Shashingo: Teaching gamers Japanese with the aid of adorable photography

Learning a new language from scratch can seem like a daunting prospect, especially if your chosen language uses characters that are different from those in your native alphabet. This task is made easier when the challenge is turned into a game, and that’s exactly what Shashingo has accomplished for anyone wanting to learn Japanese. 

Shashingo, developed by Autumn Pioneer, is an indie game that combines language learning with photography to make the entire process fun. While it isn’t likely to turn you into a fluent Japanese speaker or reader, it does at least ignite the passion to learn and give you a fun and easy access point to begin the journey. 

Broaden your vocabulary with exploration

In Shashingo, you have a full city to explore and a camera in your hand to capture anything that takes your interest. When a photo is taken and the Polaroid appears on screen, the word for the thing you captured will appear in Japanese. You can choose between four Japanese alphabets: Romaji, Kana, Kanji, or the recommended Furigana. The word will also be spoken aloud in Japanese, to help you learn pronunciation. 

You can also click on the Polaroid to hear associated phrases and have them spoken to you. The whole setup works like an audio language class with added visuals to help hammer the lessons home, which helps to make the language stick regardless of your base learning style. You’ll end up learning without really realizing that you’re learning, and that’s the best type of learning in my book. 

Almost everything that you see can be photographed, even the things that seem like they should be part of the background and nothing more. The pedestrian crossing, the pipes, the manholes, and many other things can be photographed so that you can learn what they’re called in Japanese. Some things can only be photographed at certain times, like the plane that occasionally flies through or the train that passes over the bridge periodically. 

Relax or engage, your choice

As you wander around this city that is somehow bustling despite the lack of people, which is incredibly uncharacteristic of Japan, you’ll notice that there is no pressure. The cars on the roads stop if you’re in the way, and there isn’t even a hint of impatience from them to get you to move, and you’re free to take as many photos as you like. 

This lack of stress is what makes the language-learning aspect of Shashingo so effective. There is no timer, and that means you can listen to every word 100 times if that’s what helps you to learn. As you explore and find more secrets, you can go back into your Photo Album, listen to every word, and let them sink in.

Once you’ve learned the words, you can enter Find Mode, which is kind of like a word search within the city itself. Find Mode will give you a Japanese word without any translation or hints as to what it is, and you’ll need to set out into the city to find whatever it is. Successfully finding items will reward you with coins, which can then be spent at any of the Gacha machines throughout the city to get new frames or filters for your photos. 

Shashingo has been out since February 2024, but it’s a timeless classic if you’re looking to learn Japanese or just want to stretch your brain a little bit. You can go and get the full game right now, and it’s worth following the game on Twitter, because they periodically do Steam key giveaways that get a bit chaotic, but you might get lucky.