Games you've missed out on because of the Language barrier.

[Gare]

At the moment, it's probably Japanese games that use a more advanced vocabulary and/or have zero voice acting. I'm a few years away from attempting those, I think.

But yeah, if playing JP games is your reason for studying the language, that's perfectly fine. Putting effort into language learning because you simply want to understand something shouldn't be mocked IMO. Like Elin I'm also not the biggest fan of such elitist attitudes. And the payoff is worth it, regardless of what your original motivation was. I've only been experiencing this semi-recently, but understanding something that was completely moonspeak to me a couple of years ago is a pretty great feeling.

[Nemkoon]

I'm gonna go get my popcorn for the eventual responses to this idiocy.

Touche.

[Muscab]

I'm gonna go get my popcorn for the eventual responses to this idiocy.

Now, count me in.

[garrendesares]

well i want to learn japanese for all the tales of games that were never imported to the us! especially tales of vesperia (i know it is on the 360, but i still feel wierd playing with that controller)

[gezegond]

I really want to learn Japanese as well. So far I can understand most words and some sentences while I'm watching anime (due to excessive watching ), but I can't read/write. Kanji seems like a huge obstacle to me. I'm not even sure where to begin.

[Iamerror]

Thanks Elin for your encouragement! I'm learning Japanese from a children's book. I guess you are right they probably won't mind where I learned it. Also they probably learned English for a similar reason. There are Chinese versions of popular games, someone ported Chrono Trigger, Link to the Past and Final Fantasy 7 to the nintendo. Incidently, you can find them on this website under Nintendo roms. Chrono Trigger and Link to the past are the best ones.

[Gare]

I really want to learn Japanese as well. So far I can understand most words and some sentences while I'm watching anime (due to excessive watching ), but I can't read/write. Kanji seems like a huge obstacle to me. I'm not even sure where to begin.

The Genki I and II textbooks are a decent enough start, I think. Well, I'm only saying that because that's what I used when I started attending classes, but I'm pretty sure it's equally useful if you just want to do some self-studying. Those books probably only teach a few hundred kanji and a couple of fixed expressions, but I think it's good enough for people who don't really know where to start. I'm sure you can find them in pdf format somewhere online.

[Myst]

Most of the non US games I've played are pretty mediocre and are no reason for me to learn a new language just to understand it.

You've been playing the wrong games.

The amount of must-play JP games on every system are legion. People just don't know they exist because of the language barrier they never get mentioned in any conversation. It doesn't have to be a high-profile franchise like Gundam, Dragon Quest, Megaten to be worth a try. I've played plenty of obscure non-franchise stand-alone games that were downright awesome, and often didn't even need the knowledge of the language to play due to the low amount of dialogue (usually action oriented or an easy GUI).
I have finished many JP games by roughing it and never knowing what the story was even about because of that. I choose to rather experience a great entertaining game not knowing the story than not experiencing that game at all.

[Iamerror]

I will mention that Myst is right, there are several Japanese games that you can play without knowing Japanese. I learned about them on a review show called You Can Play This, it's hosted by a guy who calls himself Jewwario. If you're interested look him up on blip.tv. A short list of games that are playable without Japanese are:
Doraemon for nes-a good game but difficult
Twinbee-nes-a shooting game
A Sailor Moon fighting game for the snes.

[smittybeerman]

Wish I could have played Dragon Quest (Warrior) 5 when it came out. Played though about half emulated and translated. Good game but would have been a lot better in the 90's

[Clayton Fischer]

I'm Brazilian, so obviously, I speak portuguese, but I hate it. Not because of the language itself, but because... I simply don't like it, so any other language is cooler to me, this is since I started playing videogames. In the past I only played games that had the spanish language on them, because of the similarities to portuguese. But some games that had only english in it, I couldn't play at all, one of them being Tomba. I got stuck in the part where you have to show the effects of some mushrooms to a Dwarf. You have to show him the crying and laughing mushrooms, but I really didn't know I had to do that, even with a portuguese/english dictionary, so I simply stopped playing (by the way, I didn't have access to the internet that time). But, 2 years after that event, I finally got an oportunity to learn english, so with it, I finally got to finish Tomba. I was so amazed how I could understand another language, and with it, do things that I couldn't before. My english is not perfect, but at least people can understand me.

My second new language experience, was with japanese, by playing Bushido Blade 2. I didn't care so much for it at the time, but, it was a new language, so I would try to learn. Since it has different writing as well, I couldn't learn by just deciphering it, even with the audio, it is hard. But thanks to the internet, I went on to download classes and books. I could learn all the kanas, it's funny though that I learned it with Paint, by drawing all of the kanas and memorizing them, it's funny but it worked (I did this because I was too lazy to go get a pencil and paper). I tried to learn some Kanjis the same way, but they aren't so simple, all that multiple reading methods (kun'yomi, on'yomi, etc.). I've learned a lot of vocabulary by watching animes. I've stopped my "studies" for a while, but I'm only waiting some inspiration to start again (I'm lazy). It's not so hard, you only need time, patience and motivation (in your case, games, and in my case, not liking my main language).

[Sabathia]

For me... pre-fan translation patches, Monster Hunter Portable 3rd. In more than a few ways I wish they'd actually bring it stateside, but supporting the company atm seems secondary to actually playing the game. I usually prefer to put my time into legit versions of my favorite games, but since I can't... I'll just have to keep my 600+ in 3rd's English patched version for now.

Others for me include at least one Monster Rancher game (rabid fan, always have been). Some of the Nobunaga strategy games... and there's more, I just don't feel like thinking too much on it.

[Gypsy]

Pffft, as if I'd let language get in the way.

[TheRealSpiders]

Pffft, as if I'd let language get in the way.

Translation guides ftw. That's what I did with the SRW games when I was younger.

[Gypsy]

Translation guides ftw. That's what I did with the SRW games when I was younger.

Word, I did that with Sakura Wars.