Changelog
Stay up to date with all of the latest additions and improvements!
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N2 content drop #10
Another week, another N2 content drop, another chocolate croissant secured. (I’m allowed one per batch, according to the rules. Although, as they say, rules were made… to be broken.)
In this batch of content, we’ve really pulled out all the stops, giving you not just one, but TWO ways to say “in the end” (～あげく and ～末に), as well as TWO ways to express your desires (～たいもの and ～ない(だろう)か). What can I say, we were feeling generous.
For vocab and kanji, we’ve got distinguished items such as 睡眠 (“sleep”, but fancy), 飾る (“to decorate”), and 砂糖 (“sugar”). Incredible!
And last but not least, this week’s reading exercise features fireworks, doggos, and dementors. What’s not to love?
All of this and more, available now, in the Sands of Mastery!
Happy studies!
(Note: we'll be posting updates about content drops here on the site from now on as well, as previously we were only announcing them on Discord, and figured it might be nice to do both!)
MaruMori's Second Anniversary Sale has started!
Hey everyone!
In celebration of our second anniversary since our full launch on the 14th of August, 2023, we've decided to hold a special lifetime sale.
We've created a sales page where we (hopefully) answer most of the questions you might have. You can take a little looksie over here:
We can't believe it's already been two years since our launch out of open beta! Somehow it feels like just yesterday (and at the same time like 10 years ago haha!)... Oh, how time flies, huh...
It's also nice to look back at what we've accomplished since then, as well as look forward to all of the exciting features and content we've got in store for you in the coming year(s)! So to help with that, we've also updated our roadmap to give a better indication of what is coming (and when), as well as added tags to show what type of feature/content it is:
Anyhow! I'm sure many of you've been waiting for this moment, so be sure to check out the billing page to take advantage of this sale and join the rest of the cult lifetimers in their endless devotion to Maru studying Japanese:
For those of you who plan to support us, or are already doing so, thank you so much! We really couldn't do this without your support and (heaps of) feedback. All of you have helped us make the site and mobile app so much better already, and we're excited to continue to improve them even further. Thank you!
- The MaruMori Team
New Mobile Apps Update - v1.0.11 - Tap to display Furigana & blurring English translations Settings for Grammar Lessons
Hey everyone!
Yet another mobile app update was approved by the app stores! The fourth one in a short period, totally not because someone reported an issue with the results page of the Verb Transitivity Trainer... No, definitely not 👀
Anyways! The good news is that along with a fix for the above mentioned results page, it also brings a neat feature to the mobile apps that many of you had been waiting for:
Grammar Lesson Furigana & English Settings
We've replaced the Suggest Changes button above the navbar on the Grammar Lesson page with a new "more" button. Tapping this button brings up two additional buttons:
The Suggest Changes button (red)
The Lesson Settings button (purple)
Tapping the latter will bring up the lesson settings modal, where you can change if/how furigana shows up on Japanese text in the lesson as a whole, as well as tell it to blur English translations in example sentences or not.
If you enable "tap to show" for furigana, it hides all furigana by default, but when you tap on a kanji (compound), it will show the furigana as usual. This is a great way to test yourself on kanji readings! This setting is now the default for the mobile apps.
In this screenshot, you can see that I've tapped on one of the English translations, and a few kanji (but not all) to show the corresponding translation and furigana. It's that simple!
Other Improvements & Bugfixes
Verb Transitivity Trainer - Fixed the results screen answers
Statistics - Added extra padding to the bottom for the heatmap tooltip to show properly when tapping on the last days.
SRS Lessons & Reviews - Fixed an issue where it wouldn't accept answers with ー in them for reading layouts.
Kanji Imposters - Kanji now show up a bit more towards the bottom of the screen to make them easier to tap.
Images - Images (like Maru in the navbar) would sometimes glitch out and show a purple square. This was a bug in the framework we were using, and it should be fixed now, as we've updated to the latest version of the framework.
That's about it for now! But keep an eye out for more app updates soon! We've already finished work on implementing Quick Study into the app, but want to add a few additional features/pages before releasing yet another update!
New Mobile Apps Update - v1.0.10 - Verb Transitivity Trainer & bugfixes!
Guess what? That's right! It's a triple wombo combo of mobile app updates!
We've just released yet another update to the mobile app, and this time it's the verb transitivity trainer's time to shine!
Verb Transitivity Trainer
The trainer works exactly the same as it does on web, but for those unaware of what exactly it is, I'll give you a little rundown!
The purpose of the verb transitivity trainer is to get you to recognise and use the correct verbs from a pair, depending on the situation.
We've rounded up 62 common verb pairs, of 1 transitive and 1 intransitive verb, and given each verb a unique scenario to test you with. This means we have 124 practice scenarios available!
We have 4 types of practice available for you:
Scenarios
En -> Jp
Jp -> En
Mixed
We think that out of these, scenarios are likely the most interesting to talk about here, as the other modes kind of speak for themselves!
Scenarios present you with an English sentence (a scenario), and you have to decide whether you must use the intransitive verb or the transitive verb for this scenario. Here's an example:
If you don't remember the "rules", make sure to tap on the "Help" button, and it will show you the general "rules" for when to use intransitive versus transitive verbs. Note that there are always exceptions though!
When you start a session, you will get 124 questions total, in a randomized order, but you can stop at any time you wish and it will show you your training results page where you can see your mistakes.
It's great practice, so be sure to give the transitivity trainer a little try on mobile this time around!
Bugfixes & Improvements
Kanji Imposters - Fixed an issue with high score submission.
Kanji Imposters - Removed a kanji with 0 similars from the game data.
Kanji Imposters - You are now able to properly scroll through the results if you had a bunch of mistakes.
Furigana - Fixed an issue where Japanese sentences/words/kana would sometimes get misaligned due to furigana.
And on we go! We're going to try and keep up this steam and bring you mobile app updates on the regular until we catch up to the website!
P.S.: For those that might not know: If you are a subscriber or have a lifetime account, you can try the mobile app through the following links:
iOS app:
https://testflight.apple.com/join/MfpPbqCq
Android app:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.foxlabs.marumori
In the coming months the app will release from early access into general release, meaning everyone will get access to the app, regardless of subscription status. But until then, we'll keep implementing missing features first!
New Mobile Apps Update - v1.0.9 - Kanji Imposters Mini Game & "More" screen redesign
Hey again!
This time around we have another new update for the mobile apps! Mainly focused on implementing the Kanji Imposters Minigame that was released on web not too long ago.
Kanji Imposters (Similar Kanji) Minigame
In case you missed the news: The Kanji Imposters minigame is all about fine-tuning your kanji recognition skills, by pairing a given kanji with its similar-looking kanji cousins. (Think 末 vs 未.)
You can do this in either a practice mode (no time/score pressure!) or a highscore mode where it's all about how quickly you choose the correct option!
We've made sure that everything stays true to how the experience is on the website, so you can expect to find all the same features in there!
Meaning that it's possible to filter out already correctly answered items in practice mode, and that there are leaderboards for the highscore mode!
This mini game is great practice for getting you to recognise kanji rapidly in the wild, as well as a great way to learn how to differentiate those pesky similar-looking kanji! So we hope you enjoy your favorite new minigame on the go from now on!
The "More" Screen
The More screen has gotten a little visual update, as we were getting a bit too many screens, and we figured it'd be nice to have them categorized (especially as we'll be implementing many more minigames and other pages into the app in the coming period).
Bugfixes & Improvements
Some pages (Statistics/Achievements, etc) now also show the navbar.
Kana Minigame - Fixed highscore mode! The difficulty is now the same as on the website (it wouldn't (immediately) spawn the same amount of fish as on web)
Statistics - No longer fails to load/shows a blank screen if you haven't (ever) done any Grammar SRS yet.
That's all for now, but expect a new app update to drop again pretty soon! (We'll be focusing hard on bringing the app up to par with the website in the coming period)
P.S.: For those that might not know: If you are a subscriber or have a lifetime account, you can try the mobile app through the following links:
iOS app:
https://testflight.apple.com/join/MfpPbqCq
Android app:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.foxlabs.marumori
In the coming months the app will release from early access into general release, meaning everyone will get access to the app, regardless of subscription status. But until then, we'll keep implementing missing features first!