I'm sure sites like Neopets or GaiaOnline exist in Japan, but I've no idea how to find any that are any good. Specifically, I'm looking for sites where there are things to do (games, puzzles, etc), community (forums, messaging), and has simple text that I can possibly read.

Has anyone got any suggestions?

Edit: It suddenly occurred to me to search for ゲーム on google.jp and I found a lot of little free flash games and stuff... But I'm still looking for a fairly reliable way to find community-type sites. Part of my problem is that I'm not good enough in Japanese to even know what words to search for.

Off the top of my head, you could try googling キッズ for kids and 掲示板 for forum. Here's the forum section of the first site that pulls up http://www.kids-dream.ne.jp/bbs/index.html

This is off topic but can anyone tell me what the little box with the black pixels is? I've seen it on various Japanese websites..

The little black box is a scannable barcode that you can use with your keitai to get more information on a product or even to purchase it. They are on everything in Japan, it seems. I love the idea and wish we had something like that in the US.

rochel Wrote:The little black box is a scannable barcode that you can use with your keitai to get more information on a product or even to purchase it. They are on everything in Japan, it seems. I love the idea and wish we had something like that in the US.

Wow.. I envy how far ahead Japan is when it comes to mobile phones.. That's awesome.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QR_Code

Or even better:
http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/QR%E3%82%B3...C%E3%83%89

yukamina Wrote:Off the top of my head, you could try googling キッズ for kids and 掲示板 for forum. Here's the forum section of the first site that pulls up http://www.kids-dream.ne.jp/bbs/index.html

Thanks! Though now I'm depressed because kids in Japan know a lot more kanji than I thought. Ah well, just something to work for.

I'm sure I'll find 掲示板 an especially handy word to know.

wccrawford Wrote:

yukamina Wrote:Off the top of my head, you could try googling キッズ for kids and 掲示板 for forum. Here's the forum section of the first site that pulls up http://www.kids-dream.ne.jp/bbs/index.html

Thanks! Though now I'm depressed because kids in Japan know a lot more kanji than I thought. Ah well, just something to work for.

I'm sure I'll find 掲示板 an especially handy word to know.

掲示板 is probably the word I see most when I'm online. *cough* facebook *cough*

rochel Wrote:The little black box is a scannable barcode that you can use with your keitai to get more information on a product or even to purchase it. They are on everything in Japan, it seems. I love the idea and wish we had something like that in the US.

Incidentally, I saw a DoCoMo commercial about those just the other day!