Games for language learners - an IFDB Poll
by Emily Boegheim
RSS FeedWhat are some good games for people trying to learn another language? I imagine that short games with relatively simple prose and not too many non-standard commands (if they're parser games) would work best, but feel free to suggest games that don't fit those parameters, if you think they're suitable. Oh, and obviously good games are preferable!
Personally, I'm most interested in German games, but I'd like to hear recommendations for games in any language (including English!). Someone else asked about Spanish games once and got zero suggestions - hopefully we can do a bit better this time?
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| A Bear's Night Out, by David Dyte 2 votes "Both in English and Spanish" [+]"Both in English and Spanish: Children-oriented. It is great to learn both English and Spanish." --Ruber Eaglenest... "Translated to..." [+]"Translated to German by Gunther Schmidl. Suggested by Taleslinger on Twitter." --Emily Boegheim...  Vote for this game | |
| PataNoir, by Simon Christiansen 2 votes "Has both an..." [+]"Has both an English and German version, so you could play 'em side-by-side." ( - Full review) --Sam Kabo Ashwell... (No comment) [+](No comment) --Marius Müller... Vote for this game | |
| Zork I, by Marc Blank and Dave Lebling 1 vote "Now in Spanish!" [+]"Now in Spanish!" ( ) --IFforL2... Vote for this game | |
| Homunculus, by Michael Baltes 1 vote "Herbstlaub Winner" [+]"Herbstlaub Winner: Winner of the first german competition for somewhat longer games. Easy language, straightforward puzzles." --Marius Müller... Vote for this game | |
| The Legend of the Missing Hat, by Adri 1 vote "Good for English learners" [+]"Good for English learners: It's written in an easy-to-read style and contains few to none special commands." ( ) --Molly... Vote for this game | |
| Escape from Simian Island, by peter@gameenglish 1 vote "Written for English Language Learners" [+]"Written for English Language Learners" ( - Full review) --IFforL2... Vote for this game | |
| Allein mit Kai, by Ingo Scharmann and Joana Markus 1 vote "Suggested by proc..." [+]"Suggested by proc and Martin at http://forum.ifzentrale.de/" --Emily Boegheim... Vote for this game | |
| Es kam aus den Alpen, by Marius Müller as "Walther Rottenschneider" 1 vote "Speed-IF...." [+]"Speed-IF. Suggested by Tale and proc." --Emily Boegheim... Vote for this game | |
| Der Angstbaum, by Jens Bojaryn 1 vote "Suggested by proc..." [+]"Suggested by proc and Martin at http://forum.ifzentrale.de/" --Emily Boegheim... Vote for this game | |
| Ares, by Michael Baltes 1 vote "very good implementation" [+]"very good implementation: An old school puzzler, but with a very good level of implementation" --Marius Müller... Vote for this game | |
| Squeaky on the Moon, by David Welbourn 1 vote "Rare Esperanto Game" [+]"Rare Esperanto Game: A pretty lousy speed IF game is actually pretty good for practicing Esperanto." ( - Full review) --Joey Jones... Vote for this game | |
| PataNoir - Ein unvergleichlicher Kriminalfall, by Simon Christiansen ; Marius Müller (translator) 1 vote "the German translation of PataNoir" [+]"the German translation of PataNoir" --Emily Boegheim... Vote for this game | |
| If You Go Down in the Woods Today..., by peter@gameenglish 1 vote "Written for English Language Learners" [+]"Written for English Language Learners" ( - Full review) --IFforL2... Vote for this game | |
| Aventura Pirata, by Mauricio Diaz Garcia and Scott Adams 1 vote "Easy to read, tricky to play." [+]"Easy to read, tricky to play.: Parallel text available. As per Scott Adams, short passages of low-level vocabulary. Buggy, unfortunately." " ( - Full review) --IFforL2... Vote for this game | |
| Die rote Blume, by Frank Sindermann 1 vote "Suggested by proc..." [+]"Suggested by proc and Martin at http://forum.ifzentrale.de/" --Emily Boegheim... Vote for this game | |
| Dr. Kong in: Exploding Poodle Inevitable, by A W 1 vote "at the surreal end of things" [+]"at the surreal end of things" --Marius Müller... Vote for this game | |
| Escape | 逃出去: A text adventure game for Chinese learners, by Olle Linge and Kevin Bullaughey 1 vote "A Graded Reader Adventure in Mandarin Chinese" [+]"A Graded Reader Adventure in Mandarin Chinese" ( ) --IFforL2... Vote for this game | |
| De Baron, by Victor Gijsbers 1 vote "Available in both English and Dutch versions" [+]"Available in both English and Dutch versions" ( ) --Molly... Vote for this game | |
| Der Schatten jener Sekunde, by Horst-Günther Rottenschneider 1 vote (No comment) [+](No comment) --Molly... Vote for this game | |
| El libro que se aburría, by Antonia Visiedo (Jenesis) 1 vote "This is a funny..." [+]"This is a funny and entertaining Spanish tutorial for people new to IF. It teaches all of the standard verbs and other commands in Spanish IF. I found Spanish IF a lot less frustrating after playing this game." --IFforL2... Vote for this game | |
| Sunday Afternoon, by Christopher Huang (as Virgil Hilts) 1 vote "german translation now available" [+]"german translation now available" --Marius Müller... Vote for this game | |