[QUOTE="AirGuitarist87"]From first hand experience, learning kanji is NOT a priority.Velocitas8
This is true to a point.. I would recommend doing typical "Japanese 101" stuff first. Learn hiragana, katakana, and some of the basic vocabulary/grammar. All of this is extremely easy in my opinion; very straightforward. Maybe even start on some easy kanji like those used to express numbers.
After you get that stuff down, it depends on what your goals are. If you'd like to be as efficient as possible and learn a lot of the language in a very short span, going through RTK1 and getting kanji writings down before going any further is going to be the best route in my experience. Once you're done with that, your progress should be comparable to that of a native Chinese learning Japanese, which is a *very* good position to be in. What I mean by that is that you'll recognize characters and know how to write them, so the only thing you'll have to learn is the various readings and meanings, which is cake when that's all you need to focus on.
Ditching those hideous hiragana-only (or primarily-hiragana) sentences as soon as possible is going to be to your benefit. Even native Japanese have trouble reading that garbage.
You need to be committed to do RTK, though.. one lesson and review session (~1 hour) per day for 2 months or so, and keep reviewing up with an SRS like Anki or Reviewing The Kanji. If you can't do this, or don't feel like RTK works for you, then traditional study will probably be more productive. If you CAN do it, then you will be in amazing shape once you start studying higher level vocabulary, kanji compounds, grammar.. and you will be 5x as productive as someone who hadn't done RTK. I personally think the frontloading is worth it if you can put in the time.
My girlfriend is a native Chinese who learnt Japanese and to be all honest - there are no shortcuts in learning any languages. You can argue that Chinese people have the kanji, but this is like an English person reading the alphabet. Sure, you can understand what the kanji means, but you can't use it in a sentence when talking to people and the grammar or context can throw it in completely different directions (the kanji 着 can mean "to wear" or "to arrive" depending on it's use). I've spent a few months where I knew what the kanji to something means but not know what the heck the sentence is telling me. Any language takes time and effort, but the whole point of learning it is communication. If you're just learning Kanji then you'll end up only being able to read (maybe write if you're determined). I've met a few people here in Japan who are excellent speakers but have next to no reading and writing ability. When someone gives them a piece of paper they just ask what it means. The opposite is a lot more difficult. Not trying to be confrontational or anything, I'm actually studying for JLPT now so I'm overflowing with anti-Japanese studying hatred hahaha. 
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