Welcome to our visual novel titled “Hello, Japan!”

We created this visual novel as material for novice Japanese learners to read for fun. You can start reading this visual novel after just a few chapters into your 1st-year Japanese textbook.

This visual novel is designed as supplementary material for the textbook「TOBIRA 1: Beginning Japanese」but we believe that you can read this visual novel along with other major 1st-year Japanese textbooks as well.

The following chart is a guide that outlines which grammatical expressions correspond with which chapters of the Hello Japan Visual Novel.

There may be words/phrases you don’t know yet, but don’t rush to your dictionary just yet. Please try and guess what it means from the context. However, if it is a critical word/phrase that impairs your understanding, please look it up in your dictionary.

Hello Japan Chapter	Core Concepts
Chapter 1 "New Friends"	Greetings X は Y です/じゃないです Basic Question Sentences Particles「の」「も」
Chapter 2 "Let's Join a Tennis Club!"	Verb Non-past Affirmative and Negative Particles「で(location)」「に(time)」「は(topic)」 Frequency Adverbs Invitation ～ませんか
Chapter 3 "Fun Weekend"	X があります/います Location Words Verb Past Affirmative and Negative Particle「と」
Chapter 4 "Trip During Golden Week"	Adjectives in Non-past and Past Verb て-form Request 〜てください Permission ～てもいいですか Prohibition ～てはいけません

Feedback

Our visual novel has been used in the Japanese Language Program at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, and here are examples of feedback we’ve received from the students.

Fun!

• I felt more involved when I was reading.
• It’s engaging and allows interactive practice outside the classroom.
• It was interactive, which made it more interesting than just studying normally.

Improve Reading Skills!

• Helped me improve my reading of katakana characters.
• Improved my reading speed.
• Getting exposure to this kind of reading has helped me easily identify and read more commonly-used words.

Learn Culture!

• With all the different locations that we go to and scenarios we encounter in the visual novel, I am learning a lot about the Japanese culture! For example, I learned how to talk with friends in a normal conversation versus talking to a teacher, or ordering food from somewhere.
• It’s super fun and makes me want to travel back. I found every chapter to be educational about more than just vocabulary and grammar.

Develop Guessing Skills!

• I feel like using context is a good skill to learn, especially for a foreign language. I am able to practice and become better at assuming and remembering these new phrases.
• I like having unfamiliar vocabulary because it is more like what you would encounter in the real world. In that sense, I appreciate having to understand from context because it is much-needed practice for real-world reading.