Learning Another Language With Video Games

[Zachery2112]

Has anyone else ever learned, or practiced, another language by playing video games? When I was learning Spanish in school, it was suggested that every student do independent study by watching movies, reading books, or (the classic method) watching hundreds of episodes of telenovelas. While everyone else was watching Disney movies with Spanish dubs, I was playing 'Fantasía Final Seis' on an emulator with the European version. I ended up learning how to read and write far more than I expected from that experience. I also practiced listening by playing Blasphemous with the Spanish dub. Besides, it felt more natural to the game.

Have you ever had an experience like that? Tell us about it.

 

[Yousef]

I’m playing through ace attorney in Spanish to build my vocab. I wanna get to a level where I no longer need to rely on a dictionary and can remember everything just fine. I’ve a minor disability that makes it difficult to have memory retention but I do think I can manage with enough practice and persistence. Being bilingual is easy, but I wanna be more comfortably trilingual. Eventually, I’d also love to move on to Portuguese or French. Italian is currently on pause.
Also stickied cuz interesting thread topic.

 

[OmegaPunch's iconOmegaPunch]

That's how I learned English when I was a kid, by playing games in English, with English subtitles and English voice acting.
I even learned new terminology from games like GTA: San Andreas.
And that's also how I want to learn Japanese, through games.

 

[happymasksalesman]

I learned English with games.
Well in university they still use movie method I fact.

 

[psvitaforever]

I'm very lazy in learning new things, let alone a whole new language, so congrats for real to all of you people who have the will to do it!! As most of gamers, I've improved my English in playing English-only games (I mean not translated in my language), but I was already studying it at school so it's not like I've learned a new language all by myself.

 

[Poltergeist]

I taught myself English by playing a lot of RPGs and essentially engulfing myself into the language on a day-to-day basis. I also actively using memory tools like Anki and building my personal dictionary almost every day.

I had English classes since my middle school, but I never paid any attention to them and had bad grades.

 

[happymasksalesman]

I more collect words for sake of writing. Like some useless English word which I never gonna use. I even made a small dictionary for what it is mean and how it says.

 

[DunkeyKong]

GTA games like V and San Andreas, both have an amazing dialogue writing. This is my favorite one

 

[LiberoVulpesLiberoVulpes's icon]

I learned English because getting games in Spanish was very difficult, so, out of sheer necessity I pushed myself to learn it. That and a lot of music, movies, and tv-shows.

And, its thanks to games I can understand some spoken mandarin, korean, and japanese (anime as well).

My English teachers were all trash.

Being in the very small percentage of bilingual people in my country, is an ego boost.

 

[happymasksalesman]

(*me remember English clases*)
It wasn't very bad,it only don't work on me.
Music is what I need to learn a language. Only reason I learn some languages lately is for their song and great movie dialogues.

Post automatically merged: Today at 9:08 AM

Being in the very small percentage of bilingual people in my country, is an ego boost.

Well In my country people are bilingual isn't small,they are so big! I remember a Australian tourist clip.

 

[Leo-Dash]

My motivation to learn English was because I wanted to understand videogames and, i'm not kidding, learn the YuGiOh's REAL ACTUAL NON-ANIME Effects

Shout out to this GOAT!

 

[Poltergeist]

Music is what I need to learn a language.

Singing songs is another powerful tool to use for the learning purpose. It improved my pronunciation drastically.

 

[beefbowl]

Has anyone else ever learned, or practiced, another language by playing video games?

I learned English through video games, I even studied English literature thanks to video games.

 

[Retro Doomer]

I suppose gaming helped me to Improve my English but i already had to know a lot of English for it to work.So yes Games can help you improve your language skills but only if you are already decent in said language and its fun to.For myself my English just improved overtime i never actively learned it so to say it just clicked with me strangely enough,well I can't speak English Fluently but i can hold a decent Conversation by myself even somewhat advanced besides some really niche words i guess.

 

[Advil Lavs]

As someone who learned english by watching Minecraft mod videos from a british youtuber, I'd say this is a great idea. It's even better if you are play a game you know from inside-out, just read every dialogue box or name of an item and try to translate them in your head.