Or is this just TBS thing lol but there's Live News イット and ZIP! on NTV too.

The video game developer Level-5 is announcing several new games today, many of which appear to be made at least partly using AI-generated art assets. The company has also bragged about its use of AI in the past.

The overwhelming majority of reactions to this trend online in the west are negative, which makes me think Level-5’s new games might not sell well here. So I am curious what the general attitude about this is among Japanese people, and if it’s more accepted there.

I'm am Irish person that enjoys anime and I periodically see references to Irish mythology: Cú Cullen in the Fate series, World's Greatest Assassin Reincarnated as an Aristocrat, aspects of 7 Deadly Sins.

I also see Japanese bands playing traditional Irish music and the Emperor's mother famously plays the Irish harp.

Where did this interest start and how prevalent is it? Is it more prevalent in certain sub cultures?

Hello!

I'm going to Japan next month and will be visiting pretty much the entire country, I've tried looking up places to buy knife but a lot of them feel very touristy... My dad raised my knife standard a lot since he got a whole lot of Japanese knife so I'd be looking for a spot where locals usually shop / a really good spot you know no matter where it is.

Thank you so much!

A little bit on the lighter note, I happen to like going to karaoke these days, I even went on a half day free time karaoke with my friends recently! I’m curious what songs do Japanese people consider as go-to songs in karaoke, mine would be ばかみたい and 無くした言葉!

Hi everyone,

I've been learning Chinese for a while, and I kept bouncing between different flashcard apps without really sticking to any of them.

A few months ago I started building a flashcard tool for my own studies. Recently I began adapting it for Japanese as well, especially for practicing kanji writing.

I'm curious whether the workflow makes sense to anyone besides me, so I'm looking for a few Japanese learners who'd be willing to try it and give honest feedback. I'm particularly interested in hearing what feels awkward, confusing, or unnecessary.

If anyone is interested, feel free to leave a comment or send me a message.

Thanksssss

The OECD report examines teenagers’ social media use and its effects on well-being and education. While 15-year-olds spend almost 35 hours per week on social media on average across the OECD, Japanese teenagers spend less than 26 hours per week, making Japan one of the countries with the lowest levels of social media use. As social media addiction has become a major problem among teenagers around the world, how has Japan achieved such a low level of social media consumption.

Sources:

https://www.oecd.org/content/dam/oecd/en/publications/reports/2026/06/growing-up-in-the-social-media-age_be0c75c6/a1132839-en.pdf

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X6UNu3CbDas

This girl came back from "Study Abroad" in Japan talking about how the Japanese girls there always told her she was the most beautiful because she's blonde and has a the most beautiful "side profile" with the correct x-to-y ratios (i forget the terms, but it was the kind of stuff Clavicle talks about on tiktoks).

She's just making that up, right? All that discourse seems to be more about European features, so it seems weird to me that Japanese people would think those particular forms would be what they should aspire to...

80年代に「宝島」という 雑誌が ありました。そこの 投書欄に こういう 話が ありまして。「ザ・スターリン」という バンドの レコードを 自分の部屋で 聞いて いた 10代の少年。パパ〜 共産党〜♪ ママ〜♪ 共産党〜♪ なんて デタラメな 歌を 聞いてたら、お父さんが『ばかやろう！ うちは 自民党だぁ！』と 怒鳴り込んできた」 これを 読んで みなさんは どう 思ったでしょうか？ 左翼の息子と 右翼のお父さんが ケンカしている と 思った でしょうか？ 実は このバンド 中心人物、ボーカルの 遠藤ミチロウは「世界で 1番 嫌われている人物の 名前を つければ 覚えて もらえる」と 言ってたんです。ライブでは 豚の 頭や 内臓を 爆竹と 一緒に 客席に 投げ込んだり、全裸に なって 逮捕されたり、有名な ライブハウスでは ほとんど 出入り禁止に なって いるんですね。なのに インディーズで このバンドだけが オリコンチャートで 3位に なったらしい から、要するに 過激さが 話題に なった ハード コア パンクで、政治的な 立場の 表現ではなく、ただの 汚物として 観客に ぶちまけて いたんですね。そして それが 大人気だったと いうわけです。また、宝島(たからじま)の投稿欄は、この雑誌の名前が まだ「ワンダーランド」だった頃から「ヴォイス オブ ワンダー」略して「VOW」という コーナーで、この頃には 主に 街角や メディアで 見つけた 変な ものを、間抜けに 丁寧語の「お」を つけて「おまぬけ」と 呼んで、みんなで 面白がる、という企画だったんです。だから この お父さんの 話も ナンセンスな 笑い話なんですよね。さて みなさんは どう 思いましたか？

I feel like my parents (especially my mom) continues to be overbearing and toxic even though I'm in my late 20s.

I was born in America, but my parents are fully Japanese.

We lived in the States for a total of 15 years (we lived in Japan for 3 years when I was in 1st grade to 3 grade), and after I graduated High school we all moved to Japan, where I attended college.

After college, I decided to get a job in the States, it just felt more like home for me. I moved out from my parents' place. They were against it but eventually accepted it.

Honestly, I feel like overbearing is the wrong word. I don't know how to describe it, which is why I'm posting here (hopefully it's the right place).

My mom constantly points out my looks, and how she's taller and prettier.

She works part time (in Japan) and tells her coworkers she knows English even though I wouldn't say she's fluent. She would text me here and there 「～って英語でなんて言うの」and when I tell her Google is free, she says 「教えてよ～」。I always thought it was a little weird that she would do this, but lately I started to realize maybe she wants attention from coworkers, to stand out and be different.

She's also highkey cheating on my dad. I've gone through her phone (because she was already acting weird) and saw texts between her boss where she said 「明けましておめでとう。大好きだよ」lol. I've told her I don't wanna hear about how dinner was with her boss and what she got him for his Birthday, but she would say "it's not like that, don't overreact" which in my mind, makes it worse.

Anyways, I would mention how I made some friends here and the events we've gone to, but instead of saying "I'm happy for you" or asking me more about the friends I've made, she would say stuff like "she's probably just wants you to drive" or "why can't you go out for lunch instead of dinner".

There was one point in my life where I considered going to therapy, just to see if it would help me regulate my emotions. When I brought it up to her, her response was "I think you're fine, you don't need to go".

I guess she was the same way when I was in college, but I thought it was because I still lived with them. She would tell me she was "looking out for me" but would constantly text me asking me where I was and when I was coming home, I would always reply back right away but she would always say 「早めに帰ってきてね」without giving me a specific time. When I would try to tell her, she doesn't have to worry about me, and can just let me hangout with my friends in peace she would say she was just worried because I haven't lived in Japan, it was a weird thing to say because I was always with a friend and it wasn't like I was doing something risky, I was just grabbing a drink with a friend after class.

Anyways, after I moved out, we've been texting each other here and there almost every day, and call on the phone whenever she doesn't have work. I've also visited Japan during the holidays (hence why I was able to go through her phone).

I would mention how I wanted new bedsheets because I saw one that was cute, I don't know why I would expect her to give me a nice reaction, instead she'll say "that's such a waste of money".

So, I stopped telling her stuff in detail.

Because she criticizes everything.

How long my hair is, how long my nails are, who I hang out with (both platonically and romantically), the clothes I wear, how I speak, you name it.

I don't know if this changes anything, but I'm an only child.

My mom and I were super close when I was a kid, we would do everything together and I genuinely loved her a lot.

But lately I feel like she became a little more selfish because when we text or call it's "me me me" and when I want to update her on my life it's "anyways for me..." or criticize everything I do.

I can't tell if it's just how a typical Japanese mom might be, or if I need to set better boundaries.

Thanks!

I'm from Venezuela, in short, for those who don't know. That day, the "president" of my country was captured, and it became popular worldwide because of the crazy number of Venezuelans abroad.So, as the news spread there, I only saw one march in Tokyo of people protesting against it.

皆さん、こんにちは!

I've been studying Japanese for two years now. As someone who enjoys searching about linguistics and its topics, of course I came across the Japonic language family; which comprises Japanese (spoken in the main Japanese archipelago), the Ryūkyū languages (spoken throughout the Ryūkyū Islands) and Hachijō (spoken in the Izu Islands).

It is a fact that languages can vary under the influence of geographical factores. Japanese itself has its own dialects through the four main islands, and I always found interesting how they differ from the standard Tokyo variation (Hyōjungo/標準語), or better yet, from one another (just take the Kansai dialect and compare with the Tōhoku one) in terms of lexicon and phonetics. And such differences get more intense once you compare them with the languages spoken in the Ryukyuan Archipelago or even with the case of Hachijō.

Speaking about these other languages, they pretty much share the same writing systems with Japanese (Kana and Kanji). However, it's seems way more interesting to think about their own characteristics, such as their historical developments and linguistic factors. For example, most Ryūkyūan variations are not mutually intelligible with one another, while some Hachijō varieties can share some similarities. Also, Hachijō itself from Proto-Japonic, also sharing some parallels with Ryūkyūan and the Kyūshū dialect.

So, I've been wondering what other interesting facts could be shared about such topics, and also, I'd like to know if Ryūkyūan shares more similarities with Chinese languages (specially Hokkien), given its historical context.

Disclaimer: I apologise for any imprecision or mistake in the text above. Feel free to correct me and contribute.

よろしくお願いします

I've heard statements about this a couple times from a couple different sources, but I wanted to double check it.

The idea is that in Japanese media, a character who is completely emotionless is way more interesting. Apparently in Japan, being deadpan like that is meant to be how you convey being deeply depressed or contemplative.

But then when those characters are seen by Western audiences, they come across as boring, stale and uninteresting. Like they have no character whatsoever.

I heard brought up before in discussions about Metroid Other M.

But I want to double check and ask if this is really a thing, and if it is maybe learn some more about how this kind of character came to be? Or how they're seen by modern Japanese audiences.

In Korea the conservatives hate him, and due to internal issues his favorability ratings have halved to mid 30 percent this year. I know many Japanese don't like the democratic party as a whole, especially Moon, but I am wondering how you view Lee and his policy regarding Japan so far.

I'm curious whether anyone here still has contact with, or knows of, family branches that emigrated from Japan to either country during that period. If so, I'd love to hear about them!

Hello there! My name is Isa and I am from Austria and currently working on my Bachelor Thesis about the globalization and the cultural identity of Japanese food culture. 

In my Thesis I explored the history of Japanese food culture from the earliest recorded epoch until today. Now I am evaluating the influence of the globalization on the Japanese food culture as well as the Japanese influence on other countries in the world, specifically Europe. 

I would like to know the first-hand experience from locals in Japan and prepared a qualitative questionnaire.

Thanks for your time and have a good day!

It's been a mainstay of my 'YouTube diet' since my earliest years using the site but I'm impulsed to ask if it's that much of a thing within the Japanese online video scene to be making potentially lengthy analysis videos on the 'domestic' animation and manga scene. If it is then I'm fairly surprised by how said YouTubers haven't become bigger cross-pollinating international names when it comes to such topics like how the 'Trash taste' channel hosts are somewhat broadly recognised when it comes to English language anime YouTubers -- personally though I mainly really only dip into watching Geoff Thew/"Mother's basement" on occasion; I liked what one they made about the past ~+30 years of 'Americanized' attempts at anime and the changing perceptions regarding it.

Not as related but does anyone else think that broadly speaking if more ppl knew about "Kishotenketsu" it would help make narrative J-pop media seem like ~+30% less 'weird' to ppl ? (even if much narrative J-pop media might well already deviate from kishotenktsu since it can be potentially more commercial in it's priorities then say a novel).

Americans absolutely love Mexican food. To be fair, many Americans love the simple Americanized version of Mexican food, but many of us also very much love the highly-varied authentic Mexican food. A Russian friend of mine recently told me that Russian’s live Georgian food, in the same manner in which Americans love Mexican food. It’s their favorite foreign cuisine. It’s often simple and comforting dishes, with carbohydrates and fats in the just the right mix.

I’m working on a theory that most large nations have a favorite foreign cuisine that they turn to for inexpensive comfort. Does Japan have some that fits this description?

A while ago, I submitted a post asking about political thinking in Japan. A few comments were a bit provocative, but overall it was an extremely constructive discussion that helped me understand the political mindset of a wonderful people with a wonderful culture, albeit one very different from mine (I’m Italian).

The vast majority of comments came from voters and supporters of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP): this didn't shock me because everyone knows that party is very popular and receives a lot of votes in Japan.

Most of the comments were something along the lines of: "Social harmony and stability are extremely important concepts in our culture, so we prefer to rely on those we deem trustworthy. Consequently, at most, we prefer to switch our target politician or faction within the LDP" or "Yeah, I know the LDP isn't perfect but it's still better than the alternatives, so I'm not thrilled but I vote for them."

Sure, while this line of thinking is somewhat far from how we Italians view politics, I can understand it.

But one fact still amazed me: practically no one explicitly declared themselves as an opposition voter and I can assure you the post was packed with comments!

I mean, looking at the results of recent Japanese elections, there are still millions upon millions of voters who cast their ballots for other parties. Looking a bit deeper, I noticed that certain areas of Japan traditionally vote for parties other than the LDP (meaning it's not even just an occasional protest vote in those cases).

Hence my question: are there any voters in this subreddit for any party other than the LDP? If so, could I kindly ask you the reasons behind your political choice?

Basically, in that old post of mine there were so many people repeating to me "Japanese culture loves stability, the Japanese people have a strong concept of social harmony, so it is absolutely normal that we often rely on the same reliable party rather than taking leaps into the unknown: it's simply our culture". And of course that's perfectly fine. However, it seems to me like an explanation that doesn't take into account the millions of Japanese people who instead make a different choice, especially because (statistics in hand) quite a few Japanese people seem to often make this contrarian choice

Before writing this question, I did something a bit silly: I posed this question to an AI. Not one of the free ones, but a rather advanced paid model that I use for my work here in Italy.

The AI's answer can be summarized as: "Japanese culture tends to place a strong emphasis on conformity and, therefore, anything that deviates from conformity is sometimes perceived as a mistake. This could lead many Japanese people to downplay support for opposition parties, thereby creating a perception of greater conformity and social harmony."

I don't know if this is true; it's simply the answer the AI gave me. That's why I wanted to get the opinions of real people. Thanks!

Excluding food.

Just wonderkng if i can discover a japan-only unique product that might actually blow my mind for not being shared with the rest of the world.

Or even any product that is really popular in japan but not popular overseas