I use Genki alongside Textfugu (I also use wanikani and Assimil) and I find Genki to be a bit more faster paced. That is it covers more grammar and vocab within a shorter amount of space. Thus, I heavily recommend you purchase the workbook that goes along with Genki as you’ll need the extra practice to memorize and understand the topics, unlike textfugu which mainly just uses Anki for outside work. There are some overlaps but I would say they compliment each other nicely. Genki for me is a bit harder to follow and not as leisurely as textfugu but that is good as you need to put in hard work to understand learn a language. Plus, it is very important to build a strong base in the basics so I would definitely purchase it!
Another thing I like about Genki is that it covers more colloquial/everyday speech rather than formal. I didn’t know a lot of the phrases on textfugu were more ‘formal’ and not commonly used in everyday life, so Genki is also practical in regards to that.

Hello! I also go back and forth between my home state and Minnesota (for school). That sounds really cool, not many people can make the claim that they’ve lived in Japan with such a profession. I definitely envy you, haha! I also think it’s great when people study a language regardless of their age. I’ve been trying to convince my parents to study spanish for years but they refuse!

Hi! I hope your studies continue to go well. At least textfugu is on a permanent discount until EtoEto comes out so hopefully you’ll be able to purchase it in the near future!