If someone asks you “Where should I go?”, you could respond with something like 「公園に行ったらどうですか。」(How about going to the park?). Basically, you can make suggestions by using the 「ば」 or 「たら」 conditional and adding 「どう」. This literally means, “If you do [X], how is it?”. In English, this would become, “How about doing [X]?”.

銀行に行ったらどうですか。
How about going to bank?
たまにご両親と話せばどう？
How about talking with your parents once in a while?

[Source: Tae Kim]

Similarly to Joel’s example, you can change the verb to past to make the suggestion stronger: ラーメンを食べる方がいいです。 -> ラーメンを食べた方がいいです。 which is more like “You’d better eat ramen”

Best way to learn the difference is probably to just read lots of Japanese and see how they use it. I’m sure over time you’ll get used to the way it works, as if by magic :D

@Joel: So true…

Edit: Damn, this was a lot longer than I meant it to be, sorry >.<

Finally, something’s actually (supposedly) getting done! Or at least, you’ve acknowledged our existence to keep us satiated ;) I haven’t used TextFugu since 2011 but it’s just that I feel so sorry for newbies shelling out $120 for a site that’s half-done and all over the place. You should really make it clearer that updates are “once in a blue moon” as opposed to the frequent updates you used to do when I joined, and that the content here doesn’t take you past N5. And that you’re far less involved with the community these days.

“I’ve lowered the price of the Lifetime subscription to $99″

Oh, well that’s a little better…

“Our plan is to eventually increase the price beyond the original $120″

Unless you’re adding three-headed monkeys and extra lasers, I can’t see how this site could be worth as much as that, let alone the $120 it is now. The whole draw of the site (for me at least) was not so much its style but the sheer involvement and passion and personality of the creator, plus the promise of lots of updates; now that updates are so few and far between and you’ve focussed your attention on other ventures – practically abandoning TextFugu’s members in the process – so much of the initial value has been lost. For an unfinished textbook that takes you from absolute beginner to just plain beginner, $120+ is far too expensive, especially considering there are *free* alternatives like Tae Kim that take you way, way beyond that. If the $120 included WaniKani (in place of the current kanji section) and EtoEto as standard, that’d maybe be a little more reasonable.

I get that it takes a while to create content and update the site (over a year though… really?), but the sheer lack of communication is what’s been the most frustrating. I know you haven’t *actually* abandoned TextFugu since you’re still working on this big, mysterious update but you’ve definitely abandoned the forums and you barely ever mention us any more. EtoEto looks like it might be good though I’m afraid the same thing will happen: you’ll say you’re working on some super-secret, mega updates but really you’ll be off starting 5 other new projects and devoting all your time to them.

All that sounds pretty ranty, I know, it’s just that I cared so much about TextFugu when I first came here; after years of sticking around the forums, I’ve slowly watched it go downhill and more people become unhappy and it’s such a shame :/

Maybe it’s a case of “middle child syndrome”: Tofugu is the oldest child the parents love the most because he was first; WaniKani is the youngest that gets spoiled and fussed over all the time; EtoEto is the next child they’re planning; and TextFugu is the in-betweener – although the parents still love him, they don’t show it enough and he feels left out. And then there’s Koichi-ben who was the illegitimate child the father had when he was stationed in Japan a while back, receiving little more than a Christmas card each year just to acknowledge his existence. Metaphors are fun…

In other news: how’s Hashi getting on these days? He’s a pretty cool guy and doesn’t afraid of anything.

Ah… ok, I think I’m seeing it now: bids were coming in so thick and fast that the reporter lost track. Thanks :)

Also, do you mean that you hadn’t seen that site before and you think it looks good, or that you *have* seen it before and already liked it before me linking? The way you phrased it made it seem like the former but then I would have expected you to have heard of it before haha.