Japanese language & culture blog

As you may’ve noticed, the NihongoUp site was going through some massive changes during the past two months. Well, I think that the site finally reached a state when it can be safely announced to the general public. I’ll leave the “beta” notice in the header for a little longer (primarily because the site still isn’t fully compatible with Internet Explorer), but overall, there shouldn’t be any major bugs or missing features. Nevertheless, I’m still working hard on getting everything in the best shape possible so if you have any suggestions or feature requests, please let me know.

For a general overview…
Read more » The new NihongoUp is live!

As you may’ve heard, NihongoUp Blog was recently nominated in the Top Language Blogs 2010 competition over at Lexiophiles. I’m now honored to announce that Japanese language & culture blog was selected, among 495 nominees, second-best in the Language Technology category, and 30th best language blog overall!

The selection…
Read more » Second-best Language Technology blog

On one hand, I still can’t believe that it has already been one year since I launched NihongoUp. On the other hand, looking back, it’s amazing to see how much this site has evolved.

My educational game has gone through countless updates, starting as a simple typing game to become an award winning educational tool. An iPhone port of the game was released, and Android version is around the corner. This blog, meant primarily as place to inform my users about the latest game updates, grew into a respected publication, with over 50 Japan-related articles written by myself, and since recently, outside…
Read more » One year anniversary + giveaway

Inspired by Jamaipanese, I’ve decided to compile my own list of NihongoUp’s most popular posts of 2009. This blog is less than one year old and it’s impressive to see how much happened last year, how my writing style evolved over time and, last but not least, how many thoughtful and inspiring reactions were incited by my articles. The ranking is based on the amount of traffic the individual posts received during the two weeks following their publication.

1. 10 Beautiful Japanese Fonts

The list of some of my favorite Japanese fonts was by far the most popular post this year; not only traffic-wise, but also in the amount of comments…
Read more » NihongoUp's top 10 posts of 2009

The final results of the Serious Games Showcase & Challenge (SGS&C) were announced and NihongoUp was chosen as the winner in the Student category! There were many quality entries and, especially after seeing the other two finalist games (submitted by teams from the Queens University and the University of Miami), I was really surprised when the final outcome was announced.

Let’s hope that this is only a start, and that this achievement will bring more well-needed attention to NihongoUp, as well as to educational games in general…
Read more » Serious Games Showcase & Challenge Winner

Yeah, it’s already been a week since the app was released, but because of the preparations for the the JLPT I couldn’t find the time to write an official announcement till now. NihongoUp for iPhone was finally approved by Apple and is now available on the App Store! This means that you are no longer tied to you computer and can continue playing studying in public transport, while rock climbing, or anywhere else where carrying even the smallest of notebooks would turn out to be impractical.

The initial impressions from the early buyers were very positive and I hope that you’ll like it…
Read more » NihongoUp for iPhone on the App Store

A new update is here, bringing  some long awaited features, as well as many bug fixes and UI improvements. Here’s the full changelog:

• JLPT 1 Vocabulary mode
• Vocabulary answers can now use kanji instead of kana (see Settings)
• Kana modes scoring/difficulty algorithm was changed
• The correct answer is shown when the balloons fall out of the screen
• The correct answer is now displayed 2x longer than before
• “Continue” button renamed to “Continue Trial”
• Music is now muted in the pause menu
• Several new particle sentences
• Many bug fixes

As always, I would like to remind that you are welcome to submit your suggestions and bug reports at the NihongoUp feedback page

First of all, I’ve finally launched a redesign of the NihongoUp front page. All the important features are now outlined on top of the site, the download and purchase buttons are much clearer, all of the information is presented in a well structured way and the whole design is hopefully more appealing and easier on the eye. This blog will most probably follow the suite in the near future; starting with the introduction of the top menu and the change of the title font.

Secondly, as you may have noticed from the new homepage header, an iPhone version of NihongoUp will soon be released! The game is basically ready…
Read more » Site redesign, NihongoUp for iPhone

Version 1.2.4 tries to address some of the issues and ideas reported at Get Satisfaction. Here’s the changelog:

• In the kanji and particles modes, when you answer wrong, the correct answer is now shown in the original sentence
• The score panel design was update and the individual statistics are now clearer and easier to understand
• Score is now calculated according to the selected game duration (now you can’t improve you high score by playing longer)

I hope that you’ll like the improvements and if you have any other ideas, definitely post them at the aformentioned feedback page!…
Read more » Game Update: NihongoUp 1.2.4

If you like my Japanese learning game’s style&mood, you should enjoy this new NihongoUp wallpaper! It may not teach you Japanese but it can be a good reminder for those of us who frequently forget to review the kanji :)

Download:

[RAR] NihongoUp Nihon Wallpaper