Visual Novel Setup Guides
Text hookers, popup dictionaries, Anki mining, OCR, upscaling and emulation. Each guide is written for reading the original Japanese, with screenshots and the settings that matter.
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Learning Japanese with Visual Novels
Learn Japanese with visual novels - complete beginner's guide covering kana, Textractor setup, JL dictionary, Anki mining, and immersion-based learning strategies for reading VNs.
Read the walkthroughGetting the text out of the game
Capture Japanese text as it appears on screen so a dictionary can read it.
Textractor Setup Guide
How to use Textractor to read Japanese visual novels. Beginner-friendly setup guide for text hooking, WebSocket extension, texthooker UI, and regex patterns for Japanese learning.
Agent Text Hooker Setup Guide
Agent text hooker setup guide for visual novels and emulated games. Configure script-based text extraction when standard text hookers fail.
OwOCR Setup Guide
OwOCR optical character recognition setup guide for visual novels. Extract Japanese text from images, untexthookable VNs, and console games using OCR with JL dictionary integration.
Meikipop Setup Guide
Meikipop OCR popup dictionary setup guide. Instant Japanese dictionary lookups for any on-screen text.
Dictionaries and vocabulary
Look words up without leaving the scene, and keep the ones worth keeping.
JL Setup Guide: Pop-Up Dictionary for Visual Novels
Learn Japanese with visual novels using JL - a popup dictionary with Anki mining, pitch accents, and frequency display. Step-by-step setup guide for beginners.
Yomitan Setup Guide: Japanese Pop-Up Dictionary
Yomitan browser extension setup guide for reading Japanese visual novels. Instant dictionary lookups and Anki mining to help you learn Japanese as a beginner.
Anki Setup Guide for Japanese Learners
Anki setup guide for learning Japanese with visual novels. Configure FSRS scheduling, recommended settings, add-ons, and best practices for vocabulary retention as a beginner.
Running visual novels anywhere
Linux, Android and decades-old Japanese hardware.
Bottles Setup Guide
Play Japanese visual novels on Linux using Bottles to learn Japanese. Set up Wine prefixes, configure Japanese locale, install VNs, and run Textractor for text hooking.
Kirikiroid2 Setup Guide
Step-by-step guide to setting up Kirikiroid2 for playing Kirikiri visual novels natively on Android devices.
GameHub Lite Setup Guide
GameHub Lite setup guide for running Windows visual novels and games on Android devices.
Neko Project II Setup Guide
NekoProject II emulator guide for playing PC-98 visual novels. Setup NP21W, configure Japanese fonts, mount disk images, and text hook retro VNs for Japanese learning.
Picture quality
Scaling and shaders for titles that were drawn for a smaller screen.
Magpie Setup Guide
Magpie window upscaling guide for visual novels. Upscale low-resolution VNs and games with advanced scaling algorithms like Anime4K, FSR, CuNNy, and CRT shaders.
ShaderGlass Setup Guide
ShaderGlass overlay guide for visual novels. Apply CRT shaders, upscaling, and retro effects to VNs and games using this transparent overlay tool.
Finding and tracking
Where the titles are, and how to see what you have read.
VN Recommendations & Discovery
Find visual novels that suit your reading level: difficulty ratings, databases, trackers and community recommendations, from a first untranslated title to the hardest prose in the medium.
Where to Get Japanese Visual Novels
Where to buy or download Japanese visual novels in the original: DLsite, DMM, Steam and doujin shops, with notes on payment methods and region locks, for readers of untranslated VNs.
Useful Tools for Reading Visual Novels in Japanese
Essential tools for learning Japanese with visual novels, including Textractor, JL, Yomitan, OwOCR, and productivity software for beginner and advanced VN readers.
JDownloader Setup Guide
How to use JDownloader for downloading visual novels from DDL sites. Setup guide covering split archives, automatic extraction, browser extension, and premium accounts.
VNTimeTracker Setup Guide
VNTimeTracker setup guide for tracking your visual novel reading progress. Monitor time spent reading Japanese VNs and display your learning statistics.