They say that immersing yourself in a language is one of the best ways to facilitate your uptake. Short of snatching a plane ticket, however, immersion can be difficult. While computer games are certainly not for everybody, you might find that squishing foreign words and information tools into interactive worlds is a great way to surround yourself with vocabulary. Recent Steam release and Kickstarter veteran Influent can provide this for you.
Influent places you in the shoes of Andrew Cross the hapless inventor of the “SanjigenJiten”, a fantastic object recognition device. His machine is capable of producing the name, in any language, of anything you point it at. Unfortunately it’s been swiped by an anonymous malefactor on Technoglobe’s payroll, and the corporation has claimed it as their own. His best hope of reclaiming his work is to attempt a public awareness campaign, proving that the next iteration of his gadget really works by using it to learn 300 words in a new language.
Does it work? See for yourself by exploring Andrew’s object-riddled apartment with the SanjigenJiten. Every item has its own suite of information attached to it, including pronunciations from native speakers. Influent is available in a bevy of languages, with the first, costing $9.99 USD, offering subsequent tongues as $4.99 USD downloadable content.
