Hello People!

THE NOT SO RELEVANT PART: Today should be a great day, even after mostly probably having failed miserably a test that could change my life completely, and for better(??).

The thing is yesterday I already knew very well I had no chance to pass it since I had to study a lot of complex and uninteresting stuff and I couldn't with all the things I have to do so, as usual, I had to rethink my whole life. Studying uninteresting things in order to get a job that would be well paid but would be crappy crappy, would be selling my life for a couple thousand of br bucks.

So my conclusion was what should be obvious from the very start: I must make a living from doing the things I'm really passionate about! Not that it would be difficult, I have already been very well paid to teach languages and other things in the past, it's just that I never really cared about making it my profession. Languages have always been my biggest passion, but I haven't ever been very faithful to any of them, not enough to "perfect" any. So, although my English may be perfectly understandable(??), I don't think it's good enough to be a teacher, so it's time to go back to the things I really enjoy studying!

THE IMPORTANT PART: So what I want from you is simply to suggest me games that in your opinion would really help me in my quest. I mean, games with lots of dialogues and story, preferably with spoken things, preferably with English you use on everyday life. Same thing about shows. I usually like everything but never watch anything. GoT, Walking Dead, and all their friends, so damn tired of everyone talking about them everyday but I haven't ever watched a single episode.

Other kinds of suggestions about studying and material for studying are also very welcome, thanks in advance for the help :)

Zipple World

8 years ago

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Visual Novels are great for grammar and vocabulary in writing. Just make sure it's a very good translation (or already an English VN).

8 years ago
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What are your favorite ones?

8 years ago
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Oh, I don't read VNs much myself. I'm quite new to the category. So far, the best one (and with the best writing) would have to be Katawa Shoujo. It's also free, so nothing much to lose in giving it a try. :P

8 years ago
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Downloading!

8 years ago
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I've only read a few VNs, but Fate/Stay Night was pretty good and so was Ever 17: The Out of Infinity. Both are reasonably long, but read a fan translated version years ago so I don't know if there's an official English version for either. If you're looking for just text then the Trails in the Sky series has a ton of dialogue in it and you spend about half of your time in most Metal Gear games listening to people talk. Based on the English in your post I'd say you know the language better than most of my English teachers in high school did so I think you've got a pretty solid starting position.
Edit: If you're open to book suggestions I can try to come up with a list of those as well

8 years ago
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Try Joe Dever's Lone wolf - you pretty much read a half-decent book (the gameplay is alright, but not very entertaining).

8 years ago
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Seems worth a try!

8 years ago
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You need to be consistent first of all. I learned English when I was 8 all by myself because I just liked the language, despite the fact my second language is actually French(which I don't really know a thing about). However, on this matter I suggest you read novels and try to understand their languistics.

8 years ago
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You're so right about consistency... I remember talking to a Bulgarian friend I met in 2005, so we've talked through all my adult life. He told me one thing no one had ever told me, and that is I am not consistent. I'm always changing my mind and pursuing new projects. But this time I guess I have what it takes :)

8 years ago
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Consistency doesn't mean you force yourself to learn English, but also force yourself to master it. The reason I learned English is because I wanted to master it, which lead me to understand its Grammar. And I even constructed correct sentences when I was young without knowing how to do so, just because I understood how the Grammar worked.

8 years ago
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http://store.steampowered.com/app/274980/ :D Dlc's for many laguages , I didn't play it but I think this in some way is what you are looking for :)

8 years ago*
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Did you mean to show me your created giveaways? (because this link will always refer to the clicker's created giveaways, haha).

8 years ago
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such timing :3
3 seconds before I posted something about it too :o

8 years ago
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oh god!! sorry >< !! i took the wrong url ><!! wait

8 years ago
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8 years ago
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Oh, I have it, some old humble bundle included it. But I bought only for the sake of using it as a tool to help me teaching kids, it's just basic vocabulary, and not very much a game :(

8 years ago
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Created giveaways steam page? o_0

8 years ago
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It was a mistake!! u.u

8 years ago
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I'm a huge word nerd -- I double majored in English and film studies, and had a minor in linguistics (because words and the way they work are so fun!). I graduated with honors, and wrote my honors thesis on why spelling reform would be a bad idea. Would you be at all interested in book suggestions instead of games?

edit, because I don't really know of/play any games that help in that area

8 years ago
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Oh! So you're the kind of person who is walking along the sidewalk when suddenly an expression you have always used comes to your attention then you break it into pieces and find out its real meaning and can't help laughing and then you proceed to think about related things while keeping a joyful expression in your face due to the discover, while making some weird faces, off course. You're scary!

8 years ago
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Off course, everything a double English majorate (does this word even exist?) suggest me will be welcome! (I was just describing myself...)

8 years ago
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And I'm curious about the reasons why you think a spelling reform would be a bad idea!

8 years ago
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Mainly because English is such a conglomerate of languages -- we borrow from so many other languages -- spelling reform would be a bad idea because root words (especially root words from Latin and Greek) give so many clues to what a word could mean, and spelling reform would remove that.

8 years ago
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Anything written by David Crystal, if any libraries around you have books by him. He is an awesome linguist, and does a very good job explaining, in plain words, why language matters.

8 years ago
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Hah no, I'm not a scary, scary hipster. I just <3 words and the way they work :-)

8 years ago
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So you're calling me a scary hipster, milady?

8 years ago
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You might be. I kid, I kid.

8 years ago
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I think watching movies with no subtitles helps a lot. It was also the case with old games which were only in English language, unlike nowadays - everything translated, even dubbed sometimes.

It doesn't matter that much if you ask for a game genre. Anything with full English language will do, and you can choose in Steam which language version to download. VNs could work, but I'm not a huge fan of them, I'd instead recommend some good RPG with lots of history and interaction - Witcher 3 is the first thing that crossed my mind, but probably some older Baldur's Gates will do too.

Basically, just pick whatever genre you want, and play it with full English version. If you don't understand something, just google translate. Many games offer subtitles, so it's double-win if you both hear and read the same text.

8 years ago
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I'm not a big fan of VN's myself. Added the mentioned games to wishlist, hope they'll be cheap when the big prices dropping comes.

But winning them here would be way better!

8 years ago
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Oh dear interesting question, I'm learning English too, so from my experience:

About game:
Hmm I like your idea, but games aren't the main tool to learn English, so don't need require that much. Visual Novel games are good, but find a game of that has fully audio is hard, and even if you find it, it should be quite expensive. and beware, you might got bored with something full of text. So after all, just find a game you like, as long as it support English, everything is fine. Why? You like it -> you want to know about it more -> if you find some words/contexts that you don't understand, you know what you should do, it becomes natural.

  • Letter Quest: Grimm's Journey
  • Alphabeats: Master Edition
    No, they're not the type of game you required, but take a look at them.

About movie/show:

  • Friends: 10 seasons, wonderful series to learn English, trust me. Fun, relax, short, its all you need. Watching them until you don't need subtitles any more and still understand why they're laughing.
View attached image.
8 years ago
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The games you suggested seem to be cool. I've added them to my wishlist, let's hope they will have good discounts at the upcoming sale :)

About Friends, off course I already knew the series, watched many episodes in the past and liked them. So yesterday I started from episode 1 and had lots of fun, thanks for reminding me of it :)

the girl is very arousing :P

8 years ago
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You could try Ace Attorney series. They are good, even though they not on steam. Or you could try these Choose Your Own Adventure

8 years ago
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Anything named Final Fantasy.
Mainly the games, 1-12, and the movies.

8 years ago
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play games with lots of dialogue and where you have to make choices, like skyrim, dragon age, fallout, mass effect. as long as it's well written (avoid those horrible indie games with bad grammar and typos -.- ) it will help you a lot to improve your english. you can also check a dictionary when you don't understand something.

at least that's how i learned english, games, movies and tv.

8 years ago
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8 years ago
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View attached image.
8 years ago
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If you're looking for the best possible example of British English, you can't go wrong with Jeeves and Wooster, it helped me a lot when I was studying English. Otherwise try Deadwood, this show has got probably the most well-written dialogs I've ever heard on TV. In any case, both of these shows are just awesome, so watching them won't be a waste of time anyway :)

8 years ago
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I would agree about Deadwood. Though maybe not for learning, one could end up using the c word more than anyone should ;)
Justified and The Newsroom would be appropriate i think.

8 years ago
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I LOVE Jeeves and Wooster! Fry and Laurie were such perfect choices for the roles. Have you read the Wodehouse books at all?

8 years ago
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Actually, this is a pretty tough question.
Personally I don't really think gaming will do you anything good in terms of grammar... all you might achieve is a better speech comprehension at best. When I was younger, I did use games in some basic English tutoring to arouse interest in English, but that is all it was useful for.

If it simply is to get some more routine in English, anything will do. Listening to English radio shows... maybe watching some TV channels like BBC or CNN. Even switching to the English manuals instead of the native once will help you out quite a bit. And yes, gaming with English speech and text will help out too. Problem here would be, that most games don't have that kind of context you might be looking for. Sure, there are going to be a few phrases and new words you might pick up - still those are games and nothing else.

"Gosh, I played Morrowind for 4 hours straight, what a study session!" ... Seriously, this really sounds kind of wrong.

I would rather suggest reading books you like in your native and the foreign language you want to learn. There are some that do offer native and foreign language on each page. If you are really going serious on this one, gaming should be an addition to your basic studying routine, but nothing more.

VN would have been my first suggestion, too, since those have a different story / content you can work with. Besides Katawa there are few more on Steam that might work well: If My Heart Had Wings, Eden and Clannad are the first to come to my mind.
Elder Scrolls: Morrowind does have tons of lines to read, but it's quite a while since I played it last...so no idea, if it was written well or not.

The best way to learn and improve is getting used to and using the language. If you do have some native English speaking friends, simply talk to them and ask them to correct you if necessary . Babbel might help as well or just google for some free advanced courses.

Good luck.

8 years ago*
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