a specific audience, which is sad, because there is so much potential in how the Japanese tell mature stories in comics and animation, unlike the West. It could totally conquer a broader audience if it wasnt stuck in the swamp of churning out so much trash for porn/hentai-addicted otakus and men who like perving on underage girls and even little girls. This is, again, not true for all anime but as a genre it is definitely pervaded.
Have you seen “Love is hard for otaku?” I only watched 2 episodes and cannot remember any weird fanservice. It’s a similar theme about two adults in an office setting, and it’s interesting how the woman has a kind of self-denial and hesitation about being a “nerd” while she actually really enjoys being one.
Sazae San
Chibi Maruko Chan
Doraemon
All of these are more slice-of-life and free of most of those hangups you mentioned. I’d consider them less perverse than The Simpsons and lots of western media.
I’m not sure where you’ll find English subs, but I’m also not sure how much those subs would be considered immersion.
Titles like Doraemon are a pain to find legally, but I will give it another try.
Whether subtitles are useful depends on how you watch, I guess. Pause and rewind a lot. Ultimately it is way better to not have any, but that depends on your level.
Just found out extensions like Rikaichamp work with YT subtitles. This is better than English subs