If you can get in the habit of doing Anki every day, that really is a great way to retain information in the long term.
My personal experience with Anki is spotty but my general tip is to just decrease friction as much as possible. Don’t spend a bunch of time making complex, fancy flashcards - just a simple question/answer format. Ideally you could make the card on your phone or whatever as you discover a new word/phrase. Failing that, a simple list you maintain and habitually migrate to Anki on a regular basis.
YMMV of course but I have a habit of overinvesting in stuff like this at the beginning, and creating a process for myself that I simply will not stick to. The quicker and easier it is to add flash cards, the more likely I am to do it.
In terms of this thread idea - I guess it has fizzled out a bit but I am certainly interested in trying more games in Japanese (ideally at a somewhat beginner level) so if people want to build a group activity around that I’d be down.
I too fell off of Wanikani earlier this year and have generally had a tough time returning to it in earnest for the last year or so. My subscription ends at the end of the year and I’d set a goal for myself that I was nowhere near reaching. My lessons were piled up and the review pile was staggering. There was no end in sight and every day I tried to knock out reviews just invited them back the next day.
I found a thread where someone recommended using external apps and enabling Anki mode through those as a way to get through the burn pile. I’d already been using Tsurukame on iOS as my mobile method for reviews so I flipped it to Anki mode and it’s been magical! I cleared the reviews in a week (~2,000) and have since gained three levels after staying stagnant for over a year.
The big caveat with this is that you’re now not learning through failure as easily since Anki mode will let you proceed if you want to with a “success” even if you failed. I try to be honest with myself as I go through them and I haven’t noticed any difference in retention of kanji or vocab since.
Instead I’m more motivated to stay engaged and seek out opportunities for reading. I just learned this week that the Zelda games on DS have a nice feature that lets you tap on kanji with the stylus to reveal the furigana so it’s been a great way to practice reading while playing.
@gingerbeardman Apologies for the late answer: sadly no, this program you linked to was exclusive to the NOA territories of Wii, whereas the Maboshi contents I mentioned were produced by/for NOE territories (“PAL territories” as we would have said at the times).
I’m in UK/Europe so I contacted Nintendo of Europe and was shocked that they replied. They couldn’t find it in their archive as it apparently only goes back to 2012 on their current server.