What are some good games to play in German?

[Carceri]

Jawohl!

To tell the truth, WW II always sounded better in German.

 

[Twiglard]

German games? German? German? German? Try German porn with plot. Likely more tasteful than German voiceovers.

 

[:Flash:]

Die Höhlenwelt-Saga:

(It's a Weltenschmiede game, as someone suggested earlier)

Then there's of course Amberstar, Ambermoon and Albion.
Die Nordland-Trilogie (Realms of Arkania), and for the diehard fans the older Attic games, including one of the very few Text adventure/rpg hybrids (with graphics), Drachen von Laas.

And if you're badly influenced by reading too much in the Politics forum, you should probably play Dunkle Schatten.

 

[Gord]

And if you're badly influenced by reading too much in the Politics forum, you should probably play Dunkle Schatten.

I remember that game. I only ever played the first one though.
Great recommendation for GD victims...

Spoiler

Spoiler

or is it?

 

[Siobhan]

I'm genuinely surprised that RoA hasn't been recommended yet, seeing how it is one of the most revered German RPG series around here. Linguistic evaluation: All three games have a good mixture of dialogue and descriptive prose, and 2 and 3 have some limited voice acting. There's also a few language-based riddles, which should make for a nice challenge.

EDIT: looks like I should've read the post by :Flash: more carefully

On a more general note, games are actually a pretty inefficient way to improve one's language skills as the writing is neither particularly formal nor particularly colloquial, and the fictional setting means a lot of the vocabulary is rather useless in real life (when would you ever need to know the difference between Kürass and Gambeson?). I found comics much more useful because they're very discourse-driven, the idiom ratio is fairly high, and even if you have to look up a lot of words it shouldn't take too long to get through.

 

[Wulfstand]

I'm genuinely surprised that RoA hasn't been recommended yet, seeing how it is one of the most revered German RPG series around here. Linguistic evaluation: All three games have a good mixture of dialogue and descriptive prose, and 2 and 3 have some limited voice acting. There's also a few language-based riddles, which should make for a nice challenge.

EDIT: looks like I should've read the post by :Flash: more carefully

On a more general note, games are actually a pretty inefficient way to improve one's language skills as the writing is neither particularly formal nor particularly colloquial, and the fictional setting means a lot of the vocabulary is rather useless in real life (when would you ever need to know the difference between Kürass and Gambeson?). I found comics much more useful because they're very discourse-driven, the idiom ratio is fairly high, and even if you have to look up a lot of words it shouldn't take too long to get through.

I've actually made another similar thread in a different sub-forum, only this time precisely for beginner-level speakers, with children's books and comics. Nobody mentioned comics, lest my memory fails me. Could you bring up a few?

 

[catfood]

The title is self-explanatory. I want to enlarge (to be honest, 'create' would be a more proper term) my german vocabulary, by immersing myself in its language.

Outside of games like Gothic/Risen, which others would you recommend I give a go? Role-playing, action and/or adventure games, it doesn't matter.

As a bonus question: can I somehow change the language in IE games into german, but still keep (what little there is of) the voice-acting in English? I'd love to replay BG 2 in german, but I doubt that anyone other than David Warner could bring justice to Irenicus' character, and having a differently-voiced Minsc in the party wouldn't be the same, I think.

Two summers ago I started a 9 month long german course. Six months in I started playing TWitcher, and I remember it being extremely difficult for me at that time. I hadn't even studied all the grammar yet so you can imagine me scratching my head through the whole thing. I sat with a notebook and a dictionary open, writing down every new word that I found. Needless to say I filled about two notebooks by the time I was done with it. It took me about two months to finish the game but by the end of it I barely needed the dictionary at all.

Gothic is a very good game to play in german because it uses a basic vocabulary. I barely used the dictionary at all I strongly recommend playing it. You'll also learn a few expressions.

I don't think the IE games are a very good source of broadening your vocabulary especially for a beginner. As a beginner you need to be able to HEAR the language being spoken. Not only does it help you memorize words and expressions better, but it also helps you get a feel for the flow of the language, which is extremely important for a language with such a rigid structure as german. I recommend text heavy stuff only after you've built some of your vocabulary.

After you're done with Gothic you should give Fallout New Vegas a try. All of its dialogue is spoken and what's more important is that it's chock full of expressions. It's going to be more challenging than Gothic.

Other games that I've played in german are:

Age of Mythology - the language used is basic plus it's a nice mix of text and voice acting
Age of Empires - pretty standard vocabulary; not voice acting though, obviously, but the text inbetween the campaign missions are a pleasant read
System Shock 2 - somewhat difficult, but you'll learn some technical and more modern vocabulary
Divinity 2 and Divinity Original Sin - also somewhat advanced vocabulary, with lots of older terms which I believe have fallen out of use (maybe a native speaker can confirm this)

Anyway here's the short gist of it: you will want at first to play games with a simple vocabulary and a lot of voice acting. Once you're past this stage you can move to more advanced things with more written text.

You can also try listening to children's stuff such as: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iFPa15QG7kY
I STRONGLY recommend stuff like this because you will learn words and expressions that a modern german speaker uses in his day-to-day life.

PS: we can chat on skype some time if you want. Mai am și eu nevoie de antrenament. :D

 

[Bubbles]

It seems inefficient trying to learn German from text adventures while ignoring the vast library of dubbed classics at your disposal.

 

[JarlFrank]

Die Höhlenwelt-Saga:

(It's a Weltenschmiede game, as someone suggested earlier)

Then there's of course Amberstar, Ambermoon and Albion.
Die Nordland-Trilogie (Realms of Arkania), and for the diehard fans the older Attic games, including one of the very few Text adventure/rpg hybrids (with graphics), Drachen von Laas.

And if you're badly influenced by reading too much in the Politics forum, you should probably play Dunkle Schatten.

Holy shit this is fucking gorgeous, how did I never know this existed?

 

[buzz]

Better yet, does it come in english?

 

[Bubbles]

Holy shit this is fucking gorgeous, how did I never know this existed?

The German adventure fan community was really pretty feeble and badly organized until St. Daedalic arrived.

Better yet, does it come in english?

no

It also has Sierra-style dead ends.

 

[buzz]

fucking nazis

 

[nil]

The german version of Soldier of Fortune 2 should be an interesting experience.

 

[JarlFrank]

On a more general note, games are actually a pretty inefficient way to improve one's language skills as the writing is neither particularly formal nor particularly colloquial, and the fictional setting means a lot of the vocabulary is rather useless in real life (when would you ever need to know the difference between Kürass and Gambeson?). I found comics much more useful because they're very discourse-driven, the idiom ratio is fairly high, and even if you have to look up a lot of words it shouldn't take too long to get through.

I found them to be incredibly efficient since you tend to be more involved in the thing than with passive media. My English only became really good once I started playing games in English back in my mid teens. You pick up a LOT of vocabulary by playing games and you become more familiar with the language, too. They're probably even better than books and movies, I'd say.

 

[Derek Larp]

Hexuma: Das Auge des Kal

I played it when I was in secondary school, I remember it being pretty good, but haven't played it since then, so YMMV.
It's a graphical text adventure. The plot is somewhat inspired by Lovecraft IIRC, you explore an old estate and find a portal to other places in time and space where you have to find several MacGuffins to stop an Old One from entering our world. I believe there was a journal of the previous owner (of the house) in the box with some hints and backstory, be sure to look for that one too.

 

[Derek Larp]

On a more general note, games are actually a pretty inefficient way to improve one's language skills as the writing is neither particularly formal nor particularly colloquial, and the fictional setting means a lot of the vocabulary is rather useless in real life (when would you ever need to know the difference between Kürass and Gambeson?). I found comics much more useful because they're very discourse-driven, the idiom ratio is fairly high, and even if you have to look up a lot of words it shouldn't take too long to get through.

I found them to be incredibly efficient since you tend to be more involved in the thing than with passive media. My English only became really good once I started playing games in English back in my mid teens. You pick up a LOT of vocabulary by playing games and you become more familiar with the language, too. They're probably even better than books and movies, I'd say.

True dat. I remember playing some of the old sierra and infocom games way back in primary school, with my dad helping me out if I didn't know a word. So I already had a basic vocabulary when we started having english classes later.

 

[Siobhan]

I've actually made another similar thread in a different sub-forum, only this time precisely for beginner-level speakers, with children's books and comics. Nobody mentioned comics, lest my memory fails me. Could you bring up a few?

The easiest comics in German are probably Disney's Lustige Taschenbücher, each volume features several short stories with Mickey, Goofy, and Donald, among others. There's also translations of many French and Belgian comic books, e.g. Asterix, Lucky Luke, Tintin (Tim und Struppi), and plenty of Marvel translations. You can even get reprints of Mirage's TMNT in German, horrible 90s comics (Youngblood, Witchblade), and a decent amount of Anime.

Admittedly those are all translations, the only German German comics I know of are Kleines Arschloch (a prepubescent shithead trolls everyone he comes across, aka RPG Codex The Comic), Clever & Smart (a funny version of Austin Powers) [Edit: total brain fart on my part, it's Spanish], and Werner (which is way too difficult for beginners).

I found them to be incredibly efficient since you tend to be more involved in the thing than with passive media. My English only became really good once I started playing games in English back in my mid teens. You pick up a LOT of vocabulary by playing games and you become more familiar with the language, too. They're probably even better than books and movies, I'd say.

I always felt that for a 20h+ time investment you get remarkably little out of them, for the reasons I already outlined in my previous post. But if you'd spend this time playing games anyways, then sure, playing them in the language you want to learn will help. One quick remark: books, movies, and music aren't passive media for me since I love to sing along, memorize and repeat lines, even act out entire scenes (I'm weird like that). In-game text and dialogue, on the other hand, is just a nuisance that distracts from the gameplay, I have little appreciation for it.

 

[:Flash:]

I've actually made another similar thread in a different sub-forum, only this time precisely for beginner-level speakers, with children's books and comics. Nobody mentioned comics, lest my memory fails me. Could you bring up a few?

The easiest comics in German are probably Disney's Lustige Taschenbücher, each volume features several short stories with Mickey, Goofy, and Donald, among others. There's also translations of many French and Belgian comic books, e.g. Asterix, Lucky Luke, Tintin (Tim und Struppi), and plenty of Marvel translations. You can even get reprints of Mirage's TMNT in German, horrible 90s comics (Youngblood, Witchblade), and a decent amount of Anime.

Admittedly those are all translations, the only German German comics I know of are Kleines Arschloch (a prepubescent shithead trolls everyone he comes across, aka RPG Codex The Comic), Clever & Smart (a funny version of Austin Powers) [Edit: total brain fart on my part, it's Spanish], and Werner (which is way too difficult for beginners).

Germany sucks at Comics. The only thing it has ever brought forth is Fix und Foxi.
Oh, and pretty new and on the Web there's the Wormworld Saga.

 

[Bliblablubb]

I would stay away from german dubbed RPGs if you are used to playing RPGs in english. Generally they suffer from three main problems:

1) Because translations always seem to be done by weird medieval festival LARPers, there is an abundance of "ye olde language", that may have been spoken in medieval Germany, but feels horrible out of place in fantasy worlds. Imagine everyone saying "thy" and "thee" and stuff.
2) Translation of given names. What. The. Fuck. I laughed my ass of when I was told Frodo Baggins is called "Frodo Beutelin" (Beutel = Bag) in the offical LotR translation.
3) Honorifics: The Transltors don't care about relationships between characters, everyone "sirs" each other. When I started Skyrim with german audio for the lulz, I couldn't stop banging my head on the table after witnessing a mother and her child treating each other like complete strangers.

Also, since games and animated movies are still considered "children stuff" by the older generation in charge, everything tends to get a "not so serious" undertone. Like Drakensang. But then again, the scenario was made by LSD junkies, so it may be intentional...

Light hearted adventure games are a good choice though, the Monkey Island series had an outstanding dubbing. I remember playing some game called "Jack Keane" or something like that, a pretty good pirate themed adventure if my memory isn't failing me.

I improved my english by playing Sierra games back in the days, since they were text-only you could check words in the dictonary before continuing. Watching TV shows was the next step, a step nowadays combined by playing modern fully voiced games.

 

[Wulfstand]

Much love for my fellow helpful Codexers.

 

[JarlFrank]

Also try the Book of Unwritten Tales adventure games. They are pretty good, a bit in Lucas Arts style.

 

[:Flash:]

2) Translation of given names. What. The. Fuck. I laughed my ass of when I was told Frodo Baggins is called "Frodo Beutelin" (Beutel = Bag) in the offical LotR translation.

Actually, Tolkien was fluent in German, was involved in the translations, and insisted on those translations for linguistic reasons. For example, he insisted that the Elves were translated to German as "Elben" (distinguished from the fairy tale "Elfen"), which was not possible in English, again for linguistic reasons. Lord of the Rings is one of the very few works that does it right, and is consistent in these translations, even down to hidden meanings that a normal translator wouldn't even notice, due to Tolkiens involvement, e.g. Shelob = "female + archaic english word for spider" is translated as Kankra = Archaic Germanic word for spider (Kanker) + female ending.

 

[Bubbles]

The Baggins family name first showed up in a children's book, where translating names is the norm.

 

[Joined on the 4th of July]

and to sperg further, Baggins and other English names in LotR are supposed to be only translations from their Westron originals. They don't speak English in Middle-Earth. Keeping those names in English while translating rest of the text to German or some other language wouldn't be consistent.

Then again, <my language> sounds dumb and English sounds cool, so being butthurt about Beutelin is understandable.

 

[Bliblablubb]

You NEVER translate given names, regardless what language. Cities, descriptions, okay, but not people. Or is you country translating names like Tailor, Fisher, Gates or Banderas in your local language? I don't think so. It's called GIVEN name for a reason, it's not a title or job description anymore.
Of course, if you have read it first in german, Beutelin is his name for you, regardless what other languages say.
Translation in children's books are done because they couldn't pronounce it, or it would confuse them while learning their native tongue. LotR is hardly a children's book though.

But okay, if you say those names are already translations from some fantasy language I give it a pass. But only because the sun is shining today!