How to be good at Japanese quickly?

I suppose the quickest way to master any language is to go over there where the language is spoken and immerse yourself in it while studying the grammar and obtaining the stylistic knowledge.  Still this is not always possible for anyone and for any language.  Especially for Japan, the language acquisition in the country depends on your financial situation and relevant immigration status.  The question then becomes what is the best way to make use of your time and budget in relation to the language learning.   "Have as many lessons as you can before traveling.  Study as much as you can. The more basics you have to build your experience on the more comfortable you will feel to absorb subtle nuances, difference in pronunciation and various new uses of phrases and words. " I usually say.   So...then how do you do this?  HOW can we get better? 

1.  Watch Japanese films and animations with/without subtitles. 
2.  Listen to Japanese music and read lyrics in Japanese (bring them to me if you want to understand properly. )
3.  Find a Japanese friend who likes to speak Japanese or is happy to do language exchange. 
4.  Read out loud many times till you can exercise and build your mouth muscle to help you form those tricky words that catch and bite your tongue sometimes.  

I feel the language acquisition starts with listening.   Babies don't know how to spell but they start bubbling words out of their mouth with natural pronunciation.   Listen to the sound of the language.  You don't have to know what they are talking about.  I know they do sound "strange" but hopefully that is the sound you like. (I won't recommend to try to get better at a language whose sound you are not so comfortable with.  Believe me.  I did that once.  Not only it didn't work but it was a torture.  Let's not waste our time.  Life is short! )  

Here is a relaxing listening exercise:  Find Japanese radio show or something that is not so loud or intrusive but calming.  If you can't, it could be listening material of a text book but something continuous will be good.  Listen to it while you lie or have a rest on the couch, every day for 10 to 20 min.  Imagine just melt into the sound, wrapped up in the waves, float with the rhythm and swim with the tones.  

5.  Master ひらがな(hiragana)/カタカナ(katakana) 

To those who have not yet found a joy of reading Japanese characters.  This is where it all starts.  Learning these two sets of 50 sounds/writing systems "kana" perfectly gives you the best discount of your lesson fees.  You don't need a tutor for this.  You just need a patience and will to master!  I know that there are a lot of text books with English are out there.  And you can write Japanese in alphabets but it gives your a wrong idea in terms of pronunciation and raises many unnecessary questions and wonders in your mind.  If you master the basic writing system first, you can jump into the core and the jewel of the language and swim straight up to the top, swiftly and steadily!!