Hi guys. This is potentially a vague question but just curious how does the community think/ average benchmark.
I’ve been in love with the Japanese and otaku culture since a kid. And this is also my main motivation for picking up Japanese. Grammar part I’m studying part time N4 3 hours a week in a local center. And vocabulary part I’m entrusting wanikani.
So my main question is. What level should I achieve before I can comfortably read modern mangas (or even potentially visual novel). I know the community introduced some basic manga to kickstart. But let’s say I’m interested to read Rent a girlfriend or quintuplets, what is the “average” or expected level at least?
Again, I know this is potentially a vague question >.<
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N3 for grammar should be very fine imo (tho N4 should have you reading manga already). For vocabulary, the more the better it’s never good enough
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I looked up both the manga you mentioned, and they both have furigana on all the kanji. The main reason for using WK is so you can quickly identify kanji and kanji-words while reading so that you don’t have to look them up first. If a manga or novel uses furigana, then the need to worry about looking up kanji almost completely disappears, because you can see how the word is read right away and use that information to look it up if you need to.
WK won’t teach you a complete enough general vocabulary to mean you’ll never have to look up new words, so I wouldn’t base a decision to start reading these manga on one’s WK level. If you feel comfortable enough with grammar and looking up the meaning of words you don’t know, then that’s enough to start.
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By the time you’ve finished up N4 grammar, be sure to pick up some “easy” manga (such as from the Absolute Beginner Book Club, and the Beginner Book Club, here on the WaniKani forums) and start reading them.
That’ll get you used to seeing grammar patterns, and you’ll slowly become more familiar with them.
The more you encounter the grammar in native material, and the more familiar you become with it, the better you’ll get at understanding it without thinking about its meaning.
That level of recognition will help you work your way through more difficult manga, as you’ll be able to focus more on all the words you don’t know, and less on what’s going on in the grammar.
So can I take it as for this case, grammar actually takes precedence?
I actually read rent a girlfriend(up to volume 6 or 7 i think). I have no idea when would be a good place to start. But i do recommend trying though. Even if you don’t understand every single word i believe it is ok to read through(or around that) i guess grammer would be biggest hurdle so i guess @jprspereira is correct about N4 should be ok. (I am around 3/4 through N4 grammer in bunpro).
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