This game is confusing. It looks good for a beginner, but I really don't think a beginner should ever rely on this game to learn japanese. Yes there is a lot of vocabulary, verbs, mix of katagana, hiragana and kanji...

BUT. (and it's a big but). You can't just throw super difficult kanji at the face of a beginner like that. For example, there is the word "室外機" (♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥) which means Outdoor Air Conditioning Unit. That could assassinate a beginner's will to keep up with learning japanese.

There is no grammar, no rules explained, nothing else but vocabulary. The only part where you have some theory to actually learn something is STILL related to vocabulary.

In summary, if you are a complete beginner (like me), run away from this game as it doesn't "teach" you japanese, you have words thrown at you that you've got to learn without having a single idea of how a sentence should be constructed or how a particle is used, etc. And if you already have a good level in japanese, I guess it's simply going to be boring for you.

I really don't try to be mean towards the devs as the idea behind the game is really original and very well thought, super cute graphics, chill music. But Shashingo is not destined for beginners, nor it is for advanced learners. So that's why the game is confusing to me and I will unfortunately ask for a refund after testing it for almost 2 hours.

(Also, 21.99 is crazy expensive for that... I had time to photopraph almost everything available in the city in less than 2 hours... Wagotabi is 5 times cheaper and waaaaay more beginner friendly !!!)

Really great game to supplement your Japanese learning experience. Most words are n5-n4 level but there are a few very niche words aswell. I'd recommend this game to people who like to study without feeling like they're studying (definitely me) and prefer a more gameified experience. I've played for 5 hours and that was the amount of time it took to get all achievements and be comfortable with most words in the game with a low/no failure rate on the find/quiz mode. I personally think it's a decent amount for the price especially with how enjoyable the experience is, but others might want to wait for a sale.

This game is very helpful in remembering nouns, adjectives, and verbs in Japanese. it's very calming and has become a useful tool in my journey to become proficient. I especially like quiz mode which has really helped me test how well I remember verbs (something I struggle with) as well as some fun onomatopoeia's which is a nice touch as many people probably don't think about using these sentence descriptors in English.

In the future, I would love to see additional maps that maybe perhaps explore some of the countryside with a focus on festivals maybe. Also sentence practice/conversation-based challenges that help test particle placement, maybe seasonal maps/adjustments for winter and fall, or alternatively interiors to explore that have interior-based finds and quizzes. No matter what the developers hopefully add in the future I'll be here to support it! Keep up the good work!