hpr-knowledge-base/hpr_transcripts/hpr2629.txt

Episode: 2629
Title: HPR2629: Thoughts on language learning part 3 - game/story mode.
Source: https://hub.hackerpublicradio.org/ccdn.php?filename=/eps/hpr2629/hpr2629.mp3
Transcribed: 2025-10-19 06:46:34

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This is HBR Episode 2629 entitled Thoughts on Language Learning Part 3 Games Ashtore Mode.
It is hosted by the ODD DUMB and in about 26 minutes long and carry my clean flag.
The summary is, I discuss some of my thoughts on how games might help in language learning.
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Hello, this is DODDDummy with another episode of Hacker Public Radio.
This is the third episode of a three part series talking about or discussing what my thoughts on language learning.
So the first two episodes, the first one was about traditional language lessons, my thoughts on how they might be better suited for me.
The second episode was about how to use chat programs, modify them a little bit to help in language learning.
This one is going to be about games, my ideas on how games, specifically computer games, might be able to assist in language learning.
So one of the things that has always been an issue for me, the casual person, well I guess I won't tell the story again because I said it in two episodes.
Basically in a real short and form, I'm interested in languages but I don't, not interested enough that I take away time from either work family or friends, those kinds of things.
I would only do this, learn languages as a hobby, that's put it in a nutshell.
So taking from a hobby slash fun time, it might make sense to use video games.
And my thinking is that if you can make the video game interesting enough that, and not like on the, you know, like they have the education games for kids, and you can obviously tell that it's an educational game.
Like for example, the way you climb a cliff is to do math problems. So not that kind of educational learning, but I'm thinking more where the game is immersive and interesting and you're doing it just for the game.
And the fact that you're learning a language is secondary and maybe with a little luck it doesn't even, you don't even really notice it, it's kind of in the back burner and you're interested in playing the game.
So that's the concept in a nutshell. And similarly to, well some guiding principles are maybe ways to make this happen.
And are similar to the discussion on applications to help you learn language as well. I guess a computer game would be, would be an application as well.
But so where you would start off, in this case, you don't start off knowing any of your native language like on the chat program, for instance, you,
the spell checker database had all of the native language. And as you progressed, the native language database dwindled.
But in this case, you wouldn't start off with any, any native words, everything would be the new language, but it would start off really very basic.
And even though you have to learn to progress to the game, it doesn't, the goal is to make it not seem like you're doing that.
So how might, I mean, I assume there's a ton you can do this law manners of ways, but here's one that I thought of. And this is something I thought of four or five years ago back when I was really considering maybe trying to develop a course for myself to study.
But I never really did. So, but here was my general idea. Of course, I didn't write this stuff down. So I don't really know if this is exactly what I had in mind, but I think this will be good enough to get the, to get the point across.
And even, even now I'm just going to go off the top of my head. Well, I mean, I've already had the idea, but I'm going to retell it off the top of my head. I don't have any notes or anything like that.
So I'll wander like I normally do. So, for example, in my mind, when I was thinking about this, what I had in mind really was point and click adventure games.
For those of you who don't remember exactly those, what those are, take a look at scum VM and the games they support or the kind of games I'm talking about. So that's what I had in mind. So in my thinking, and I probably played some games, something like this. If I remember, there's, well, I don't remember the games, but I remember one game that was kind of similar concept.
And that the person, and I think this is pretty common in these kind of games. Anyways, but anyway, so here we go. I'll just kind of give. So in my, so the concept when I first thought about this, I thought that I might have you, this would be kind of first person.
So you wake up and you're in a hospital room or some kind of a clinic, maybe not a hospital, maybe, maybe some kind of clinic. And so you open your eyes.
And well, of course, the first thing you see is gotta be a beautiful nurse or, well, nurse, either way, male or female, just depending on what your, what your interests are. So what would be beautiful to you?
So you open your eyes as beautiful, nurse, and you look around and she's saying something to you, but you don't know what it is.
And he just simply don't know what she's saying to you. And it's in a language that you don't know. So you don't even know as far as the game goes, you don't know what language it is.
And so you try to say hello or where am I or something like that. Oh, that's, that's right. I forgot. There are a couple of, at the very, very beginning, I'm thinking that you would start off with a couple of English words.
That you know how to say. So when you do the little dialogue box, it will come up and you have choices. Hello, who are you? Where are you?
And you quickly find out that they don't understand anything you say, which for some native English speaker, in my case, I wouldn't have to be that way, but in my case, that's kind of unusual.
I can go almost, well, I've been to remote places in Thailand, in Germany, and the Philippines. Well, that's enough. And I've been in the really remote places where the people there don't really think they know English, but they still know English for you.
They know numbers, they know the basics. Hello, you, but they don't, a lot of them don't think they know English very rarely do that come across somebody who knows who really doesn't know any English.
And truth be told, even those people probably knew some English, but maybe they were just too shy to say anything at all.
Because a lot of those people that I would see would still the TV around them would be an English. So anyway, so for me, that would be a kind of interesting point of the game that they don't understand at all with what I'm saying.
But so anyway, quickly you realize that neither neither you nor the people taking care of you understand, even know what language you're talking about.
And so, so there's a couple of things that are clear. Well, one, you don't know how you got there at all. You don't have that memory.
The game play could and you know, reveal that memory to you in the future just depends on how you wanted to take it. But these are just some kind of thoughts to give the idea of what I had in mind.
And so, you don't know why you're there. You know that you don't know if they're friend or foe, but it's pretty clear pretty soon that they don't want you to die and they're trying to nurse you back to health.
Now, of course, you don't know if that's so that they can try you or you really don't know what it is.
And so maybe to get you, but one thing's clear, you need to learn their language. And for whatever reason, they're not interested in learning your language, you have to learn their language.
And they won't let you out of the room or maybe, you know, that you're pretty confined right now. At first, you're even tied down.
And you don't know if you're tied down because they want to protect you or they want to protect themselves or some kind of combination thereof. You just know that you're tied down.
And so maybe as you eat or as you do some things, maybe they, and they start to try to teach you the language.
Maybe they do so with like cards that have the names of things and they pronounce the names of things.
And so kind of keeping the gameplay in mind, maybe they feed you the first several meals and where you get them, they feed you different things.
You don't really get a choice, but they feed you different things. So maybe in four or five, six meals, you start and they show you the picture and they tell you the word.
And so, or maybe when they're feeding you, they tell you the word. So you start learning what kinds of foods are. And maybe they tell you their names. So maybe you start learning their names.
And maybe they give you a name because you don't know your own name. So maybe they give you a name in the new language.
Let's just say that. And so you learn your name, you learn the people who take care of you. Maybe it's just a one person. Maybe it's more, maybe there's shift who knows.
So when your vocabulary gets good and then you you are able to pick the things that well, whenever I don't know, but you demonstrate that you understand what the things are.
So maybe in the menu, you get like a option of can I have give me another bite of pork. Let's say you still don't pick what you want or maybe you do.
Maybe you pick what you want at this place when finally to demonstrate that you know what they are, but somehow you demonstrate you know how to ask for the food that you want.
And maybe you learned some of the foods that you don't want kind of be interesting. And then so once you demonstrate that you can order, maybe they let you out of your little room, but maybe you're still in some kind of a facility,
some kind of a hospital type atmosphere of some sort, but maybe it's like still walled off, but you can maybe you're given a little bit of freedom to to walk the grounds a little bit or maybe to go to the cafeteria to actually order your food.
So you go to the cafeteria, you order your food and maybe maybe there you tell them your name and you tell them who sent you.
So you've learned a little bit from them feeding you learned a little bit. And then again, still it's not like you're trying to make it to where it's not like you're learning the language as a chore, but you're learning it because the game needs you to know the words.
And then maybe you notice why you're getting a little bit of freedom. And so maybe you, anyway, so you get a little bit of freedom and you notice why you're walking around the grounds that you have access to a couple of things.
One, maybe you try to do things like go to places you're not supposed to and maybe they maybe they tell you that you're not and kind of recommend you.
And so you start learning words that mean no in various ways and maybe if you keep doing that, maybe you die, right? Maybe that's if you take them over, you die, you disobeyed and they shot you, that kind of thing.
So so you're and then you notice maybe there's a guy that you see or somebody maybe it's a woman, depending on how you want to do this by a game.
And you notice that somebody's watching you, but they don't let on that they're watching you, you like overtly, they don't tell you anything.
And so the gameplay for this point is maybe you start having some officials visit you as you progress and get healthy and they're coming in watching and talking to you.
But maybe you're still learning you can't quite exactly not talk to them, but you know that there's some officials of that area who are interested in you.
But you still don't know why you still don't know you still know you can't leave.
And so maybe even at this point they are maybe they're showing you some kind of artifacts of things that you brought with you, whatever makes sense for the for the game.
But maybe and you still like no, I can't remember or maybe you start remembering a little bit.
But all this time you're learning learning the language like maybe they start pointing stuff out and telling you what they are that you can see inside the room.
And and maybe the pretty nurse walks you around the garden and you know tells you trees and just different things like that.
So there's a squirrel there and tell you that so kind of I guess this maybe be tropes actually of this kind of thing with the person for some reason doesn't have any memory.
So at some point you're going to learn enough that that person who's been watching you decides he can talk to you.
So let's say for example, maybe he's not the reason he hasn't contacted you yet.
Maybe he's watching you and observing you to see when when you're learned because he doesn't know the language either.
He only knows the language you're trying to learn. And so maybe he's just watching and waiting to see when you're to the point where you can have a meaningful conversation.
And at some point you get to that point where he makes up some kind of an excuse or a ruse to bump into you or maybe it's a she again however you want the story to play out.
And he gets you alone a little bit or maybe he even passes you a note. Hey, let's meet.
And so maybe you have to figure out that the note says let's meet. So hopefully maybe you already learned enough that that can happen.
It could be a lot of things. Maybe if you have to confide in someone to see what the note means or show it to someone maybe you get killed or maybe you build trust or maybe he talks to you in person to see.
And that could be a thing too. So maybe this person meets you maybe more than once before he finally confides in you. Maybe he's saying the words and the new language.
Hey, let's meet or some words to test your knowledge and maybe until you learned enough about that, you just think it's a casual, you know, an accidental meetings.
And he's saying just normal stuff that you don't know and the new language until you finally get a clue.
And then so at some point you would get to the point where you you've progressed enough where you actually can have this meeting.
And then you have the meeting and then in my little mind, he's a government official, some kind of a spy and he's your friend.
And somehow I didn't really work this one out, but somehow he's your friend, but he doesn't know your language still.
So maybe your people infiltrated and spoken his language.
Because for some reason, I think it was nobody in this game would know your language and you would only get menus with your language at the very beginning.
And really soon the game would be designed so you don't need menus in your language and you want to get them in your language.
And so somehow the story unfolds about your mission and that you're a spy and maybe he doesn't tell you, maybe he doesn't know a lot.
So you don't exactly still know, it's one of those situations where you got to trust this guy because he's the only one who seems to really be helping you.
The people who are taking care of you, they seem friendly, but they don't really seem like they would put themselves on the line to save you.
So they're not yet someone that you can fight in.
But this guy at least you know or this person you know is or at least he's told you that he's on your side.
And then I thought I had kind of two ways to go with that. One I haven't seen before in a video game.
But the one is maybe you're a spy and the goal is to be the goal is to help and maybe you're an enemy of these people who have you.
And maybe that's why you don't know your, so maybe you're a spy of these people, I mean your enemy and your mission here is to make peace.
So to help them kind of trick them and give them the idea of making peace with the other one.
And if this is a co-op kind of game, then maybe there could be someone else in a different language.
It doesn't even have to be English, right? It could be a totally different language, two different languages and they're following along and they're trying to help help your team.
So kind of if you both get along, then maybe you can have peace.
Of course, you could be a bad guy too and you could be infiltrating. So there's all kinds of different ways to play this and all kinds of scenarios they could come in.
You know, there could be, you could be from the future and maybe someone planted you in the past to, you know, to come here and there's some trumped up reason why maybe it's after the, there was some kind of apocalypse and everyone's kind of returned a babble to where they learned their own languages and not other languages.
But you just came back to this point in the past so that you can somehow infiltrate and again make peace or change the course of history or something along those lines.
And you could even do this where you're in the past somehow you got, you know, you came on some foreign land and again you still don't know the language and they don't know your language.
So I think there's plenty of stories in all times to where something like this could work.
But again, the point is to try to make it to where it's kind of like if you were really in another place that didn't know your language, you're there and you got to learn the language and how they would maybe just kind of normally teach it without the aid of no one any of your language.
And then who knows, I mean, you could even do this one of those deals where there is no real objective, you know, you could just do it where maybe you, the gameplay is kind of open ended and they're, you know, they're not monsters and maybe this curiosity and maybe they let you just live normally.
And part of the game is just you, you know, you're growing up in that life and making a life.
You learn the language well enough to get a wife and start maybe start a family.
But I think that concept could make for a fun game and also could make the learning the language kind of like I said words.
You almost don't notice that that's the point because the gameplay is interesting and your the story is compelling and and that's how you learn.
Now, and this one has the benefit because you could then more easily, I think than the other two that I talked about, you can more easily work on correct grammar and things from the beginning.
And you could also teach slang if that's what you wanted right because normal people use slang so you could you could do this in a lot of different ways.
And again, of course, the goal is still the same to get somebody up to that five or six year old level toward they can feel more natural or feel comfortable reading the language books and the other language.
So, so the scope of this isn't trying to be forever and ever and to keep selling you lessons forever and ever.
And in the course, when I first thought about this, like I said, it was just point and click games. But lately, and I don't know this is what I first thought about this.
But lately, past months, there's been some the ones that come to minor clout to and and lost in blocks and there's been a couple others if I'm not mistaken.
But some HPR episodes, hacker public radio and I guess anyone listen to this probably knows what what that is.
But they've been talking about different kinds of stories and game plays, you know, how different game play and also like you forgot what it's called number built your own adventure books is out there called and various role playing games.
And so it seems natural to me to that this could very easily be the same kind of thing, of course, because text adventures came from, well, point you click adventures came from text adventures, which came from
if I'm not mistaken, came from, you know, build your own adventure books. And so this could very, very easily be some kind of those kind of games. And I think this could probably be a board game as well.
If you thought about it and figured it out. And then of course, this could also be a book earlier in the previous episode on this subject.
I talked about how maybe it's not a bad idea to just start with with baby books that are just totally in the new language.
Of course, I was trying to give a spin on it towards combination, you know, baby books, but only for adults. So this could be a text adventure where everything is in a book. And like I said, you do the same thing where you got pictures and words.
And that's how you learned kind of still kind of not exactly like a baby would learn, but where you're kind of like a baby, but only it's in the context of whatever story that you're trying to tell.
And I think that could could work pretty well. And of course, there's no reason this could be a proper text adventure games, kind of like the info comp games of the past or future still our future too.
So yeah, that's my general idea of how it seems to me like this could really I know for me personally, if there was a game, it probably would be less compelling if it's a story I created.
But you know, but if there was a story in this manner, I think I would learn better. And just for the sake of the game. And I think that could keep me engaged longer.
If nothing else, maybe it would be a, you know, one of those things where when you're training, you try to do several different ways. So you can come at it from different aspects and exercise different, quote, unquote, muscles.
So that's it. I've already rambled on for nearly 30 minutes. I guess that's plenty. And I don't think I'm going to edit this at all. So that's that's all for now.
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