Friday Starter is a weekly column of news and tidbits from the world of baseball video games—past and present, domestic and foreign.
Japanese for Baseball Video Games 101
If you’re interested in playing baseball video games from another region, you don’t need to know any Japanese. If you’ve played other games before, you can intuit your way around the menu. Or if you haven’t, you probably have a smartphone with the Google Translate app, which has a camera feature that will get you through just about anything.
I want to stress you can enjoy these games without learning anything. But, learning just a little bit will make things a lot simpler, and could be rewarding and cool all by itself. If you want to be able to put the smartphone translate app away, here’s what I recommend.
Japanese is tough because it has four writing systems. Thankfully, you already know one: romaji, AKA Latin AKA the English alphabet. Some JP baseball games have English text in the menus, like in Pawapuro 2014 here:
Normally when learning Japanese, you study hiragana next. But if your goal is to get a little better at playing baseball video games, study katakana first. Katakana is the writing system for foreign loanwords in Japanese. There are a lot of these in baseball games, and because it’s baseball, they come from English, the language you already know how to read.
So if you learn katakana, your Japanese vocabulary suddenly expands massively right away. You unlock the ability to read words that come from English, which are plentiful in baseball video games.
If you know katakana, you can read almost the entire main menu of Simulation Pro Yakyuu 2 for the Super Famicom. Without being able to read the kanji below, you’d still know that the four options are “Pennant Race,” “Open,” “Edit,” and “Data.”
After learning katakana, I’d recommend studying the baseball terminology you don’t know already. This Anki flashcard deck is just for Japanese baseball terms, and should help. A list of common vocab is listed below also.
After that, you’ve got the wide world of hiragana and kanji ahead of you. Hiragana is a set of phonetic syllables, just like katakana, but used for native Japanese words and sounds. Then kanji is the big beast, a huge set of Chinese characters that you will never stop learning. It’s a long road, and it has hills and valleys where you feel stuck at a certain level until suddenly improving without noticing it. But learning a new language, even one as tough as Japanese, is rewarding. And after putting enough effort into it, you’ll slowly realize you can read the games you’re playing without even having to consciously think about it.
Main menu:
- Exhibition games can be called:
- 対戦 or たいせん – “Taisen” meaning Match
- オープン or オープン戦 – “Open” or “Open Match”
- rarely エキシビション – “Exhibition”
- Season mode can be called:
- ペナント – “Pennant”
- ペナントレース – “Pennant Race”
- シーズン – “Season”
- Options can be called:
- オプション – “Option”
- 設定 – “Settei,” coincidentally similar-sounding to its meaning “Settings”
Pause menu:
- Pinch hitting is called:
- 代打 or だいだ – “Daida” or “Substitute Hitter”
- Pinch running is called:
- 代走 or 代走 – “Daisou” or “Substitute Runner”
- Going to a reliever/the bullpen is called:
- リリーフ – “Relief”
- or sometimes 投手交代 – “Pitcher Substitution”
- Making a defensive replacement is called:
- 守備交代 – “Defensive Substitution”
- Quitting mid-game is often not an option in older games, but when it’s there, it’s usually:
- やめる or 止める – “Stop”
The pause menu options in a Pawapuro game, with Pinch Hitter highlighted:
Positions
Most positions have two different ways of saying the name, one English (written in katakana) and one Japanese (in kanji). Both are common.
Typically in game menus, the positions are abbreviated into just the first of the kanji characters below. For example, right fielder is abbreviated as 右, the first character of 右翼手. Third baseman is abbreviated 三, the first character of 三塁手.
Pitcher – ピッチャー – 投手 – Toushu
First Baseman – ファースト or 一塁手 – Ichiruishu
Second Baseman – セコンド or 二塁手 – Niruishu
Third Baseman – サード – 三塁手 – Sanruishu
Shortstop – – 遊撃手 – Yuugekishu
Catcher – キャッチャー or 捕手 – Houshu
Outfielder – 外野手 – Gaiyashu
Infielder – 内野手 – Naiyashu
Left Fielder – レフト or 左翼手 – Sayokushu
Center Fielder – センター or 中堅手 – Chuukenshu
Right Fielder – ライト or 右翼手 – Uyokushu
Starting Pitcher – 先投 – Sentou
Reliever or Relief – リリーフ or 中継ぎ投手 – Nakatsugi Toushu
Closer – クローザー or 抑え投手 – Osae Toushu
Example of pre-game lineups in Pawapuro 10, with the positions abbreviated to just one character on the right side of the face icons:
Other Vocabulary
Baseball (as in the sport) – 野球 – Yakyuu
Baseball (as in the ball) – ボール – Ball
Ball (as in the opposite of a strike) – ボール – Ball (again)
Strike (as in the opposite of a ball) – ストライク
Out – アウト
Foul – ファウル
Game/Match – たいせん or 対戦 – Taisen
1-player / Single-player – ひとり or 一人 – Hitori
sometimes ひとりで – Hitoride
2-player – ふたり or 二人 – Futari
sometimes ふたりで – Futaride
A menu in Pawapuro asking if you want single-player, two-player, or to watch the game:
Generic term for player – 選手 – Senshu
Exhibition Game – オープン – Open
All-Star – オールスター
Other resources
Linking some other resources I have used in the past, if you are interested in learning more: